21 Nov. 45
The Nazi Party declaration also committed its members to an
anti-Semitic program. It declared that no Jew or any person of
non-German blood could be a member of the nation. Such persons were
to be disfranchised, disqualified for office, subject to the alien
laws, and entitled to nourishment only after the German population
had first been provided for. All who had entered Germany after August
2, 1914 were to be required forthwith to depart, and all non-German
immigration was to be prohibited.
The Party also avowed, even in those early days, an authoritarian
and totalitarian program for Germany. It demanded creation of a
strong central power with unconditional authority, nationalization of
all businesses which had been "amalgamated," and a
"reconstruction" of the national system of education which
"must aim at teaching the pupil to understand the idea of the
State (state sociology)." Its hostility to civil liberties and
freedom of the press was distinctly announced in these words:
"It must be forbidden to publish
newspapers which do not conduce to the national welfare. We demand
the legal prosecution of all tendencies in art or literature of a
kind likely to disintegrate our life as a nation and the suppression
of institutions which might militate against the above
requirements."
The forecast of religious persecution was clothed in the language
of religious liberty, for the Nazi program stated, "We demand
liberty for all religious denominations in the State." But, it
continues with the limitation, "so far as they are not a danger
to it and do not militate against the morality and moral sense of the
German race."
The Party program foreshadowed the campaign of terrorism. It
announced, "We demand ruthless war upon those whose activities
are injurious to the common interests", and it demanded that
such offenses be punished with death.
It is significant that the leaders of this Party interpreted this
program as a belligerent one, certain to precipitate conflict. The
Party platform concluded, "The leaders of the Party swear to
proceed regardless of consequences-if necessary, at the sacrifice of
their lives-toward the fulfillment of the foregoing points." It
is this Leadership Corps of the Party, not its entire membership,
that stands accused before you as a criminal organization.
Let us now see how the leaders of the Party fulfilled their
pledge to proceed regardless of consequences. Obviously, their
foreign objectives, which were nothing less than to undo
international treaties and to wrest territory from foreign control,
as well as most of their internal program, could be accomplished only
by