The next Hoheitsträger were the Zellenleiter, the political leaders of a group from four to eight city blocks, or of a corresponding group within country districts, and then follow the Blockleiter, the political leaders of from 40 to 60 households.
Now, each of these political leaders, of these Hoheitsträger, or bearers of sovereignty, was directly responsible to the next highest leader in the Nazi hierarchy. The Gauleiter was directly responsible to the Führer himself; the Kreisleiter was directly responsible to the Gauleiter, the Ortsgruppenleiter to the Kreisleiter, and so on.
The Führer himself reserved to himself, in accordance with the philosophy that runs through the Party, the right to name all Führer. It was he, personally, that named the Reichsleiter, all members of the Party Directorate. It was he that appointed all Gauleiter and Kreisleiter and all political leaders, down to the grade of Gauamtsleiter, which was a lower classification of political leader within the Party organization of the Gau.
These Hoheitsträger, together with the Reichsleitung, constituted the all-powerful group of leaders by means of which the Nazi Party reached right down into the lives of the people, consolidated its control of them and compelled them to conform to the National Socialist pattern. For this purpose broad powers were given to them, including the right to call upon all Party formations to effectuate their plans. They could requisition the services of the SA and of the SS, as well as of the HJ and of the NSKK. If I may direct your attention, for the moment, to the Party organizations that appear at the extreme left of the chart, I would just like to say that structurally these organizations were organized regionally to accord with the offices and regions controlled by the Hoheitsträger. If I might be more explicit, let us take the SA. The subsidiary formations of the SA came down and corresponded, in its lower organizations, to the Gau, so that we have a Gauleitung in the SA, and further down, to the Kreis, so that we have a Kreisleitung in the SA, so that the Gauleiter and the Kreisleiter, to cite two examples, charged with a particular duty by the Führer, could call on these organizations for assistance in carrying out their tasks.
These sinister implications of the use of this power will become more apparent as the Prosecution’s case develops, and as the wealth of evidentiary material is introduced into evidence to prove the criminality of the defendant organizations.
The component Party-organizations, called “Gliederungen” within the Party, are shown at the extreme left of the chart, and are the organizations to which I directed the attention of Your Honors a moment ago. These organizations actually constitute the Party itself, and substantially the entire Party-membership is contained within these organizations. The four principal organizations are sometimes referred to as “para-military” organizations. They were uniformed organizations and they were armed. These organizations were the notorious SA and SS, which are named as party-defendants in this case, the HJ (Hitler Youth), and the NSKK—the Motor Corps of the Party (Kraftfahrkorps). Then there were also the National Socialist Women’s Organization, the National Socialist German Students’ Bund (Nationalsozialistischer Deutscher Studentenbund), and the National Socialist University Teachers’ Organization (Nationalsozialistischer Dozentenbund).
There are additional organizations that were officially designated within the Party, as affiliated organizations, not Gliederungen or controlled organizations, but affiliated organizations (Angeschlossene Verbände der NSDAP). Among those organizations we have the German Labor Front (Deutsche Arbeitsfront)—the DAF; we have an organization that controlled the civil service (Reichsbund der Deutschen Beamten). There were the physicians within the National Socialist Deutscher Ärztebund; there were the teachers in the National Socialist Lehrerbund; there were the lawyers within the National Socialist Rechtswahrerbund, of which, at one time, the Defendant Frank was the head.
There is another group of organizations which was officially known as supervised organizations (Betreute Organisationen der NSDAP), organizations that included certain specialized women’s organizations (Deutsches Frauenwerk), certain student societies (Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Studentenschaft), former university students (Altherrenbund der Deutschen Studenten). There was a group that had reference to the German communes (Nationalsozialistischer Deutscher Gemeindetag), and there was a Reichsbund für Leibesübungen that interested itself in controlling all those interested in physical exercise.
According to the official Party designations applicable to the various organizations and associations that controlled German life there was a fourth category, which is the last organization that appears to the right on the chart before Your Honors, which is sometimes simply called “Weitere Nationalsozialistische Organisationen”, and here, in some respects, we are in “No man’s land”, because the Party was not static, it was dynamic and our latest information is now to the effect that the organizations that ordinarily came within this category, well-known organizations like the RAD (Reich Labor Service) and the NSFK (the National Socialist Fliegerkorps) or Flying Corps may no longer be included there. At least that was the opinion of the Party treasurer, who certified to this chart.
I think with these few remarks, I have given some general impression of the structure of the Party, with which we are dealing in this proceeding before Your Honors.