LAMMERS: Well, to say no authority goes too far. I mean in respect to politics...
MAJOR JONES: But, they were of an extremely limited character. That is what you are saying to the Tribunal, isn’t it?
LAMMERS: In the main they were administrative chiefs in their ministries. They were not political ministers who were consulted in regard to large-scale political matters.
MAJOR JONES: Less authority than the ministers of Germany had under the previous Constitution?
LAMMERS: That, beyond doubt, was the case, for under the former Constitution votes were taken and the minister could at least give expression to his authority by voting against something in the Cabinet.
MAJOR JONES: I am now going to put to you some observations which you yourself made in 1938 about the powers of ministers in the Führer’s State. I am referring to Document 3863-PS. This is your comment on the Staatsführer in the Third Reich:
“From this basic total concentration of supreme power in the person of the Führer there results, however, no excessively strong and unnecessary centralization of administration in the hands of the Führer. In my general elaborations on the basic concept of the Führer State I have already pointed out that the respect for the authority of the subordinate leader”—Unterführer—“by those beneath him forbids interference with every one of his individual orders or measures. This principle is applied by the Führer in his governmental leadership in such a manner that, for example, the position of the Reich ministers is actually a much more independent one than formerly, even though today the Reich ministers are subordinate to the Führer’s unlimited power of command, in respect to their entire official sphere and in respect to every individual measure and decision on the most trivial matters. Eagerness to bear responsibility, resolution, energy, coupled with initiative and real authority, these are the qualities which the Führer demands above all of his subordinate leaders. Therefore he allows them the greatest freedom in the execution of their affairs and in the manner in which they fulfill their tasks. He is far from exercising petty or even nagging criticism.”
That is a picture of the power of Reich ministers, which is very different from the picture you are painting to the Tribunal, is it not?
LAMMERS: In my opinion there is not the least contradiction. All I am saying here is that every minister normally had no say in respect to large-scale politics. In his own sphere however, he was the supreme administrative chief. I explained here that as a subordinate leader he had the widest powers, insofar as the Führer had left him those powers, and that the Führer did not narrow-mindedly interfere with these powers. He did not think of doing that. This concerns matters of second- and third-grade importance; large-scale politics were not discussed here.
MAJOR JONES: You see, your picture of the administration of this vast State of Nazi Germany is a picture of one man deciding all principal matters himself out of his own intuitive powers. Is that the picture you seek to present to this Tribunal?