In 1935 the Defendant Göring, as President of the Reichstag, made a speech urging that body to pass the infamous Nuremberg race laws. I offer, as Exhibit Number USA-588, our Document 3458-PS, which is an excerpt from Rühle, Das Dritte Reich, Page 257. Göring said:
“God has created the races. He did not want equality and therefore we energetically reject any attempt to falsify the concept of race purity by making it equivalent with racial equality. We have experienced what it means when a people has to live in accordance with the laws of an equality that is alien to its kind and contrary to nature. For this equality does not exist. We have never acknowledged such an idea and therefore must reject it also, as a matter of principle, in our laws, and we must acknowledge that purity of race which nature and providence have destined.”
Again, to show his official attitude, as revealed on 26 March 1938 in a speech in Vienna, I offer, as Exhibit Number USA-437, our Document 3460-PS, starting with Page 348. Göring said:
“I must address myself with a serious word to the city of Vienna. The city of Vienna can no longer rightfully be called a German city. So many Jews live in this city. Where there are 300,000 Jews, you cannot speak of a German city.
“Vienna must once more become a German city, because it must perform important tasks for Germany in Germany’s Ostmark. These tasks lie in the sphere of culture as well as in the sphere of economics. In neither of them can we, in the long run, put up with the Jew.
“This, however, should not be attempted by inappropriate interference and stupid measures but must be done systematically and carefully. As Delegate for the Four Year Plan, I commission the Reichsstatthalter in Austria jointly with the Plenipotentiary of the Reich to consider and take any steps necessary for the redirection of Jewish commerce, i.e., for the Aryanization of business and economic life, and to execute this process in accordance with our laws, legally but inexorably.”
Acting within the framework of economic preparation for aggressive war, the Nazi conspirators then began the complete elimination of Jews from economic life preparatory to their physical annihilation. The Defendant Göring, as head of the Four Year Plan, was in active charge of this phase of the persecution.
The first step in his campaign was the decree of 26 April 1938, requiring registration of all Jewish-owned property. Both Göring and the Defendant Frick signed that law. It is already in evidence.