The statement of offense under Count Two of the Indictment is also relevant at this point. It must be obvious that essentially Counts One and Two interlock in this Indictment. The substance of the offense stated under Count Two, Paragraph V of the Indictment is this:
“All the defendants with divers other persons, during a period of years preceding 8 May 1945, participated in the planning, preparation, incitation, and waging of wars of aggression which were also wars in violation of international treaties, agreements, and assurances.”
The emphasis in the statement of offense under Count One of the Indictment is on the Common Plan or Conspiracy. The emphasis under Count Two of the Indictment is on the substantive crimes to which the conspiracy related and which were committed in the course of and pursuant to that conspiracy.
I should hasten to add at this point that in the division of the case as between the Chief Prosecutors of the four Prosecuting Governments, primary responsibility for the presentation of evidence supporting Count One has been placed on the American prosecutor, and primary responsibility for the presentation of the evidence supporting Count Two of the Indictment has been placed on the British prosecutor.
But as we shall show somewhat later, there will to some extent be a cooperative effort as between the two prosecutors to present certain phases of both counts together. In addition to the statement of offense relating to illegal war in Paragraph III under Count One of the Indictment, Count One also contains what amounts to a bill of particulars of that offense. In so far as those particulars relate to illegal war, they are contained in Paragraph IV (F) of the Indictment which is set out in the English text on Page 7 through the top of Page 10 under the general heading “Utilization of Nazi Control for Foreign Aggression.” The allegations of this bill of particulars have been read in open court, in the presence of the defendants, and the Tribunal, as well as the defendants, are certainly familiar with the contents of those allegations. I call attention to them now, however, in order to focus attention on the parts of the Indictment which are relevant in consideration of the evidence which I intend to bring before the Tribunal.
My introduction to the presentation of evidence in this matter would be faulty if I did not invite the Tribunal to consider with me the relationship between history and the evidence in this case. Neither counsel nor Tribunal can orient themselves to the problem at hand—neither counsel nor Tribunal can present or consider the evidence in this case in its proper context, neither can argue or evaluate the staggering implications of the evidence to be presented—without reading that history, reading that evidence against the background of recorded history. And by recorded history, I mean the history merely of the last 12 years.
Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, of the U. S. Supreme Court, found in his judicial experience that “a page of history is worth a volume of logic.” My recollection is that he stated it perhaps better, earlier in the preface to his book on the common law where he said, I think, “The life of the law has been not logic but experience.” I submit that in the present case a page of history is worth a hundred tons of evidence. As lawyers and judges we cannot blind ourselves to what we know as men. The history of the past 12 years is a burning, living thing in our immediate memory. The facts of history crowd themselves upon us and demand our attention.
It is common ground among all systems of jurisprudence that matters of common knowledge need not be proved, but may receive the judicial notice of courts without other evidence. The Charter of this Tribunal, drawing on this uniformly recognized principle, declares in Article 21:
“The Tribunal shall not require proof of facts of common knowledge but shall take judicial notice thereof.”
The facts of recorded history are the prime example of facts of common knowledge which require no proof. No court would require evidence to prove that the Battle of Hastings occurred in the year 1066, or that the Bastille fell on the 14th of July 1789, or that Czar Alexander I freed the serfs in 1863, or that George Washington was the first President of the United States or that George III was the reigning King of England at that time.