21 Nov. 45
hold an inquest on the validity of the execution. The Charter
implies common sense limits to liability just as it places common
sense limits upon immunity. But none of these men before you acted in
minor parts. Each of them was entrusted with broad discretion and
exercised great power. Their responsibility is correspondingly great
and may not be shifted to that fictional being, "the
State", which cannot be produced for trial, cannot testify, and
cannot be sentenced.
The Charter also recognizes a vicarious liability, which
responsibility is recognized by most modern systems of law, for acts
committed by others in carrying out a common plan or conspiracy to
which a defendant has become a party. I need not discuss the familiar
principles of such liability. Every day in the courts of countries
associated in this prosecution, men are convicted for acts that they
did not personally commit, but for which they were held responsible
because of membership in illegal combinations or plans or
conspiracies.
The Political, Police, and
Military Organizations:
Accused before this Tribunal as criminal
organizations are certain political and police organizations which
the evidence will show to have been instruments of cohesion in
planning and executing the crimes I have detailed. Perhaps the worst
of the movement were the Leadership Corps of the NSDAP. the
Schutzstaffeln or "SS", and the Sturmabteilungen or
"SA", and the subsidiary formations which these include.
These were the Nazi Party leadership, espionage, and policing groups.
They were the real government, above and outside of any law. Also
accused as organizations are the Reich Cabinet and the Secret Police,
or Gestapo, which were fixtures of the Government but animated solely
by the Party.
Except for a late period when some compulsory recruiting was done
in the SS, membership in all these militarized organizations was
voluntary. The police organizations were recruited from ardent
partisans who enlisted blindly to do the dirty work the leaders
planned. The Reich Cabinet was the governmental facade for Nazi Party
Government and in its members legal, as well as actual responsibility
was vested for the entire program. Collectively they were responsible
for the program in general, individually they were especially
responsible for segments of it. The finding which we ask you to make,
that these are criminal organizations will subject members to
punishment to be hereafter determined by appropriate tribunals,
unless some personal defense--such as becoming a member under threat
to person, to family, or inducement by false representation, or the
like--be established.