7 Jan. 46
THE PRESIDENT: And your third?
DR. SEIDL: The third question is — and it is addressed directly to
the Prosecution — whether the Vatican, as prosecutor, has
identified itself with the principles upon which this Trial is being
conducted?
[There was a pause in the proceedings while the
Judges conferred.]
THE PRESIDENT: In the opinion of the Tribunal the
observations which have just been made by counsel on behalf of the
Defendant Frank are entirely irrelevant, and any motion which they were
intended to support is denied. The Prosecution will therefore continue.
COL. WHEELER: I now offer in evidence the first of a number of
documents which the Vatican has supplied to the Prosecution in this case
from its own files and which authoritatively state the acts of
suppression of the Church by the Nazi conspirators. This first Vatican
document, which deals in part with acts of suppression within Germany,
is Document Number 3261-PS, Exhibit Number USA-568, a verbal note of the
Secretariat of State of His Holiness the Pope to the German Embassy,
dated January 18, 1942. 1 read the certificate accompanying this
document:
"The Vatican, November 13th, 1945.
"I, Domenico Tardini, Secretary of Extraordinary Ecclesiastical
Affairs, hereby certify that the attached document, consisting of nine
printed pages and entitled, 'Verbal note of the Secretariat of State
of His Holiness to the German Embassy,' January 18th, 1942, Pages
3-11, is a true and correct translation into the English language from
the Italian language of a carbon copy of a document now in the
possession of the Secretariat of State of His Holiness, the original
of which was dispatched to the German Embassy. " — Signed —
"Domenico Tardini."
The
paper in the document book, Your Honors, is a mimeographed copy of the
same printed document which we received from the Vatican. We did not
have enough printed documents to make them in the document books.
On Page 2 of the English mimeographed text of this verbal note,
Paragraphs 3 and 4 — appearing on Page 2 of the German translation,
Paragraphs 3 and 4 — the Papal Secretary of State describes, I
quote:
"Measures and acts which gravely
violate the rights of the Church, being contrary not only to the
existing concordats but to the principles of international law
ratified by the Second Hague Conference ... "
THE PRESIDENT: Did you say you were reading the third paragraph?