As far as I can remember he came in 1940 or 1941. He was promoted then to be Oberamtsrichter and division chief at the local court at Nurnberg. Groben was an associate judge at the special court in Nurnberg, from October 1941 until he was called up for service with the armed forces, and I don't remember the date of the call up. Ferber was in Nurnberg when I assumed office. He was with the public prosecution at Nurnberg. Later on he was associate judge of the special court and he acted as my deputy. While I was still in office he was promoted director of the district court, but he remained within my sphere of work. On the 1st of May, 1943 he became my successor.
Rauh, -- we only used him in emergencies as a deputy every now and then. He only attended sessions without in any way participating in the work of the special court, without participating in writing the opinions.
Hofmann, Wilhelm, was first public prosecutor with the Nurnberg prosecution. For some time he deputized for the senior public prosecutor because that post was left vacant for some time. He also deputized for the senior public prosecutor later on when the senior prosecutor was away.
Baur, was the court physician at the district court -- or rather, he was the auxiliary physician at the district court. He had to attend to his official duties at our court, but he had no official relationship with the administration of justice authorities. He was subordinated to the minister of the interior. The same applies to the witness Kunz. The witness Doebig, at the time when I assumed office at Nurnberg, was the general public prosecutor with the district court of appeals at Nurnberg. In the autumn of 1937 he became president of the District Court of Appeals in Nurnberg.
Miethsam was Ministerialrat at the Reich Ministry of Justice, an the personnel department. He had no immediate contacts with the special court at Nurnberg.
Elkar was assigned to me for training when he was referendar. Later on he was a full time Hauptsturmfuehrer with the SD. My private relations with these people, about which questions have been put, are as follows: With Engert and Ferber I entertained relations of the nature of being acquaintances -- closer acquaintances. We frequently met; we understood each other very well; we got on very well.
Concerning Gross, Ostermeier and Groben -- I had practically nothing to do outside of official contacts. The same is true of Rauh, Hofmann, Baur and Kunz did not play any part in my private life. Anyhow, they were doctors, physicians, who were used to going their own way. Miethsam -I did not know Miethsam at all, nor did I entertain any relations with Doebig outside official duties. Elkar, perhaps in those days was -- perhaps I should put it this way -- the referendar who was most attached to me. He joined my circle frequently when we went to pubs.
Q.- Who of the people you have just mentioned was able to observe with Whom you entertained relations?
A.- I would like to answer that question in a general way by saying that Nurnberg was a city of about 400,000 inhabitants. It was a matter of course that people who lived as far apart as we did here, all in residential areas, it was natural that for months sometimes we didn't meet outside official duties. The few people whom one saw frequently are those I have already mentioned; those one met at a pub or some restaurant. It think that is the custom everywhere in the world. As concerns any insight into my private work or my social intercourse, such an insight those people could not have had, and normally I wouldn't expect them to be interested in it, unless even in those days they wanted to look out for things that might be useful to them in present times. Those men at that time didn't believe in the defeat of Germany any more than I did.
Q.- How do you explain these statements?
A.- The explanation is quite natural and can be stated quite dis passionately but I would like to emphasize that my character would not allow me to take that way myself.
Today all these people are in some relations or other -- this is the way I would like to put it. People who were in some relations or other with the special court at Nurnberg, apart from me, and they are charged with having had those relations with the Special Court in those days. Therefore, it is very much in their own interest to ascribe to me some fantastic behavior, or that I held some mysterious position, so as to eliminate or minimize their own responsibility. For that purpose, in a manner which is incomprehensible to me, certain conclusions have been drawn which were brought about under the impact of the catastrophe, assertions which have lead these people to believe that they can now present those conclusions as if they were facts. They live in the hope -
THE PRESIDENT: May I interrupt you. You have been a judge for a long time, and you know that, as a witness, you are entitled to set forth any facts which you may have in your possession which would tend to show the lack of knowledge on the part of witnesses who have testified against you; or, any facts which would tend to show their prejudice. But you also know, as a judge, that it is for the Tribunal and not for another witness to appraise the weight of their testimony or to express an opinion as to the motives which may have actuated them. I think you should limit yourself to statements of fact, as you have largely been doing, which will show their sources or lack of sources of knowledge, or facts showing their prejudice.
We will take our recess at this time.
(A recess was taken.)
THE MARSHAL: The Tribunal is again in session.
BY DR. KOESSL:
Q. May I continue?
By the questions which I am going to put to you new I wish to find out whether you belonged to the part of the corps of the political leadership which has been declared as criminal, and next I want to ask you about your personal relations with the party leadership. To whom and at what time did you apply for membership in the Nazi Party?
A. As far as I know, from the 1st of May, 1933, until the 1st cf May, 1937 the Party was closed to new members. At least, in large parts. Concerning our area here, at any rate, during the time from the 1st of May, 1933, until the 1st of May, 1937, no new member were admitted into the Party. However, on the 1st of May, 1937, the Party opened its ranks again and already, during the preceding months, operations were started so that Party members could enroll as from the 1st of May, 1937, and that, concerning those persons who had applied for membership prior to the 1st of May, 1937. I made my application in the Fall of 1937 and I applied to the local Ortsgruppe which was competent for my residence that was Lichtenhef/Nurnberg.
Q. Why did you make that application?
A. First of all, I wish to answer by using a negative expression. Nobody forced me to do so. Nobody urged me to do so, nor was I under any pressure of any kind, but I applied of my own free will.
I haven't finished yet, council.
At that time, that is, in the Fall of 1937, as I have already stated, the political developments had reached the stage where the Nazi Party h d become the integral component of the German state. I was a judge and a civil servant in that state. I had to serve that state, and since the overwhelming majority of the German people had professed their adherence to that state, it was a matter of course to me to profess my adherence to that state also. If I had not wished to do that, that is to say, if I had not wished to do that for all time, then, in all deceny I could no longer have made available my services to that same state, but that did not mean at all that, as a citizen of that state, one had to worry every much about developments and it certainly did not mean, by a long way, that one approved of matters which were contrary to the law or that one approved them simply because they were connected with some National Socialist authority.
Such servile development had net yet applied and that was due to my basic attitude to the effect that the matter wasn't very urgent. One day, Denzler, the Gaurechtsamtsleiter, who was competent for our court, called on me and told me that the time had come for me to see to that matter. That was the outer reason why I then took that natural step.
Q. I'm now going to show you a small red bock. Please look at the heading and, on page 56 and the following pages, please read out articles 1 and 11 of the law which appears there.
A. This book is called "The law of the NSDAP, the Nazi Party." A compilation of regulations, with annotations, etc., edited by Dr. C. Haidn and Dr. L. Fischer. It was compiled in the year - it says: "Berlin, the Fifth Anniversary of the Seizure of Power by the National Socialists." That is to say, it was in 1938.
Q. Will you please turn to page 56?
A. On age 56 there appears Law B, "Law for the Guaranty of Unity between Party and State."
Q. Please read out Articles 1 and 11 of that law.
A. It says.
"Article I. After the victory of the National Socialist revolution, the National Socialist German Workers' Party is the bearer of the concept of the German State and is insoluably united with the State. It is a corporation of public right. The Fuehrer decides on its provisions.
Q. And article. 11, please?
A. Article 11 says:
" For the guaranty of the closest cooperation of the authorities of the Party with the public authorities, the deputy of the Fuehrer is a member of the Reich Government."
Any more?
Q. That's enough.
That law ans that state of affairs - do they explain your entry into the Party?
A. Well, yes. I have already said that before.
Q. Did you know that Party program?
A. Naturally, I know the Party program for it appeared in public everywhere. In this building here, the administration of justice had put up placards. The party program appeared framed bigger than a human being. That's natural that one should have read it.
Q. Did you know that Book "Mein Kampf"?
A. I knew the book.
Q. When did you get that book?
A. It was given to me as a present by somebody. I am sure that was after I joined the Party.
Q. What importance did you attribute to the book?
A. Unfortunately, I must say that I never had time to read the whole of the book, but I did read portions of it. My view is that in 1933 the bool had only 50 percent of the importance which was attributed to it when if first appeared. And later n in 1935 or '38 the book had lost its topical interest, and that for the more resign because the subjects which were delt with in the back had become outmoded. In my view, the bed continued to be sold and mere people bought it because it was the book by the Fuehrer of the German Reich. I am convinced that this beck, if Hitler had not assumed power, certainly from 1933 onwards, would hardly have been obtainable at all in the bool clubs. It was the work of a idealist which, as I have said before, was outmoded by the times, and thus ufferes the fate which every political book suffers to a larger or smalller entent.
Q. Did you knew Rosenberg's bed, "Lyttes des 20 Jahrhrnderts"?
A. The book was mentioned once at this trial in connection with the testimony of the witness Schosser. The book, "Mythes des 20 Jahrnunderts" - as on my book shelver, and I am sure I read some of it, but again I must say that I definitely didn't read the whOle of it; but one thing I can say and that is significant for the idea that are abroad on such matters, that the conception "Blut und Boden", Beed and Soil, is not mentioned in that book, nor does it have any parallel commands which is supposed to be parallel to these of the Bible. The witness there get confused between Rosenberg and Ludenforff. Put that confusing element could be observed everywhere. I didn't buy that beck myself; an acquaintance of mine gave it to me probably he gave it to me on my birthday;
but by that I do not mean to say that I was hostile toward the Nazi party because I didn't even possess Rosenberg's book.
Q. What is your attitude to that book?
A. That depends on the question of my attitude to Ludendorff. I shall have to go into that question more thoroughly later. By Ludendorff and his movement, before and after the seizure of power, Rosenberg was attacked, and in particular in his book "Mythes des 20 Jahrhunderts" he was attacked there very severely and was repudiated not so much because of its contents as on the peculiar method employed. Because by that bool an attempt was made under the cover of gennine philesphy -- to make political transactions. That, at least, for the world of science in Germany, was a peculiar and altogether novel method. But by that, one did not serve philosophy or for any length of time the political aims.
Q. What was your basic attitude when you joined the Nazi Party?
A. That question has arisen several times, and I believe I have already answered it to the effect that I, in the Nazi Party, saw an integral factor of the State.
THE PRESIDENT: I think you answered that. We have your answer.
BY DR. KOESSL:
Q. Did you belong to any formations or associate organizations?
A. Those concepts, formations and affiliated organization, several times have played a part in this trial, and according to what I could understand, they have not yet been properly explained. Formations and affiliated organization are not one and the same thing. They are organizations which did not have the same relations with the Nazi Party.
Q. Witness, would you a on the little red bed on page 75? Would you read the headline on page 73?
A. It says:"Decree fer the Execution of the Law of Guaranteeing Unity between State and Party."
Q. And Article 111?
A. Article 111 says: "The NS German Doctors League, Incorporated the League of National Socialist German Lawyers, Incorporated..." That in the organization which later on became the Lawyers league. The first name given to that organization was League of National-Socialist German Jurists and afterwards it was rented "Rechtswahrerbund" the lawyers League. There follow several other organization: NS Teachers Association, NS War Victims Association, NS Public Welfar League, Reich League of German Civil Servants, NS League of Technicians, the German Labor Front. They are the association affiliated with the Nazi Party.
Q. There are two footnotes. I will ask you to read first note 2 of the German Jurists conference in 1936 by the Reich Leader of the Reich Leader of the Reich Legal Office was given the name National Socialist lawyers Association."
Q. Now, will you read Note 5, please?
A. Note 5 says. "The affiliated organization National Socialist corporations. Article 17, Sectional, of the first executive order appears on page 96. Politically the Nazi Party will take care of them, but they possess their own property and their own legal status. They come under the financial supervision of the NSD-P Treasurer. Article 5, Section 2, Executive Order. The political supervision is carried out in this form with the Reich leadership of the Nazi Party. Offices are established with the task to assume political leadership over the affiliated organizations."
Q. Now would you please read note 3, referring to Article 2 on page 74?
A. These were the so-called affiliated organization. The Formations have to be differentiated from them. The passage. which I am now to road treats-the subject. "The formations, 'Gliederungen', are a part of the Nazi Party without possessing a legal status of their own and property of their own. Article 4, Section 1 and 2. They have fulfill special tasks, but they are completely at one with the Nazi Party and need neither an existence of their own in the political nor in the legal field.
The heads of the formations are combined in the Reich leadership of the Nazi Party and are based there. The Chief cf Staff of the SA, The Reich Leader SS, the Reich Youth leader are Reich leaders cf the Nazi Party. The other formations too are subordinated to the Fuehrer or the Fuehrer's deputy and they are subordinated to him immediately."
In Article II those so-called formations -Gliederrungen -- are named: the SA, SS, National Socialist motor Corps, the hitler Youth, the NS University Lecturers League, the NS German Students League, the NS Women's League are formations -- Gliederrungen -- of the National Socialist German Workers Party.
Q. Now, this question becomes understandable. Did you belong to any formations of the party?
A. I never belonged to any formation -- Gliederung -- of the party, but I did belong to the affiliated organizations which I have already mentioned. The difference is that the formation -- Gliederung -- is a component of the party and has no legal status on its own; whereas the affiliated associations have a legal status which is completely separate from that of the party, and they also may possess their own property.
Q. Did your wife or your daughter belong to the Nazi Party?
A. No.
Q. Your daughter went to High School and at the beginning of the war she went to a university. Why, like other girls , did she not join the NSDAP after she had been in the Hitler Youth?
A. That rested, with herself. She told me that she was not interested in political things and that she didn't want to join the party. I told her she could do as she liked and I said that that was a very personal matter which was for her to decide and she preferred not to join.
Q. Was it possible that that might affect her career at a later time?
A. Yes, obviously . Concerning marry women.'s professions, the NSDAP was the only one in charge and it was always a condition that if you wanted to join that profession you had to be a member of the Nazi party. But that wasn't so important. Many people were excluded for other reasons from other things.
Why should somebody got voluntarily accept such situation?
Q. Did you, in Party circles, have sufficient influence to achieve that?
A. That question never played a part with us, because in the field of religious or political views everybody should go their own way; whether it was my wife or my daughter or myself, it was all the same. In those spheres of life one cannot lay down the law to people and one cannot exercise any pressure. Therefore, the idea that I should have done anything for my daughter in that respect, that idea never occurred to me.
Q. In the affidavit 221, the witness Gross said that he had joined the Party because pressure had been exercised on him.
A. I only heard for the first time that people had joined the Party because pressure was exercised on them, during the last two years when I passed through various camps. Before the catastrophe, although I met a great many people and although I met people of all professions and occupations, I never heard of one single case where anybody told me that any pressure had been exercised on him and that, therefore, he had joined the NSDAP. Today it is altogether the other way around. Everybody is trying hard, if possible, to have joined the Party either when he was asleep or when he was otherwise in a state in which he could not be taken into account. I never heard of such things.
THE PRESIDENT: The witness will recall the suggestions that I have already made to you concerning the matter of the interpretation of the motives of other people. I trust that you will adhere to the suggestion that the Tribunal has made.
THE WITNESS: I did not want to transgress that ruling, but I only interpreted the question to mean what were the experiences that I had.
BY DR. KOESSL:
Q. A person who did not join the Party, did he have to fear that anything would happen to him ?
A. I did not see or hear of any case where a person who did not join the party came to harm. There is one exception, though. About that case, I can only tell here what I was told by somebody else, although it is a reliable source and I am referring to Dahmes, the president of the District Court in "Wuerzburg. He was an old, highly qualified civil servant from the old days. He was asked whether he didn't want to join the Nazi Party. The old gentleman replied something like this: At his age he was no longer interested in matters of that kind and the result was quite a violent affair which, in my view, was started by local fanatics, but at any rate, the outcome was that the gentleman had to be pensioned off. But, as a general phenomenon, these things did not happen.
Q. What happened about the formations of the Gliederrungen , for example of the SA? I am asking that question because Baur, Groben, Kunz -- those witnesses were members of the SA.
A. In the case of the SA, that was an entirely voluntary matter, in 1933 people joined the SA as a rule because by that step they wanted to make sure that they would be allowed to join the NSDAP, later on. They wanted to appear to be people of certain merits because of their membership with the SA. After the Roehm Putsch, the as we all know, was decimated legally by leaving people at liberty to leave the SA. From that time on just a simple sheet of paper was enough to get out of the SA. So that certainly membership with the SA was not based on any methods of compulsion or pressure.
Q. What offices did you hold in political leadership corps of the NSDAP?
A. Within the field of the party I did not hold any office at any place or at any time. In particular, I was never a political leader on any level.
DR. KOESSEL: I would like to draw the attention of the Tribunal to the fact that the indictment in the case of every defendant who is charged with membership in a criminal organization, that it mentions every one with his rank. Only in the case of Rothaug the indictment merely says that he had been a member of the Leadership Corps of the NSDAP on the Gauleiter level. However, no reason is given for that assertion.
Q. Witness, in. the opening statement the Prosecution said that only members of the NSDAP could become members of the National Socialist Jurists League and that other persons could only be promoting members. Is that correct?
A. That is altogether wrong. Membership was, in the National Socialist Lawyers League, not tied to membership with the NSDAP. To speak of myself and hundreds of thousands of others, we had been members of the Jurists League since 1934, but only in 1937 and 19% we became members of the Nazi Party. The membership of the Jurists League was in no way tied to membership with the Nazi Party. Furthermore, these so-called promoting members are mentioned. Promoting members -- Foerderade Mitglieder -- that was something that existed with the SS. There were promoting members of the SS and there were also promoting members of the NS Air Corps. But there never were at any time or any place any promoting members of the NS Jurists League. You either were a member of the Jurists League or you were not. There were no half-way methods.
Q. Was the so-called Aryan principle adhered to in the Jurists league?
A. In the Jurists the Aryan principle was not altogether adhered to. The person who could still be a civil servant could also be a member of the Jurists League. That is to say, it didn't matter if, among the antecedents, there was one Jewish grandparent.
Q. By the designation of the function can one tell whether somebody held a party office or an office of an affiliated organization?
A. That question, too, has frequently played a part at this trial, and some of the answers to it have been somewhat complicated. Without knowing all the provisions and regulations, one can by the designation tell whether somebody belongs to the leadership corps or not. A person who was a political leader has included in the designation of his office the function, the word "leader," that is to say a "Reichleader," a "Gauleader", "Kreisleader," "Blockleader", "zell leader" -- all those are political leaders; in their official designation the word "leiter" , "leader" occurs. One must distinguish from those political leaders all the designations or functions where the word "waiter ---warte" occurs --- administrator. For example, Gaugruppenwalter, Gau Administrator; or, Kreisgruppenwalter, administrator. In the case of judges or public prosecutors, like the office which I held, in the case of this function where the designation Gaugruppenwalter was used -- administrator -- it is never possible that that person was a political leader. Those are simply functions not within the party, but within the so-called affiliated organizations. Therefore, one can tell by looking at the word who is a political leader and who isn't.
Q. In the opening speech of the Prosecution it says that you had been a Gau-gruppenleiter.
A. As you emphasized correctly, it says there that the leiterleader -- was the designation for the political leader, and so to fit me one turned the designation around by mistake and made it Gaugruppenleiter. Evidently that is an error. I was not a Gruppenleiter. Gaugruppenleiter -- that is exactly what I wasn't. There even wasn't a Gaugruppenleiter, -leader , - in the professional organization of the Lawyer's League, that is to say I was not a political leader.
Q. From when to when did you hold the office which you have just mentioned?
A.-I can't toll you by heart; I can't tell you from memory, but when I went to Berlin on the 1st May, 1943, that was the end; and, as far as I remember, I obtained the office at the end of 1938. Yes, the end of 1938 I believe.
Q. Who was your superior in the organization?
A. As concerns the organization of the Lawyer's League, the affiliated organization, I worked under the Gauwalter of the League, the Gau Administrator of that league, and I must add here that the Gau of the Jurists League consisted of several groups. There were the judges and public prosecutors; there were the legal administrators; there were the attorneys; and economic lawyers. It is possible that there may have been another group, but I don't remember. Those four groups formed the -- I was expressing that wrong. They formed the Gau of the Jurists League, and at the head of that Gau there was the Gauwalter, and at the head of those four individual columns there was in every case one Gaugruppenwalter. One Gaugruppenwalter for the matters concerning the judges and the public prosecutors; one Gaugruppenwalter for the attorneys; one Gaugruppenwalter for the affairs of the civil servants of the administration of justice; and one for the economic lawyers, who were jurists who worked in industry. That is to say as Gaugruppenwalter they were subordinate to the Gauwalter.
Q. In what way did those transactions of work develop between the various groups?
A. As concerns the work of my group, the group for judges, and prosecutors, the work which came to us from outside, that was handed to me to work on by the Gauwalter as far as he thought necessary. On the other hand, from the league itself, that is to say from our members, there were many inquiries which came to us and which we had to solve in some way or another. I had to work on such questions; prepare them. A decision in my capacity as Gaugruppenwalter I did not have to make.
Q. The office of Gaugruppenwalter, did that mean that you combined with your own office of the party ?
A. No, that was not so, but in order to be able to judge these conditions quite clearly, one needs to know this. One person could combine two offices, and a so-called Gauwalter in the Jurists League could simultaneously hold the office of a political leader. To name an. example, as a rule before Oeschey's days, that is to say in the days of Benzler, the Gaurechtsamtsleiter who held an office in the party and who, therefore, in the designation of his office, had the word"leiter" included, simultaneously was Gauwalter of the Jurists League. In his capacity as Gauwalter of the Jurists League, he was not a political leader, but in his capacity as Gaurechtsamtsleiter he was. In the case of Gauleiter -- so, that is slip of the tongue -- in the case of the Gruppenwalter -- his activities in the Lawyers' League and the Jurists League were not combined with an office as political leader.
Q. Could one have told that by the designation of office. I think you have given a sufficient explanation on that point. You need only answer yes or no.
A. Naturally the designation would have made that clear -- would have indicated that. The person who was also a political leader was called Gaurechtsamtsleiter, head of the Gau legal office, and Gauwalter, administrator , of the Jurists League, whereas the other person was merely called Gaugruppenwalter, group administration.
Q. Did you at Berlin or Rotsdam hold any office?
A. Neither in Berlin or in Potsdam did I hold any office.
Q. Do you know what your competent Ortsgruppe in the party was there?
A. I never found out because I had no time to bother about those things at that time.
Q. Do you know who was the Ortsgruppenleiter?
A. I did not ever find out about that either.
Q. Did you know any political leaders in your district?
A. At Berlin and Rotsdam I didn't.
Q. Did the Ortsgruppe ever approach you? After all, you were a member of the party.
A. Nobody approached me, but inquiries were made about me, not because I was a party member, but because that was a custom with the party. If anybody moved into a new district an attempt was always made to get hold of him, but I was never at home, and my landlady in Berlin somehow dealt with the matter.
Q. How was it that nobody bothered you?
A. Well, I never registered when I moved. Of course if one moved from one place to another he was supposed to re-register with the new Ortsgruppe at the place to which one had moved, but I never re-registered. I continued to pay my contributions in Nurnberg.
Q. What was the reason?
A. Because I wanted to be left in peace in Berlin, and I was so over-burdened with work that I had no time left for such matters.
Q. Did you yourself see any cause in war time particularly to apply for work?
A: Well, that question is answered by my saying that I thought the time had come to take the position which others had been holding in the Party for a long while, that is to say, to do nothing. Therefore, from that point of view, I was pleased with my transfer to Berlin because for some time, at least for a little time, I would be rid of having to cope with Party matters.
Q: Did you ever denounce any person, or did you ever cause any person to be denounced?
A: In my private life I never denounced anybody or saw to it that someone else denounced a third person. I assume that you are putting that question to me because I have been charged with having been a political fanatic, and because it is assumed that a fanatic, at some time or order in his private life, must have exercised some activity of his own. I can give an assurance that never in my life did I denounce any individual, neither in the criminal nor in the political field.
Q: Did you ever have any reason to denounce anyone?
A: I do not think it necessary to enumerate individual cases here, but I frequently heard of matters and the person who brought them to my notice certainly intended to make me take steps as a private individual. Through my family, too, such matters were brought to my ears. However, I rejected all those matters and, in particular, I explained very clearly to my wife and my daughter that even unintentionally, in any contact whatsoever, they were not to tell me about any experiences of their own which in fact they had because otherwise, by so doing, they would start steps being taken against others which, concerning the laws in force, might be of great significance to third persons.
We, as private individuals, did not wish, on any account, to assume responsibility for such matters.
I do not believe it necessary to enumerate the cases with which you are acquainted.
Q: On the 1st of May -- at page 2896 in the English transcript -- the witness Elkar called you, and I quote, "the highest authority on legal questions in the Gau of Franconia." A little later he calls you "the Spiritus Rector in the National Socialist Jurist's League."
Doebig says -- English transcript page 1775 -- you had been the leading spirit in the Jurist's League.
What influence did you exert on the Jurist's League as a whole?
A: First of all, may I say in general, particularly to the introductory question, that I consider that those opinions expressed about me are considerable exaggerations. As for having boon an authority on legal questions, that Is out of the question. I have always found that other people found it a great deal easier; they always dealt with problems far more quickly, particularly those who passed these opinions. In effect, the way with us was that questions which concerned my Gnu group, that is to say, the judges and prosecutors' groups, were passed on to me. I then gave my opinion on those questions. My opinion was passed on to the Gauwalter and he then passed the matters on in the routine way, which is the custom in every state; it was just passed on then to the next authority.
I really don't think that, at any time or at any place, I had to cope with a problem of world importance.
Q: Did you receive immediate instructions from the NSDAP and the Gauleitung concerning your work in the Jurist's League?