GÖRING: Heydrich said that, but I issued a law.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Did you not then say:
“One moment. They will have to pay in any case because Germans suffered damage. There will, however, be a law forbidding them to make direct payments to Jews. They will also have to make payment for damage suffered by Jews, not to the Jews, but to the Minister of Finance.
“Hilgard: Aha.”
GÖRING: I have just said so.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: You accepted Heydrich’s suggestion, which was quite contrary to the one you made?
GÖRING: No, I did not accept Heydrich’s suggestion, but I issued a law to the effect that insurance money due to Jews must be paid to the Minister of Finance, as I did not agree with Heydrich that insurance money should be paid out and then surreptitiously confiscated. I went about it in a legal way and was not afraid to make the necessary law and to take the responsibility for the claims to be paid to the State, that is, to the Minister of Finance.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Well, the Tribunal will judge for itself, we have the evidence.
Now, Hilgard, representing the insurance companies, then raised the question that the amount of glass insurance premium was very important, that glass insurance was the companies’ greatest asset, “but the amount of the damage now caused is twice as high as in an ordinary year,” and he pointed out that the whole of the profits of the German insurance companies would be absorbed, did he not?
GÖRING: Yes.