Streicher was asked by a Russian interrogator whether he had been dismissed from his office because of moral delinquency and therefore it is necessary to have the file on this disciplinary case produced. This file shows that Streicher was not dismissed from his school post because of indecent conduct, but because of his political attitude. That is one point. And quite apart from that is the matter in which Lothar Streicher is supposed to act as a witness. That was the matter mentioned in the report of the Göring commission concerning the three young delinquents who were visited by Streicher, and on which occasion he is supposed to have been guilty of indecent manipulations or gestures.
I come now to the question of Dr. Bischof, Mr. President. This matter concerns the following: Streicher is accused, with reference to quotations from the Talmud, or quotations referring to ritual murder, either of having consulted an incorrect translation, or of not having ascertained facts sufficiently, in a frivolous and grossly negligent way.
THE PRESIDENT: When you say, Dr. Marx, that he is being reproved with that, there is no such charge in the Indictment. No such charge has been made in the course of the case of the Prosecution. The charge against him is that he provoked the German people to excesses against the Jews, not by misquoting some Jewish book, but by referring to Jewish books of the Middle Ages.
DR. MARX: I take the liberty of drawing attention to the fact that, on the contrary, the Prosecutor, Lieutenant Colonel Griffith-Jones, when he presented the case against Streicher, referred to this point explicitly and accused Streicher of having here, against better knowledge, quoted passages from the Talmud. And consequently, it is important that this file against Holz is consulted, because in it is established, by the witness Dr. Bischof, how the quotations came about. This Dr. Bischof is a recognized scholar. But, Mr. President, the whole matter could still be shortened if the Prosecution would state today that this whole matter regarding the ritual murder is not to be made a subject of the Indictment. There would then be eliminated from the trial an element which could only extend it in any case, and which can play no important part against the defendant anyhow, and has nothing to do with the actual Indictment.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: I want to make that position perfectly clear. The important point in the case for the Prosecution is the use of the suggestion against the Jews that they committed ritual murder. If someone takes something out of a book in the Middle Ages and reproduces it so that it will be understood by the ordinary reader as being a practice of Jews, or a reason for disliking Jews, then the Prosecution says that that is an evil method of stirring up hatred against the Jews. Whether anyone can find in the Jewish book of the Middle Ages some remark about ritual murders is really immaterial. The gravamen of the case for the Prosecution is using the ritual murder accusation as a method for stirring up hatred against the Jews today. That is the case which the defendant has to meet.
THE PRESIDENT: We will consider the application.
DR. MARX: I beg your pardon! I consider it necessary, nevertheless, to answer at least very briefly the statements of the preceding speaker, Sir David Maxwell-Fyfe. The fact is that the special number of Der Stürmer under discussion makes reference in particular to a trial which took place in 1899 at Piseck, in Moravia or Bohemia, and during which this question also figured. It is thus not true that the Defendant Streicher had as his basis only medieval superstition, but on the contrary, that he dealt with material taken from modern legal history, using material, the genuineness of which I cannot establish, but which I cannot simply dispose of as incorrect and which the Tribunal also would probably have to investigate. That is why I said that this entire matter ought not to be touched at all. For here it is a question merely of whether Streicher was acting in good faith or not, and if he can say that trials of that kind have taken place and the judges actually were not unanimous, then one cannot say in fact that he acted against his better knowledge. That is what is essential in this matter. Thus, I personally would prefer to have this matter eliminated, if the Prosecution would no longer consider this whole subject matter as part of the Indictment.
THE PRESIDENT: We will consider the application.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: The next one on the list that I have, My Lord, is an application by the Defendant Göring for a Major Buex; spelled “B-u-e-x.” I asked Dr. Stahmer and he was good enough to tell me that that was the same gentleman who was asked for as a witness by the Defendant Jodl, under the spelling of “B-u-e-c-h-s.” I understand the Tribunal has granted him as a witness to the Defendant Jodl, and Dr. Stahmer will have the opportunity of asking him the questions then.
DR. STAHMER: I agree.