A later passage shows the authority and power which Streicher held in his Gau:
“According to reports of reliable witnesses Gauleiter Streicher is in the habit of pointing out on the most varied occasions that he alone gives orders in the district of Franconia. For instance, at a meeting in the Colosseum in Nurnberg in 1935 he said that nobody could remove him from office. In a meeting at Herkules Hall, where he described how he had beaten Professor Steinruck, he emphasized that he would not let himself be beaten by anybody, not even by an Adolf Hitler.
“For, this also must be stated here, in Franconia the Gau acts first and then orders the absolutely powerless authorities to approve.” (1757-PS)
That report shows the kind of treatment and persecution which the Jews were receiving in the Gau over which Streicher ruled. It further shows the absolute authority with which Streicher acted in his district.
As a result either of that investigation or of some other matter, Streicher was relieved of his position as Gauleiter in February 1940, but he did not cease from propaganda or from control of his newspaper. In an article written in “Der Stuermer,” on 4 November 1943, Streicher declared:
“It is really the truth that the Jews, so to speak, have disappeared from Europe and that the Jewish reservoir of the East, from which the Jewish plague has for centuries beset the peoples of Europe, has ceased to exist. However, the Fuehrer of the German people at the beginning of the war prophesied what has now come to pass.” (1965-PS).
That article, signed by Streicher, shows that he had knowledge of the Jewish exterminations which were going on in the East. Streicher’s article was written in November 1943. In April 1943 the Warsaw ghetto was destroyed. Between April 1942 and April 1944 more than 1,700,000 Jews were killed in Auschwitz and Dachau. It seems clear from this article that Streicher knew what was happening, perhaps not the details, but the fact that Jews were being exterminated.
(4) Perversion of Youth.
Streicher paid particular attention to the instruction and perversion of the children and youth of Germany. He was not content with inciting the German population. He started to poison the minds of the children at school at the earliest possible date. He continually emphasized the need for teaching children anti-semitism. In a speech as early as June 1925 Streicher said:
“I repeat, we demand the transformation of the school into a national German institution of education. If we let German children be taught by German teachers, then we shall have laid the foundations for the national German school. This national German school must teach racial doctrine.”