As previously mentioned, the Party program was binding upon the political leaders and they were under duty to support and carry out that program.
The Party manual states, and I quote again from the middle of Page 1 of Document 1893-PS:
“The Commandments of the National Socialists: The Führer is always right. . . . The program be your dogma; it demands your utter devotion to the Movement. . . . Right is what serves the Movement and thus Germany. . . .”
And on Page 2 of the same document another brief quotation:
“The Leadership Corps is responsible for the complete penetration of the German nation with the National Socialist spirit. . . .”
The oath of the political leaders to Hitler has been previously mentioned. In this connection the Party manual provides, and I quote from the second paragraph on Page 3 of the same document:
“The political leader is inseparably tied to the ideology and the organization of the NSDAP. His oath only ends with his death or with his expulsion from the National Socialist community.”
While the leadership principle assured the binding nature of Hitler’s statements, program, and policies upon the entire Party and the Leadership Corps thereof, the leadership principle also established the full responsibility of the individual political leader within the province and jurisdiction of his office or position.
The leadership principle applies not only to Hitler as the supreme leader but also to the political leaders under him and thus permeated the entire Leadership Corps. I quote from the middle of Page 2 of Document 1893-PS:
“The basis of the Party organization is the Führer idea. . . .
“All political leaders stand as appointed by the Führer and are responsible to him. They possess full authority toward the lower echelons. . . .”
The various Hoheitsträger of the Leadership Corps were, in their respective areas, themselves Führer. I quote from the third paragraph of Page 9 of this same document:
“Within their sector of sovereignty, the Hoheitsträger have sovereign political rights. . . . They are responsible for the entire political situation within their sector.”
I again refer to and quote from Document 1814-PS, Exhibit Number USA-328, which is the Party book. It is just a one-sentence quotation, and it states: “The Party is an Order of ‘Führer.’ ”
The subjugation of the entire membership of the Leadership Corps to the fiat of the leadership principle is clearly shown in the following passage from the Party manual; it is this same document on Page 3:
“A solid anchorage for all the organizations within the Party structure is provided and a firm connection with the sovereign leaders of the NSDAP is created in accordance with the leadership principle.”
Next is the subject, “The Nazi Party, directed by the Leadership Corps, dominated and controlled the German State and Government.”
The trial brief dealing with the criminality of the Reich Cabinet sets forth the evidence as to the identity of various ministers comprising the Cabinet, and I shall not deal with that subject. The presence of the Reichsleiter and other prominent members of the Leadership Corps in the Cabinet facilitated the domination of the Cabinet by the Nazi Party and the Leadership Corps.
And I omit the next paragraph down to the law of July 14, 1933.
A law of 14 July 1933 outlawed and forbade the formation of any political parties other than the Nazi Party and made offenses against this a punishable crime, thereby establishing the one-party state and rendering the Leadership Corps immune from the opposition of organized political groups. I now quote from Document 1388-PS, that being the English translation of the “Law against the Formation of New Political Parties” stated in Reichsgesetzblatt, 1933, Part I, Page 479; and I quote the first two articles of this law, which read as follows:
“The National Socialist German Workers’ Party constitutes the only political party in Germany. Whoever undertakes to maintain the organizational structure of another political party or to form a new political party will be punished with penal servitude up to 3 years or with imprisonment of from 6 months to 3 years, if the deed is not subject to a greater penalty according to other regulations.”
I will skip the next paragraph.
I now quote from Document 1398-PS, which is the English translation of “Law to Supplement the Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service,” dated 20 July 1933—1933 Reichsgesetzblatt, Part I, Page 518.
On 13 October 1933 “A Law to Guarantee Public Peace” was enacted which provided, inter alia, that the death penalty or other severe punishment should be imposed upon any person who “undertakes to kill . . . a member of the SA or the SS, a trustee or agent of the NSDAP . . . out of political motives or on account of their official activity.”
THE PRESIDENT: Where is that you were reading, 1398-PS?
COL. STOREY: Yes, Sir; 1398-PS. I am in error, Sir, it is 1394-PS just previous.
THE PRESIDENT: Which article are you reading?
COL. STOREY: I am afraid I don’t have the reference, but here is the quotation, I think it is on that one page. “A Law to Guarantee Public Peace,” and then it has to do—it is Article 2, I believe—Paragraph 2, Article 1.
I next refer to Document 1395-PS, which is the English translation of the Law on Security and the Unity of Party and State of 1 December 1933, and it was enacted “to secure the unity of Party and state.” This law provided that the Nazi Party was the pillar of the German State and was linked to it indissolubly; it also made the Deputy of the Führer (then Hess) and the Chief of Staff of the SA (then Röhm) members of the Reich Cabinet. I quote:
“After the victory of the National Socialist revolution the National Socialistic German Labor Party is the bearer of the concept of the German State and is inseparably the State. It will be a part of the public law. Its organization will be determined by the Führer. . . .
“The Deputy of the Führer and the Chief of Staff of the SA will become members of the Reich Government in order to insure close co-operation of the offices of the Party and SA with the public authorities.”
This law was a basic measure in enthroning the Leadership Corps in a position of supreme political power in Germany. For it laid down that the Party, directed by the Leadership Corps, was the embodiment of the State and in fact was the State. Moreover, this law made both the Führer’s Deputy and the Chief of Staff of the SA, which was a Party formation subject to the call of the Hoheitsträger, Cabinet members, thus further solidifying the leadership control of the Cabinet. The dominant position of the Leadership Corps is further revealed by the provision that the Reich Chancellor would issue the carrying-out regulations of this law in his capacity as Führer of the Nazi Party. The fact that Hitler, as Führer of the Leadership Corps, could promulgate rules which would have statutory force and be published in the Reichsgesetzblatt, the proper compilation for State enactments, is but a further reflection of the reality of the Party’s domination of the German State.
I now refer to Document 2775-PS, which is Exhibit Number USA-330, which is the English translation of certain extracts from Hitler’s speeches to the 1934 and 1935 Party Congress at Nuremberg. I quote from the second extract in Document 2775-PS, which is a declaration by Hitler to the 1934 Party Congress and which reads—just one sentence, “It is not the State which gives orders to us, it is we who give orders to the State.”
Upon the evidence, that categorical statement of the Führer of the Leadership Corps, affirming the dominance of the Party over the State, cannot be refuted.
On the 30th of June 1934 Hitler, as head of the Nazi Party, directed the massacre of hundreds of SA men and other political opponents. Hitler sought to justify these mass murders by declaring to the Reichstag that “at that hour I was responsible for the fate of the German nation and the supreme judge of the German