DR. SAUTER: If I understand you correctly, he tried to see to it that the foreign workers who had to work in Germany were supplied as well as was possible with consumer articles: food, shoes, clothes, and so on.
HAYLER: Particularly shoes and clothing; Funk was not the competent authority for food.
DR. SAUTER: Shoes and clothing?
HAYLER: Yes, I have specific knowledge of this. And as a result Funk had considerable difficulty; for the Gauleiter, in view of the great scarcity of goods, did their best to secure supplies for the inhabitants of their own Gaue for whom they were responsible, and in so doing used every means which came to hand. Funk constantly had to oppose the arbitrary acts of the Gauleiter, who broke into the supply stores in their Gaue and appropriated stocks intended for the general use.
DR. SAUTER: Dr. Hayler, do you know whether Dr. Funk—I am still referring to the time when you worked with him—represented the viewpoint that the foreign worker should not be brought to Germany to work here but that rather the work itself should be taken from Germany into the foreign countries so that the foreign worker could perform his work in his home country and remain at home? Please answer that.
HAYLER: I know very well that Funk represented that viewpoint; and it is in accordance with his general attitude, for the political disquiet and dissatisfaction which accompany the displacement of such large masses of human beings temporarily uprooted was in opposition to the policy of appeasement and reconstruction which was definitely Funk’s goal.
DR. SAUTER: I now come to the last question which I wish to put to you, Dr. Hayler. When the German armies retreated and when German territories were occupied by enemy armies, difficulties arose regarding the supplying of these territories with money. At that time Hitler is supposed to have planned a law according to which the acceptance and passing on of foreign occupation money was to be punished even by death. I am not interested now, Dr. Hayler, in finding out why Hitler planned to do this; but I am interested in finding out, if you can tell me, how the Defendant Funk reacted to this demand by Hitler and what success he had.
HAYLER: Two facts can be established in regard to this point, which should be of interest to the Tribunal. I have rarely seen Funk as depressed as at that time, after he had received information about the so-called “scorched earth decree.” I believe he was the first minister to issue at that time two very clear decrees, one from the Ministry of Economics, in which he gave definite instructions that wherever German people were an administration of economy in some sort of form must remain; where it is necessary that people be provided for, the State must continue to provide for these people.
The second decree was issued at the same time by the President of the Reichsbank, in which he decreed that the money market had to be cared for by the remaining offices of the Reichsbank in the same way that economy was to be cared for.
Regarding your question itself, I recall very distinctly that the Führer himself, it was said, had demanded of the Ministry of Economics the issuing of a legal regulation according to which the acceptance of occupation money was forbidden to every German on pain of death. Herr Funk opposed this demand very energetically, I believe with the help of Herr Lammers. He himself telephoned headquarters repeatedly and finally succeeded in having the Führer’s directive withdrawn.