Evening star., 1946-10-17
Nuremberg Experiment

~>S~S
in what Associate Justice Jackson
calls the Nuremberg experiment"
Eleven of the Nazi leaders have
forfeited their lives. Hermann
Goering cheated the gallows by
swallowing poison at the last hour.
The others were hanged. It may be
said of them that they went to their
deaths as brave men. With the
possible exception of Joachim Won
Ribbentrop, the condemned revealed
no consciousness of guilt, no sign of
remorse. Instead, they seemed in
their final statements to be appeal
ing to the opinion of the world
against the judgment of the court
and against the principles upon
which their conviction rested.
Nevertheless, Mr.. Jackson is amply
justified in his contention that the
prosecutors. in the short-range
sense, "have done what we set out
to do" They have established in
international law the principle that
it is a punishable crime for any in
dividual to plan or conduct aggres-
sive war. They have also made it a
punishable crime to persecute mi
norities in connection with such a
war, or in preparation for such a
war, or as policy toward inhabit-
ants of occupied countries.
This is the principal fruit of the
Nuremberg experiment and it can
become a significant landmark in
the progress of mankind. Yet, as Mr..
Jackson so plainly recognizes both
in his recent address at the Uni
versity of Buffalo and in his report
to the President, what the world has
here is mere beginning and not an
end. The Nuremberg experiment, as
such, is successfully concluded. Now
the question is whether the people
of the world will build upon it to the
end that the principles established
will serve not only to punish the
vanquished architects of the Nazi
conspiracy, but also to deliver people
everywhere from persecution and
oppression and slavery.
It is an unhappy fact that, even as
the Nazi conspirators mounted the
gallows, offenses kindred to those
for which they were condemned
were being practiced with impunity
throughout numerous countries of
the world. In Russia. whose repre-
sentative sat in judgment on the
German offenders, there is the IA
miliar array of concentration camps,
secret police, intolerance of dis
senters and many of the other tools
of tyranny which served Hitler's
purposes. Nor is this true of Russia
alone, for there are other countries
in which those who dissent from the
will of the majority live in constant
dread of the tap on the shoulder
which signals the beginning of the
march to the concentration camp
or worse. +,
All Of this, of course, is well known
to Mr.. Jackson. and it is because of
this, perhaps, that he says I'VE are
too close to the Nuremberg trial to
appraise its long-range effects" Yet,
as he puts it, .the possibility is real
that in the present depressing world
outlook the trial may constitute the
most important moral advance" to
grow out of the war.
This cannot possibly be so, how
ever, without a wealth of intelligent
sacrifice, courage and effort. The
principles of Nuremberg will wither
and die if the men of the free coun-
tries shrink from the implications of
future tyrannies as they shrank
from that of Hitler's. This time, in
the last analysis. the danger that
is inherent in any ruthless dictator
ship must be recognized and some
how dealt with before the inevitable
evolution of totalitarianism touches
of another war.