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Volume V · Page 73
| to do harm to other human beings on account
of them, to torture or to destroy them. On the contrary also for people of foreign nationality who had been struck in the same way by the war, I intervened to the fullest extent of my possibilities and attempted to alleviate their fate. If, today, measures taken by other agencies are brought into connection with my activities and, as a whole, are to be considered incriminating, then all that is far removed from my own intentions. If such a conclusion was to be reached, then counsel for the prosecution, who was certainly not benevolent toward me, would have found the right criteria when in pretrial investigations, he said, "Why did you let yourself be used like that?" If I can claim for myself to have been in good faith and to have had the best of will, how far more can my collaborators then do so. Not only the collaborators who are with me today here in the defendants’dock, but also all those whose de-Nazification proceedings depend upon the outcome of this trial. For all of them I request, without consideration of my own person, that full recognition should be granted them as to these two viewpoints. 3. Thirdly, I am assisted by my clear conscience. During almost three years of custody, and to a large extent on the strength of the documents submitted in this trial, I have conscientiously and relentlessly investigated myself and my activities. My views into the happenings of the world have been broadened. As a result of this thorough investigation, I can say in all truthfulness of my heart, before God and man, that I always believed that I contributed to the best of humanity and that I acted in that direction. I committed no war crimes and no atrocities. I opposed injustice wherever I encountered it and, from a deep human feeling of duty, I did whatever I could against all cases of hardship which I noticed. The number of witnesses who saw in me a decent man, ready to help, who was far removed from every act of force, could easily be augmented. The Tribunal will find whether my way of life and my acts of commission or omission represent the picture of a criminal. I myself know that I always acted with a pure heart, and in this knowledge I believe that if I made mistakes — and after all, who among human beings does not make mistakes — then it is only a case of human imperfection. In that case, however, my thinking and my actions should not be tried by a human court, but they belong in the sphere of eternal justice. The words "He who has not sinned shall cast the first stone" have value before the court of eternal justice. I do not feel guilty. Your Honors, in your verdict, do not let us be smitten by a ban of dishonor. Honor is the last good that remains to us, and I ask for your just verdict. |
