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Volume III · Page 521
| Reich Supreme Court in January but had stated
that the time was not yet ripe for that, at that time I offered him my
resignation which he rejected. Furthermore, I had mentioned that at the same
time that did not keep him from starting investigation proceedings against me
the same time of that year 1943 without my knowledge for the allegedly illegal
procurement of furniture. That Thierack was primarily interested in getting rid
of me in a manner which would give the impression to the outside world that I
was being dishonorably discharged is proved by what I shall say briefly about
my finally leaving the office. Yesterday I also mentioned the fact that Thierack, as early as September 1942, kept my book for about 3 months. The German Judge — PRESIDING JUDGE BRAND: You need not repeat what you said yesterday; we remember it. Go on to something new. DEFENDANT ROTHENBERGER: Yes. After Thierack had finally turned over this manuscript to the Party Chancellery and after it had been examined there for about 6 months, about in August or September — I am not quite sure about that date any more — of 1943 an SD report was received in the Ministry. Thierack put that SD report to me, and he told me it could be seen from that SD report that a plagiarism was contained in that book. That book contained a short historical review of the position of the judge in the old Germanic and Franconian era, and several sentences concerning that era were allegedly taken from a book by a Professor Fehr. Professor Fehr, Thierack told me, was an emigree, who lived in Switzerland, and a democrat; and there was concern that one day the London broadcasting station might broadcast the information that the German reform of the administration of justice really emanated from an emigree who was a democrat and lived in Switzerland. He said that was extremely dangerous from the point of view of foreign policy, and that I had to clear it up. I did not know the name "Fehr" at that time at all. As can be seen from the preface, a considerable number of my assistants in Hamburg had participated in the work on this book, and one of these assistants dealt with the historical part of the book. One year before, when no mention was made about the possibility of publishing that book, he had compiled that historical data for me, which I needed for a lecture that I was supposed to give in the Reich Ministry of Justice. The other day I stated that in August of 1941 I gave a lecture in the Reich Ministry of Justice about the segregation of the profession of judges from the usual civil servant class. That historical compilation was made for that purpose. |
