dtufail/nuremberg-trials-corpus huggingface dataset:
DR. THOMA: In the face of the yearning of humanity the Prosecution now desires to aid its progress, even if only step by step, in this direction; it seeks to achieve the end that `'unequivocal rules" shall emerge from this Trial, its mistake however, is that it wants to explain ``traditional opinions of justice" and civil criminal laws as the contents of a public conscience which hardly exists any longer, compliance with which cannot in any case be demanded retroactively of the defendants. It is certainly very true that a profound change is commencing today in the moral thinking of humanity, a regeneration of the moral law of nations, and that this Trial before the High Tribunal marks the beginning of this new era. However, it appears to me very doubtful whether it is proper to impress a new kind of justice upon the conscience of mankind by making an example of the defendants. It is easy to speak of human and divine laws, or of the demands of public conscience, but we become greatly embarrassed for an answer to the question: What is the substance and content of private morality' when is an act immoral according to private morality? In their concern over what is good or evil, some rely on religion, others have been taught wisdom by experience and education, still others find an explanation in the philosophers. The State has in recent times taken up the moral education of its citizens in increasing measure, not only through criminal laws but also through "political education" or whatever other name is used for it. Not only did the National Socialist State have a great advantage here over the liberal states, but so do all totalitarian states of the world: They have hammered moral principles into the minds of their citizens, both of a private and public nature. They have proclaimed moral ultimate values, such as fidelity, honor, and obedience. By this means reflection concerning private and public morals is made easier for the individual citizens and they are obliged by force to uphold these ultimate values in the prescribed form.
DR. THOMA: The German people, who had become tired and resigned as a result of continual warlike disputes and religious upheavals, willingly followed National Socialism, even when the latter's ethics were exalted to a faith; it took this leap into the unknown, not with the idea of being taught by this means to deceive people, to enslave them, to rob them, to kill them, to torture them (see Volume VII, Page 78), but because it was in search of moral elevation, an authoritative moral leadership in its material and spiritual distress, and because nothing else was offered to it, especially not by a liberal world conscience which did not know how to make the fundamental principle of humanity a reality. The National Socialist ethical conceptions were taught to Germans as summum bonum, as the highest idea, and they believed the idea to be moral and good. Then National Socialism came into conflict not only with ideologies, but also with the plans of power of other states, because it could not find the formula which would include not only perfection and life for Germany, but also the interests and justice for all nations of the world. To try to construe out of such inadequacy of a national ethical idea, however inefficient, a punishable action, a conspiracy, is not admissible in my opinion, if only because uniformly acknowledged national morality has not yet developed, and unlimited national ~ 10 July 46 egotism has not yet been dethroned and is still considered the highest moral instance of the State. It might be objected that the Germans should only have followed the teachings of their great philosopher in thought and action, according to his "categorical imperative": Act in such a way that the maxim of your will could always serve as a principle for general legislation! Then they would and should have recognized the moral instability of National Socialist teachings.
DR. THOMA: To that I can answer with the words of the great English philosopher, John Locke, who says on the question of what is good or evil in his Essay Concerning Human Understanding; Book 2, Chapter xxvm, Paragraph 6: ``Gad has ordained it in such a manner that certain activities produce general happiness, preserve society, and even reward the doer. Man has discovered this, and has established it as a practical rule. With that rule are connected certain rewards and punishments either by God Himself (reward and punishment of infinite size and duration in the Beyond) or by mortals (legal penalties, social approval or condemnation, loss of honor) good and evil which are not the natural effect and results of the actions themselves. Then men look to those rules or laws, be they divine or made by the State, and the laws of usage or of private opinion, and measure their actions by them. They judge the moral value of their actions according to whether they conform with the rules or not. Moral good or evil therefore amounts only to conforming or not conforming our action with a law which by the will and power of the legislator determines for us what is good and evil." Therefore good and evil has been and still is today what the authorities want or do not want. Christianity for centuries has been preaching not only to Germans but to all nations of the world: ``Let every man be subject to the authority above him." And the authorities do not move beyond conscience and morality so long as the expansion of national egotism is not opposed by clear laws and commandments and irrefutable legal convictions. The highest good, summum bonum, in international morals of nations has not yet been mandatorily codified. There does not exist any authoritative idea for the community of nations. Instead of discussions on individual ethics and individual criminality, the Prosecution should have submitted its accepted principles and criteria as international common law, which was not done.
DR. THOMA: Therefore, with regard to the standpoint of the prosecuting authorities as to the personal responsibility of acting statesmen, I feel impelled to look upon this as a totally new philosophy and one which is very dangerous in its consequences. Apart from the misdeeds of the individual, which do not satisfy even the minimum of moral conceptions, the ethical conceptions of National Socialism and the actions resulting from them, insofar as they are an expression of National Socialist ethics, cannot be subjected to the judgment of a human forum, since they are an event of world history. And the fate and guilt of the Defendant Rosenberg likewise cannot be judged conclusively within the framework of this Trial. As to the question of deciding the criminal guilt of the defendant, that is the hard task of the High Tribunal; but his potential historical gust cannot and will not be judged by the Tribunal. Rosenberg, like all persons of historical importance, has acted according to his character and spirit, thereby perhaps becoming guilty in the eyes of history. The more freedom of action a given personality has in his win, the clearer the importance of conditions and the one-sidedness of all human activities becomes, and out of an insignificant guilt there grows, particularly in historical personalities, an enormous power which decides the fate of many, and which remains a gloomy foreboding for whoever lets it loose. Goethe once said: "The doer never has a conscience, no one feels his conscience but the observer." But this maxim can never mean that a person must not move and act to the best of his knowledge and conscience, and particularly far his country's sake. And we all know that in reality nobody is capable of attaining the good he is striving for. Just as his knowledge, so will his actions always be incomplete: Any action we accomplish as free beings is an infringement on the operating forces of the universe, which we are never able to assess.
DR. THOMA: Rosenberg was caught up in the destiny of his nation in a period of severe foreign political oppression and internal dissension. He struggled for cultural purity, social justice, and national dignity, And rejected vehemently all elements, which did not admit this high, values or consciously attacked them in an irreverent manner. With respect to foreign policy he stood for an agreement between the four central powers of the European continent, in full realization of the grave consequences of a lost war. He acted in all loyalty and respect toward a personality who appeared to give political shape and increasing power to his ideals. After the political victory at home, Rosenberg proposed that the polemics and other aspects of the period of struggle be subdued. He stood for a chivalrous solution of the existing Jewish problem, for spiritual and cultural instruction of the Party on a high plane and, contrary to the statements of the Prosecution, he opposed any form of religious persecution. He can hardly be reproached for emphasizing a definite religious-philosophical conviction of his own. The practical application of many of his views was practiced to an increasing degree by authoritative agencies of the Party, although later they were disregarded, especially after the, outbreak of the war. Finally, as has been discovered now, they were often turned into the opposite of what Rosenberg fought for. Until 17 July 1941 Rosenberg was excluded from participation in any national legislation. Considered from the point of view of personal responsibility, all his speeches and writings up to that time come within the scope of unofficial journalistic activity which every politician and writer must admittedly be free to engage in-a freedom which the Tribunal has fundamentally acknowledged with regard to all utterances by the statesmen of other countries during the unofficial period of their career. It seems to be all the more significant that Rosenberg as a private citizen did not call for war or for the commission of any inhuman or violent acts.
DR. THOMA: As Minister for the East he advocated a generous solution in accordance with the understandable national and cultural aspirations of the eastern European peoples. He fought for this concept as long as there were any prospects for its realization. Ultimately realizing that Hitler refused to be persuaded, he requested his dismissal. The fact that Rosenberg could not prevent many outrages from happening in the East cannot be charged against him in the criminal sense. Neither the Armed Forces nor the Police nor the Allocation of Labor were subject to his authority. Whenever injustices or excesses came to his knowledge, he did everything he could to counteract them. For almost a whole year, Rosenberg endeavored to keep labor recruiting on a voluntary basis. Later, when several age groups were drafted, he protested against every abuse by executive agencies and always demanded redress. Quite apart from the legitimate requirements of the occupation power, his labor legislation for the Eastern Territories was necessary for the establishment of order and the repression of arbitrary measures as well as of dangerous idleness, increasing sabotage, and the growing number of murders. There was a war on and it was a war area, not a postarmistice period, much less one following final capitulation. So far as he was informed of things and commanded any influence, Rosenberg fought for his convictions. The fact that adverse powers became stronger than he was cannot be brought up as a charge against him. One cannot punish offenses, and at the same time punish those who revolted against them. In view of the terrible extermination orders which have now been disclosed, it is certainly possible to raise the point whether Rosenberg could not have exerted much stronger opposition. To expect this would, however, suppose an earlier knowledge of things which he only learned about after the collapse.
DR. THOMA: Should he be charged with any carelessness it must not be forgotten that he felt it to be his duty to serve the Reich engaged in the struggle for its existence,-and that terrible injuries were also inflicted upon the German nation, injuries which Rosenberg was equally unable to recognize as war necessities. His official tasks, as for example the duties of the Einsatzstab in the West and East, were carried out by Rosenberg without compromising his personal integrity. The requisitioning of artistic and cultural objects he always carried out provisionally, subject to final decisions by the supreme authority and; as far as was at all possible, with proper identification of the proprietor. Moreover, in the use of unclaimed furniture for the benefit of air-raid victims in Germany, provision was made for the subsequent indemnification of the owners based upon a precise inventory. In considering his entire personality we see that Rosenberg followed with faith and devotion an ideal of social justice combined with national dignity. He fought for it openly and honorably, went to prison, and risked his life for it. He did not step in only when National Socialism afforded the opportunity to begin a career, but at a time when it was dangerous and asked only for sacrifice. In his speeches after 1933 he took his stand in favor of deeper spiritual formation, a new cultural education, personality values, and respect for every form of honest work. He accepted the gloomy days of that time as unfortunate but inevitable accompanying phenomena of a revolution otherwise acclaimed as having passed without bloodshed, without having in fact learned of the secret details. He fully believed that good forces and ideas would prevail over these other human imperfections. During the war he was at the service of the Reich in accordance with his duty. For 25 years, throughout the revolution and the events of the war, he maintained his personal integrity and untainted character.
DR. THOMA: He had to witness with deep sorrow that a great idea, in the hands of those possessed with the lust for power, was gradually abused, and in 1944, at Party meetings, he protested against this abuse of power entrusted to its holders. During this Trial he had to his dismay and horror to look upon the evidence of the degeneration of his life's ideal; but he knows that his aspirations and the aspirations of many millions of other Germans have been honorable and decent. Today he still adheres to his honorable, honest, and humanly irreproachable conduct and, full of sorrow for the wounds inflicted upon all nations and for the downfall of the Reich, he awaits the sentence of a just Tribunal. The Tribunal adjourned until 11 July 1946 at 1000 hours.7
THE PRESIDENT: The Tribunal will adjourn this afternoon at four o'clock to sit in closed session. Dr. Seidl, will you present the case of the Defendant Frank?
DR.ALFRED SEIDL (Counsel for Defendant Frank): Mr. President, My Lords. The Defendant Dr. Hans Frank is accused in the Indictment of having utilized his posts in Party and State, his personal influence, and his relation with the Fuehrer, for the purpose of supporting the seizure of power by the National Socialists and the consolidation of their control over Germany. He is also accused of having approved, led, and taken part in the War Crimes mentioned in Count Three of the Indictment, as well as in the Crimes against Humanity mentioned in Count Four, particularly in the war crimes and crimes against humanity committed in the course of the administration of occupied territories. As I have already explained in the case of the Defendant Hess, the Indictment fails to adduce any facts in substantiation of these accusations. It is similar in the case of the Defendant Frank; here again the Indictment contains no statement of factual details to substantiate the accusations. Like all the other defendants, the Defendant Frank is accused of having taken part in a common plan which is alleged to have had as its object the planning and waging of wars of aggression and the commission in the course of these wars of crimes which infringe upon the laws and customs of war. The evidence has shown that the Defendant Frank joined the National Socialist Party in the year 1928. Both before and after. the assumption of power by the National Socialists he was concerned almost exclusively with legal questions. The Reich Law Department was under his control as Reichsleiter of the Party until the year 1942. After Adolf Hitler's appointment as Chancellor, Frank became the Bavarian Minister of Justice. In the same year he was appointed Reich commissioner for the co-ordination of legal institutions. This task consisted in the main of transferring to the Reich Ministry of Justice the functions of the administrative legal departments of the component states of the Reich. That was completed by the year 1934.
DR.ALFRED SEIDL (Counsel for Defendant Frank): When the affairs of the Bavarian Ministry of Justice had been transferred to the Reich, the office of the Defendant Frank as Bavarian Minister of Justice came to an end. In December 1934 he was appointed Reich Minister without Portfolio. In addition he became, from 1934 onward, President of the Academy for German Law, which he himself had founded, and President of the International Chamber of Law. Finally, he was the Leader of the National Socialist Lawyers Association. This list of the various posts held by the Defendant Frank in Party and State would alone be sufficient to show that his work was almost exclusively concerned with legal matters. His tasks were in the main confined to the execution of Point 19 of the Party Program, which demanded a German common law. And in actual fact almost all speeches and publications by the Defendant Frank, both before and after the assumption of power by the National Socialists, dealt with legal questions in the widest sense of the term. In the course of his examination in the witness box, the Defendant Frank testified that he had done everything he could to bring Adolf Hitler to power and to carry out the ideas and the program of the National Socialist Party. But whatever the defendant undertook in this respect was done openly. The aims of the National Socialists before they assumed power can be expressed in a few words: Liberation of the German people from the shackles of the Versailles Treaty; elimination of the mass unemployment which had arisen in consequence of that treaty and the unreasonable reparations policy of Germany's former enemies; counteraction against the symptoms of degeneracy- political, economic, social, and moral-connected with that unemployment; and finally, the restoration of the sovereignty of the Reich in all spheres. The Prosecution was unable to produce any evidence to show that the revision of the Versailles Treaty was, if necessary, to be carried out by violent means and by war.
DR.ALFRED SEIDL (Counsel for Defendant Frank): The political, military, and economic situation in which Germany found herself before the assumption of power-a situation in which it could only be a question of eliminating the terrible consequences of the economic collapse and of enabling seven million unemployed again to play their part in the economic process-could not but make any serious thought of a war of aggression appear futile. Moreover, the evidence brought forth nothing to show the existence of the common plan as stated in Count One of the Indictment, as far as one understands thereby a definite and concrete plan among a narrow uniform circle of persons. The evidence, in particular the testimony given by the witness Dr. Lammers and the defendant himself in the witness box, has shown on the contrary that Frank did not belong to the circle of Hitler's closer collaborators. The Prosecution was unable to present to the Tribunal a single document dealing with important political or military decisions with which the Defendant Frank was connected. In particular, the Defendant Frank was not present at any of the conferences with Hitler which the Prosecution considers especially important in proving the alleged common plan, the minutes of which conferences the Prosecution has submitted as Exhibits, Numbers USA-25 to 34. The only statute which is important in this connection is the Law on the Reintroduction of General Conscription of 16 March 1935. The facts have already been explained, and will be further enlarged upon, which led to the promulgation of that law and why it cannot be looked upon as an infringement of the Versailles Treaty. The Defendant Frank signed that law in his capacity as Reich Minister, as did all the other members of the Reich Government. That law, which had as its object the restoration-at least in the military sphere-of the sovereignty of the German Reich, did no harm to any other nation.
DR.ALFRED SEIDL (Counsel for Defendant Frank): Nor did the content of that law, or the circumstances which led to its enactment, admit the conclusion that it was part of a common plan with the object of launching a war of aggression. The German people had been obliged to realize, during the preceding 17 years, that the voice of a nation without military power, and in particular a nation in Germany's geographical and military situation, cannot make itself heard in the concert of nations if it has not at its disposal adequate instruments of power. The Government of the Reich faced the consequences of this realization after equality of rights had been promised the German people over and over again for 14 years and that promise had not been kept, and in particular after it had become clear in the years 1933 and 1934 that the Disarmament Conference would not be capable of fulfilling its appointed functions. For the rest, I refer to the proclamation of the Reich Government to the German people, which was issued in connection with the publication of that law. Further, the work of the Defendant Frank, even after the assumption of power and up to the beginning of the war, was confined almost exclusively to the execution of tasks connected with the leadership of the Academy for German Law and the National Socialist Lawyers Association. The objects of the Academy for German Law are apparent from the law concerning its establishment of 11 July 1933. It was intended to encourage the reform of German legal procedure and, in close and constant co-operation with the appropriate legislative authorities, to put the National Socialist program into practice in the whole sphere of law. The academy was under the supervision of the Reich Minister of Justice and the Reich Minister of the Interior. The function of the academy was to prepare drafts of statutes; legislation itself was exclusively restricted to the Reich ministries for the various departments. One of the tasks of the academy was to exercise the functions of the legal committees of the former Reichstag.