Talk:Enabling Act of 1933/Archive 2

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

Protest User:Str1977 Removals

John Toland's publishers Doubleday considered it perfectly on-topic all I included . I deny the use of off-topic as a justification. This is a growing WP issue , and you will force it to become more so . Please leave and accept the source. EffK 00:32, 26 November 2005 (UTC)

Nuremburg Testimony by von Papen re:"Special Courts Decree" of 21 March 1933

A Decree signed with the Amnesty Decree appears below , and requires key attention. (Testimony by Franz von Papen was characterised by the Trial as self-serving, and 'double faced', but in the Nuremburg trial is relevant to the 23 Reichstag Enabling Act. The Decree is The Formation of Special Courts and Article 2 clarifies:

The Special Courts have jurisdiction over crimes and offenses enumerated in the decree of the Reich President for the protection of people and State of 28 February 19333 and in the decree concerning the defense against insidious attacks against the government of the national revolution of 21 March 19334, provided that such crimes and offenses are not within the jurisdiction of the Reich Supreme Court or the courts of appeal. From:[[1]] (fair use/educational/public)

Nuremburg Trial allusion to Hindenburg Presidential Decrees of 21 March

DR. KUBUSCHOK: Witness, will you now describe the events leading up to the Enabling Act of 23 March 1933.

VON PAPEN: The Enabling Act arose out of the necessity to have the economic measures carried out in an untroubled Reichstag session. Negotiations were conducted with the Center Party to obtain a 1-year parliamentary truce, but these negotiations failed. Hence this law which had some parallels in the past became a necessity. The Prosecution has emphasized this law as clear proof for the existence of a conspiracy. May I say, therefore, that I myself tried to provide for a certain check by desiring to maintain the veto power of the Reich President. The Cabinet records of 15 March show, however, that State Secretary Meissner did not consider the participation of the Reich President necessary.

DR. KUBUSCHOK: I should like to refer to Document Number 25, which is identical with Exhibit USA-578, to the attitude taken by Von Papen in this Cabinet discussion and to the standpoint just mentioned of State Secretary Meissner.

"Meissner, State Secretary of the minority Cabinet, of the Cabinet of the Reich President, and his excellent assistant."

I should also like to refer to Document 23, because from the enumeration of the emergency decrees in that document it is clear that in the state of emergency which obtained then it was not possible to govern by means of Reichstag laws and that the Enabling Act was to be a substitute for these emergency decrees which were being repeatedly issued.

I must make one correction: The standpoint of State Secretary Meissner is contained in Document 91, Exhibit USA-578.

[Turning to the defendant.] On 21 March 1933, an amnesty decree was issued. The Prosecution has described this decree as an unheard-of law. What can you say about it?

VON PAPEN: The Prosecution calls this law "sanction of political murder."

I should like to say the following about it: This law was issued in an emergency decree of the Reich President, not of the Cabinet; and it was a natural end of a revolutionary period which had lasted 7 weeks. There are very many historical parallels for this amnesty decree; for example, the law which was issued by the young German Republic on 21 July 1922 and which includes murder in the amnesty measures.

DR. KUBUSCHOK: May I now refer to Document 28, Page 99 of Document Book 1. This contains the law of 21 July 1922, which

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17 June 46

concludes "the period of a state of unrest which obtained in the years 1920 and 1921." May I also refer to Page 100 of this Document Number 28 which contains the law of 20 December 1932 which has been mentioned.

On 23 March the law dealing with the special courts was issued. What can you say in that connection?

VON PAPEN: These special laws, or special court laws, are also not entirely new. I, personally, as Chancellor of the Reich issued such a law on 9 August 1932; and I based my action then on a directive of the Bruning Cabinet dated 6 October 1931. In revolutionary periods punishable political acts must be brought to speedy trial under the law.

DR. KUBUSCHOK: May I now point out Document 27, Page 89 of Document Book 1, especially the introduction preceding Paragraph 1, which shows that this emergency decree was based on the Bruning emergency directive of 1931.

From http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/imt/proc/06-17-46.htm,[[2]] Copyright linked .Fair Use/Educational/Pubic.)

[Key because:"The Prosecution has emphasised this law as clear proof for the existence of a conspiracy." Highlights-EffK]

From Monday 22 July 1946 at http://www.nizkor.org/hweb/imt/tgmwc/tgmwc-19/tgmwc-19-183-09.shtml[[3]] I place this Kubuschok clarification (he was representing the defence)

Since in the framework of this trial we do not have to judge considerations of political expediency and not even moral conceptions, but only whether what happened was done with a criminal purpose, in the sense of the Charter, the task set for the defence is comparatively simple.

EffK Note:The Special Courts Decree was signed by Hitler on 21 March and came into force after the second succeeding day. It was not the sole Decree signed, and in fact can have no constitutional bearing upon the ' dormancy ' of sovereign (the people's) Deputies( as eg KPD deputies). EffK 12:56, 4 December 2005 (UTC)

Nuremburg re:von Papen ,Enabling Act and Reichskonkordat

As from above last link, (highlight EffK):

The fact that in the laws of that time National Socialist doctrines appear only rarely and in moderate terms shows sufficiently that the composition of the Cabinet of that time had a retarding influence on the implementation of National Socialist ideas. Without this influence it would not be understandable why Hitler undertook a relatively unpopular limitation of the previously advocated aims of the Party.

The hand of the defendant which checked and corrected the shaping of the individual laws is clearly discernible. The classic example for this is his endeavours in connection with the Enabling Act. It was a technical necessity for the legislation during the crisis of that time. The preceding years had shown that owing to the protracted deliberations in the Reichstag, urgently needed legislation was not acted upon satisfactorily. Therefore, even in Bruening's time, almost all the legislative power was practically put in the hands of the Reich President, so that the important laws were issued in the form of emergency decrees by unilateral legislative acts of the Reich President. If, due to these compelling reasons, the legislative power could not in practice be left in the hands of the Reichstag, the legislative power thus transferred to the Cabinet constituted a compromise. As shown by the result of the Reichstag vote concerning the Enabling Act, none of the parties, including the Zentrum [Centre] party, failed to recognize this.

The question now arises as to whether the right of the Cabinet, since according to the constitution the Reich Chancellor had to establish the fundamental lines of policy, would be limited by the fact that the right of promulgating laws was reserved for the Reich President. The State Secretary of the Reich President himself declared, in a Cabinet session, that he did not think it necessary to burden Hindenburg with the responsibility of the entire legislation because of the latter 's right to promulgate laws. Von Papen's direct intervention with Hindenburg immediately afterwards remained without success, as stated by the witness Tschirschky.

Mr. President, would this be an appropriate time for me to present the essential points of the questionnaire which was answered by Tschirschky?

THE PRESIDENT: Well, you can comment on it, but you aren't going to read the whole document, are you?

DR. KUBUSCHOK: With your approval I will give a summary of it.

THE PRESIDENT: Yes.

DR. KUBUSCHOK: This is Document 103, which I submitted a while ago.

Question 1 I have already read.

Question 3 concerns the controls just discussed. The witness says that they were surely intended to prevent Hitler and the NSDAP from carrying out their policy.

In the next question the witness affirms the alleged aim of the conservative block: Black-White-Red.

In question 5 the witness confirms the development, which I still have to present, y toward an authoritative government by Hitler.

The answer to question 7 shows that Papen, in the Cabinet, strongly resisted the w suggested legislation in many points.

Question 10 concerns the attitude of Papen toward the Church. The last sentence is particularly important: "Von Papen believed, by the conclusion of

[Page 219]

the Concordat[ Reichskonkordat ], that Hitler and the NSDAP would be placed under such strong contractual obligations that the anti- clerical attitude would be arrested." [EffK:NB] The answer to No. 11: "I do not consider it possible that von Papen himself participated in a later violation of the Concordat, or that he used his political conviction to exercise political pressure."

• What could be considered original-research, would be to try to elucidate or check the strange last words political conviction . This could refer to his politics as a conviction, or to his catholic conviction in politics or to his political conviction affecting the negotiations towards the Concordat, or affecting thereby the after-math of it:It comes from the summary by the defense for von Papen .

EffK 10:48, 4 December 2005 (UTC)

Nuremberg:9 March Frick statement and Enabling Act

From[[4]]http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/imt/document/nca_vol1/chap_07.htm, (Copyright linked:Fair-use/educational/Public), highlight EffK,:

Acquistion of Totalitarian Political Control, 2.B Control Acquired ,3:

'Taking advantage' of the Presidential decree of 28 February 1933 suspending constitutional guarantees of freedom, Goering and other Nazi conspirators immediately caused a large number of Communists, including party officials and Reichstag deputies, and a smaller number of Social Democratic officials and deputies to be placed in 'protective custody'. (2324-PS; 2573-PS; L-83) Thus all Communist deputies and a number of social Democratic deputies were prevented from attending the new session of the Reichstag. -On 9 March 1933-, Frick announced that the Communists would be prevented from participating in the first session of the Reichstag on March 21st, because of their being more usefully occupied. (2403-PS) As Frick cynically stated:

"When the reichstag meets the 21st of March, the Communists will be prevented by urgent labor elsewhere from participating in the session. In concentration camps they will be re-educated for productive work. We will know how to render harmless permanently sub-humans who do not want to be re-educated." (2651-PS)

At a meeting of the Reich Cabinet on 15 March 1933, the problem of securing the necessary two-thirds majority in favor of an Enabling Act was again considered. Frick stated his belief that the Act would have to be broadly conceived, in a manner to allow for any deviation from the clauses of the Constitution of the Reich. Goering thought the two-thirds majority would be forthcoming and that if necessary some of the Social Democrats could be excluded from the room during the voting. (2962-PS)

At a meeting of the Cabinet on 20 March 1933, there was further discussion of means for securing the majority and quorum necessary to secure passage of the Act (2963-PS). On 23 March, Hitler spoke in favor of an Enabling law proposed by the Nazi conspirators and in the course of the debate said:

"The Government insists on the passage of this law. It expects a clear decision in any case. it offers to all the Parties in the Reichstag the possibility of a peaceful development and a possible conciliation in the future. But it is also determined to consider a disapproval of this law as a declaration of resistance. it is up to you, gentlemen, to make the decision now. It will be either peace or war." (2652-PS)

Thus subject to the full weight of Nazi pressure and terror, the Reichstag passed the proposed law, 441 deputies voting in its favor, and 94 Social Democrats being opposed (2579-PS). the following day, the law was promulgated. it provided:

"the Reichstag has resolved the following law, which is, with the approval of the Reichsrat, herewith promulgated, after it has been established that the requirements have been satisfied for legislation altering the Constitution.

• There is no reference here to any legalising Deputy arrests by (parallel) Presidential Decree of 21 March or of the 'Dormancy' announced by Frick at either 21 Decree, or 21 Opening of the Rechstag, or, 23 March Decree or Frick /Council of Elders 'procedural change' to shed light or clarify . Here it says conspirators...taking advantage of the Fire Decree, with a 9 March statement and requirements satisfied...
• At the foot of this Nuremberg document, no possibly relevant Decree is sourced but the Fire Decree and the Amnesty (Court?) Decree . I have remarked before that neither the Fire decree nor the Enabling Act as placed in Wikipedia allow for the constitutionality(legality) of the taking advantage . It would appear here that the trials term advantage means extra-legal, making the Weimar Germany Article correct in specifying illegal Deputy arrests and detention(& murder). It was , of course, legal to judicially execute the thousands of non-Deputy Communists found guilty under the Fire Decree.

On the same page link, this, from 7 March March 1933 In-judicially relevant to the deputy arrests is Hermann Goering's following

"Fellow Germans, my measures will not be crippled by any judicial thinking. My measures will not be crippled by any bureaucracy. Here, I don't have to give justice, my mission is only to destroy and exterminate, nothing more! This struggle, fellow Germans, will be a struggle against chaos and such a struggle, I shall not conduct with the power of any police. A bourgeoise state might have done that. Certainly, I shall use the power of the State and the police to the utmost, my dear Communists! So you won't draw any false conclusions; but the struggle to the death, in which my fist will grasp your necks, I shall lead with those down there-those are the Brown Shirts."

• I remind that it was Goering to whom Pope PIus XI delivered his 10 March 1933 accolade for Hitler.

EffK 13:55, 4 December 2005 (UTC)

Big edit

I've edited the tagged section of the article, and it at least reads a lot better now. However, I'm not that familiar with the Enabling Act's history, so I may have misinterpreted the previous text; someone more knowledgable should review the edit to make sure I haven't introduced any mistakes. —Brent Dax 02:01, 11 December 2005 (UTC)

Any interest is extremely positive. I have to say that Shirer does not mention that there was any constitutional power covering the arrest of the deputies, or any other power-KPD civil agitators , publishers, writer, leafleteers, yes. Not KPD deputies. This is a repeat of the general wikipedia assumption, based on the Fire Decree. I have seen no source that shows that the constitutional sovereignty of the Deputies, answerable to the people alone, was overturned, nor that it could be by this decree or any other decree. I refer you to the eseence of the EAct itself Art 2, "Institutions of the Reichstsg" etc. Certainly on WP the Fire Act is claimed as such over-turning power, but Shirer does not claim this. No one claims this. I refer you to the Papen transcript and his negative knowledge of such arrests and/or maltreatment.

We need a full report on this from somewhere, exactly proving the legality of these deputy arrests, before we can be sure that WP linked assumptions are correct. I appreciate the slight advance re:procedural change, but equally I wonder at the main gestapo Decrees of 21 march, Special Courts Decrees. One in force from 23 , one from 24 signed that 21.These decrees relate to today as they cover renditionary activities and the ability to deny prisoners their pre-trial. Habeas corpus through the Fire decree may have been delayed to longer,5 days to usual 1 day and relates to civil population. Special Courts Decrees were required for the 'legit' gestapo-state. They hark back to such prior decree of 6 Oct 1931. I do nort believe any of them enable the arrest of sovereign Deputies. The fact that the Nazis wanted to arrest them, and did arrest them, is not to say that it were constitutionally possible. The questioning of Nuremberg suggests to me that it was not. A big question ? Source required. EffK 13:33, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

Mr EffK, here's my reply:

• The Fire Decree suspended the general protection the constitution granted through the catalogue of basic rights. However, the laws were (for the moment) still unchanged. (For the detailed regulations you have to ask someone else).
• So any Communist (or other) that was not a member of parliament could be arrested anyway.
• Article 37 protected deputies of the Reichstag from being arrested or interrogated unless they were caught in flagranti (Immunity). This could be waived by the Reichstag, since it was (and is) meant to protect the body of parliament and not so much the individual MP.
• The immunity lasted until a new Reichstag had assembled, so MPs of the 1932 Reichstag were protected even after he dissolution until the Day of Potsdam, and beyond that if they were re-elected.
• The arrest of the MPs were illegal, since the executive branch did not first inform the Reichstag and got the waiving of the immunity. Police might have claimed that they caught MPs in flagranti, e.g. by attending some KPD meeting which they could interpret as "an act of treason" as the party was seen as traitorous after the Fire. But I don't know whether any police officer had that idea, or whether they just went ahead.
• I guess the Reichstag at one point waived the immunity post facto, maybe in connection with the dormancy declaration, but I'm not sure whether such a move made the arrests legal according to the thinking back then.
• At least until such a declaration the arrested MPs were detained illegally.
• However, we know by now that this had no real effect on votes in parliament, don't we?
• To end on a positive note, I want to express my appreciation that EffK has finally abandoned his reference to article 2 of the Enabling Act which has by itself nothing to do with the question of detained MPs. (Obviously this refers to your post over at "The Holocaust". Here you are still sticking to "EA,2")

Str1977 20:22, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

OK . Now, I have an answer. An unsourced answer.

• 1FK Why is this un-sourced? I cannot accept it un-sourced, if I am to be true. I welcome the candour of the statements from Str1977 . I think , perhaps, even Str1977 will accept that I should have this sourced. I am in no hurry to have it sourced but I should expect that within German documents or texts Str1977 will be able to confirm this. Would you please on your future reading Str1977, please direct us to a source such that for once and for all we can correct the various articles, all of which have suggested legal Fire Decree measures covered arrest of Nazi opposition parties , such as it is written here on this very Article Page.

Str This is unsourced because my statement were not digging into historical sources but basing myself entirely on the legal issue and on the articles of the Weimar constitution (37ff) that are relevant here. What I did was explain to you the legal standing of MPs under German law (which is the same nowadays). As I said, I have no detailed knowledge of all the arrest measures and I am not willing to spend time on digging them up. Please understand this.

FK I think they smell a rat tho.

Str There is no need for corrections. The Fire Decree authorized massive arrests and basic rights infringements.

FK This is your off-topic

The Fire Decree was the legal basis for all the atrocities committed in the Third Reich.

FK Please source this claim-We don't speak/read German very well, maybe

That doesn't mean that anything that happened was legal (as some other editor recently suggested somewhere else) but it removed the basis for any legal boundaries.

FK Come on /boundaries!-like the CIA Flights, yeah? No boundaries?Well, you now, to JonRoma speak of siting deputies rather than 'Elder's Councils', deputies reaching decisions rather than Hitler and Hindy signing Decrees. We need it all.

• 2 FK I am concerned about any Articles that write this word legal with the assumption or otherwise yet un-sourced, that the Enabling Act was a legal parliamentary accession to totalitarianism. Articles except that one where I followed the assumption implicit in Sect 2 of the Enabling Act and wrote illegal.

Str The legality of the arrests has no bearing on the EA votes (see below). The EA was a legal measure (as the EA of 1923(or 24) was). It was strictly speaking not the accession to totalitarianism, though it was the basis of it. Totalitarian was what Hitler made out of it.

FK The smarting contradiction is all that cuts the boredom

FK All hunky'cept it is remarkable the contradiction(tween Sec.2 and the prev. arrests themselves,which is master totally cool)

Str Article 2 of the EA protected the Reichstag as an institution. It is irrelevant before the passing of the EA (obviously, as it wasn't in force, and as its clauses only made sense given the passing of the EA).

FK Article 37 did it

Str The government was not authorized by the EA to issue a law doing away with the Reichstag or the Reichsrat. They could pass a law totally altering the parliament but not doing away with it. The Reichsrat was reduced to being irrelevant through the Gleichschaltung of the states but the body, though irrelevant, was not abolished.

FK Totally cool design but I havent been focusing esp. on the Federal

As I said, Article 2 protected the Reichstag as an institution.

FK I brought it up,actually

Str Individual MPs had their immunity but that was always subject to a decision by the Reichstag. The Reichstag could allow prosecution of any MP anytime. We can imagine what that meant in Hitler's Reich.

FK -Suddenly your talking numbers in the house, not Elders' Counccils

• 3 FK I have to extend this to say that we need after Str1977's useful assertions to qualify the legality of the vote in the Enabling Act.

Str As Jon Roma shows below, the legality of the vote was not inhibited.

• 4 FK We need to discover whether this Reichstag was a body in any standing with the Allied International Military Tribunal, whether we are or are not to consider that the Reichstag and Germany had a constitutional Parliament, or had not?

Str Of course, Germany had a constitutional parliament until 1945.

FK I take no such assumption

Str It was not democratic, to be sure, but it was constitutional under the heavily corrupted version of the Weimar Constituion in force in 1945.

FK I have sourced this Weimar was dead in its Reichstag , from old Rosenberg wrote from was it ex-|Chanchellor Wirth? Dead from October 1931.

Str The unconditional surrender in 1945 however did away with all independent German institutions, including the Reichstag.

News travels fast

Str From 1945 until 1990 Germany was represented by the Four Powers and all states (both the Länder and later the BRD and the DDR) always acted under their authority which could take away what they had given any time, though both BRD and DDR increasingly gained sovereignity over the years (in the west the mile stones were 1955 (BRD limited sovereignity including foreign policy) and 1968 (emergency laws). Full sovereignity was only attained in 1990 by reunification.

FK Off-topic

Str I don't understand what you mean by "standing with the Allied International Military Tribunal". If you mean the Nuremberg court, I should think that there was no standing, as no Reichstag existed after 8 May 1945.

FK The Court was allocated Centre in Berlin.The Tribunal was wherever Judges sat but as you say you recognise the term it agreed

• 5 FK Was the common-plan or conspiracy to overthrow the German State and Institute Totalitarianism brought into effect at the handing of the vote by Ludwig Kaas, silently with no speech, at the second session of the 23 March Reichstag -the point at which this conspiracy entered effect?

Str That presupposes that there was a conspiracy in which Kaas was involved.

FK Not exactly the logistics of the statement, but you yourself allow unsourced by you, conspiracy earlierin time with Hindy. I think Wikipedia , as Sam Spade has benificently learned me, that new information comes, and so Articles cannot be locked, given the all-things-being-equal=good-faith-principle(As a neubie, I 'didna ken' and as a tiredie I now see bad faith) .

• 6 FK At the Trials the conspiracy seems rendered as running throughout the time preceding this moment in time. Documents are brought forth relating to the criminal plans, policies and directives such as were published , showing clear anti-democratic intent towards totalitarian criminality of purpose from the entire history of the NSDAP .

Str As you are referring to Papen's trial, the conspiracy refers to Papen's intrigue of toppling Schleicher and bringing Hitler into power.

FK Oooh-you're ahead of me here, where-where-?

• 7 FK If it took the clerks five minutes to count the vote, if it took 24 hours for the Enabling Act to enter force, after publication through the Institution of the Reichstag, is that the time that the totalitarian state enters some more formal reality or stage? Do we at that point reach then what Str1977 considers and said at Holocaust 'accession question, is "legal" accession ?

Str No, the EA did not immediately bring about the totalitarian state. It however permanently (at least for four years) and formally (the rule by presidential decree was always fragile)..

FK -Such lasted 2 Years Straight with 4 chancellors, external poarisation or not

Str.. did away with the separation of powers. Hitler used these powers to create a totalitarian state. It is difficult to say when the transition was completed, as it was a gradual process.

FK Well, let's try shall we, after all this time

Str The accession of Hitler refers to his being appointed as Chancellor, which was legal.

• 8 FKOr, is there nothing legal about an accession that is in fact result of a common-plan using un-constitutional and hence supremely illegal method, including beatings and murder, of rigging the Reichstag Parliament ? A large portion of the Institution who were the living embodiment of the Institution , were subject to the common-plan or conspiracy and the question has to be asked whether the house, their house of which they were members decided on that day or the subsequent day of business, the 23 march, as was its right and constitution, to assemble and as a house consign these arrested KPD and SDP, nigh a quarter of the house, to a technical oblivion . it appears not, rather that a Rule of Procedure was brought to contrive that, their absence although un-constitutional and protected from all but assembly the house itself, to characterise their absence as voluntary and their mandates therefore annulled.

Str The appointment was legal. Yes it was brought about by an intrigue influencing the president but that is more extra-constitutional than un-constitutional.

FK Land Blackmail(Tax Scandal and bribery/(5000 Acres),plus then the Military Industrial Complex

Str Papen's and Schleicher's appointment were of the same kind. The rest of your rant I do not understand.

• 9 FK Although Str1977 may not wish to see talk of section 2 of the Enabling Act this subject needs to be evaluated beyond such doubts as are re-inforced by this recent Str1977 confirmation as to the illegality(presumably that is, the un-constitutionality), of Reichstag Deputy arrest under Article 37.

STR I have addressed this above.

fk That ended in similar extra type illegality , I hitherto wrote quasi for such hazinesse

• 10 With the caveat I placed and Str1977 confirms, as to in-the- act -in flagrante treasonable expression. It was not enough to have been caught with documents, but to have been caught with documents formed within the previous 24 hours only, according to art.37 of the Weimar constitution.

STR Let experts answer this. I don't know whether anyone used this as legal justification. If so, they might have stretched the definition.

FK It is stated clearly in English translation

• 11 In fact we move to the constitutionality of the Reichstag at 21 March, the opening, full-square. To the necessity for equal source which can over-throw or confirm the charge made by Nuremberg as to the entire , inluding the Enabling Act being or notbeing a part of the common-plan or conspiracy for the accomplishment of a War of aggression, or a War in violation of International Treaties;

Don't understand. What charges does Nuremberg make and what right does it have to make charges. It was a law court judging the defendants - it was not the sole and final arbiter of all legal issues in Germany since 1933.

FK It said that domesticicy of law was not an extenuation, any more than Time. MY present understanding ios dorectly opposite on yours, utterly:which is why I dragged it up and placed the direct source. You may hopefuly bring me the full benefit of whatever might enlarh=gen my intellect on this one question:domestic Law, even in Italy or wherever.

• 12 of crimes before the War or during the war including in this case committed against a civilian parliamentary population on political grounds in execution of the crime against peace, to which execution whether or not in violation of the domestic law of the country where perpetrated, are accountable such organisers, instigators and accomplices as as are responsible.

Str The Nuremberg trials made three accusations: 1) war crimes; 2) crimes against humanity 3) conspiracy to start an aggressive war. Papen was acquitted as he committed none of these things. And those found guilty were condemned for these charges and not for the setting up of the Hitler state.

FK You are welcome to source the exact documentation

• 13 FK This includes officials as well as Heads of State and where any group or organisation is declared criminal by the Nuremberg tribunal such members can be tried before national, military or occupation courts and subject to additional issuing punishment.

• 14 FK The Indictment includes the Secret State Police , commonly known as the Gestapo, whose inception is pre-figured in step with the issuing of the Decrees of President Hindenburg, particularly those Special Courts Decrees submitted to the Tribunal for 21 March, the day of the ceremonial opening of the Reichstag.

STR After eight months of discussion I would expect correct names.

FK A dictionary for Xmas?

• 15 FK Despite the Tribunal characterising the NSDAP as having 2Achieved power in this way" but not immediately specifying the way itself, the overall charge is of the Crime against Peace, of seeking to wage War and the Tribunal states:

For the aggressive designs of the Nazi Government were not accidents arising out of the immediate political situation in Europe and the world; they were a deliberate and essential part of Nazi foreign policy.

From the beginning, the National Socialist movement claimed that its object was to unite the German people in the consciousness of their mission and destiny, based on inherent qualities of race, and under the guidance of the Fuehrer.

For its achievement, two things were deemed to be essential: the disruption of the European order as it had existed since the Treaty of Versailles, and the creation of a Greater Germany beyond the frontiers of 1914. This necessarily involved the seizure of foreign territories.

War was seen to be inevitable, or at the very least, highly probable, if these purposes were to be accomplished. The German people, therefore, with all their resources were to be organised as a great political-military army. schooled to obey without question any policy decreed by the State.

Str Sure, but the court considered it that way, that Papen only helped the Nazis to get there and was himself not involved in preparing or starting the war. And historiography agrees. You might disagree with the court's judgement of these facts but that needn't concern us here.

FK Source historiography please

• 16 FK The 'beginning' is stated as being 25 Febuary 1920 when Adolf Hitler presented the un-changing programme,known since as the NSDAP programme, to the prior-named small German Labour Party . In respect of the crime against peace article three demands land and territory(colonies) over and above article two which demands a Greater Germany.

Str I don't think the mere demand for colonies fits the "crime against peace" charge. It was only two years after Germany had lost her colonies (good riddance !!) and all other major powers still had colonies. How to get them back is of course a different question.

FK The textual Nuremberg charge is clear as the NSDAP program from 1920

• 17 FK The Tribunal was charged to consider all charges and evidence with the maximum expedition possible. On Tribunal day 193, 2 August 1946 the Enabling Act and the Special Courts appear in the testimony of a Dr. Franz Schlegelberger to Reich Government defence Counsel Dr. Kubuschok:

Q. For what purposes and under what conditions was the Enabling Act submitted to the Reichstag in March, 1933?

A. The Enabling Act, which is called the "Law to relieve the distress of People and Reich," was issued because the cumbersome machinery of the Reichstag worked too slowly and laws had to be created speedily. It had been expected that only a temporary solution would be found with the Enabling Act and for that reason it was limited to four years; later it was repeatedly extended.

Q. For what reasons were special courts established and what special circumstances were there in this procedure?

A. Special courts were already established during the Bruning Cabinet in 1931, temporarily, and now they were created again because in this way they wanted to deal quickly with things which needed special expedition. This could be achieved only with legal means eliminated, but in order to avoid unjust procedure and unjust sentences, a number of checks were established. (1) The resumption of closed legal procedure in favour of the defendant was made easier; (2) The plea of invalidity, to the Reich Court was granted, which meant that the Reich Court could quash a sentence and substitute another; (3) A special appeal to the Reich Court was instituted by means of which a completely new trial could be started. Finally, an official defence was instituted.

I may emphasize that the special courts and the legal devices which I have mentioned were as much in favour of, as against, the defendants, that these special courts were regular judicial courts and not exceptional courts, and that they were each conducted by three professional judges.

• 18 "Legal means eliminated" characterise the Special Courts Decree but what is significant is the evidence confirming that the 1931 pre-cursor to the 21(24) Special Courts Decree was temporary to 1931, and was here "created again".
• 19 Elsewhere the actual document is produced , and clearly shows the counter-signature of Hitler and von Papen and that it takes effect on 24 march, subsequent tothe Enabling Act, therefore even were it to have the possibility of justifying "preventative detention" of Deputies, this could not have technically affected their absence on 23 March for the Enabling Act.

• 20 I thank you Str1977 for supplying your knowledge- since your assertions of it seem logical I an quite prepared to take them on good faith, however whilst source may be un-forth-coming for that, it will be absolutely required to qualify where I am taking the question now. i have always wondered how a religion could make a Concordat (akind of peace is that not) with a criminal government, and yes, that will arise again. You answered it before to the effect that it was not a criminal government, but I have yet to see source that over-turns the clear Indictments of Nuremberg as to the criminal totalitarian political government of the Third Reich

[See Yale Avalon project/nizkor.org]

Str I don't know where you want to take any questions, but Wikipedia is not the proper place for such questions, as this already has no bearing on any article I know of.

I never accept such assertions and to the former, WP is in an epistemilogical tortion on legality which you yourself only finally settled(by an assertion I hope I will not come to regret) today. If I had not done my pretty fruitless home-work here, I should have been POV to have done do. You may recognise that I have awaited your great response towards this one point of legal.

Str To clarify: The Hitler government was a criminal government based on the crimes it committed, just as a man robbing another man is a criminal. But the Hitler government was also the legal government under the Weimar Constitution. If a citizen of a country robs someome he is a criminal but he is still a citizen of his country. Do you understand?

FK I cannot ignore the information given to us by Arthur Rosenberg, and seek a true clarification of constitutionality throughout

Str Ideally, we wouldn't need concordats and governments would respect the Church's rights without being told to. But unfortunately this hasn't been the case since the 11th century and so formal agreements are necessary to prevent the worst.

FK And you very much hindered recognition of the Reichskonkordat by de-listing half the relevant info for a huge length of time at great personal cost to me

Str No situation called more for a concordat than the one in 1933. As for peace: what about all the other agreements and treaties with Nazi Germany signed by other countries (UK, France, Italy, Poland, USSR)?

FK I rebel as much or more than you at POV, we both suffer from historiogtaphy, and it interferes with fact here in this interactive space

• Note 'Putsch' has entered the English language, as has 'coup d'etat' or 'Junta'. Accession is used at Holocaust/Jews/ instead of seizure to characterise Nazi ascent to totalitarian power upon consequence of the Enabling Act. EffK 01:44, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

My complaint about "putsch" was tongue-in-cheek.

Str1977 10:51, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

Love you too, but wuh, d'no bout the tongue........