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Q. In Document NG-102, Prosecution Exhibit 75,[258] you made the suggestion for a confirmation of sentences by the presidents of the district courts of appeal. Under what circumstances did you make that suggestion?
A. This suggestion to have the sentences by the courts confirmed is in close causal connection with this practice of transferring prisoners to the police.[259] Hitler’s Reichstag speech of April 1942 left no doubt in my mind that these interventions would increase, and my suggestion was to the effect that Hitler should delegate the right, the prerogative which he reserved for himself, to the Ministry of Justice and to the presidents of the district courts of appeal. If this had been achieved, the whole matter would have remained in the hands of the administration of justice, for even the applications for nonconfirmation according to my draft were supposed to be made by the attorneys general who in turn had received instructions from the Ministry.
My letter in regard to this question of confirmation shows again what means I had to use. I could not reveal the real reason if I did not want to be unsuccessful from the very beginning. Bormann, however, in this case saw through my reasons. In a letter from Bormann to Lammers, Bormann writes, this attempt was again a confirmation of the will of the administration of justice to keep these matters in their own hands, as, for example, the question of analogy [analogy provision of article 2, Reich Criminal (Penal) Code], or the extraordinary objection or the nullity plea; but in the Ministry of Justice there was not the will to apply these means with the necessary severity. Above all, Bormann saw clearly that if my draft had become law, Hitler’s right of intervention would have been destroyed with one stroke. All the presidents of the district courts of appeal were supposed to pronounce their decisions in Hitler’s name, and if they had confirmed in the name of Hitler, Hitler could no longer have attacked their opinion. If I may use a common expression, I can say that Bormann, the fox, did not fall for the trap. In that connection, perhaps, I may point out two things. Lammers’ remark in the document shows that I refused to have the Party drawn into this confirmation procedure basically. Furthermore, the document shows how I had to go about such things. These confirmation sentences existed in the case of military courts, that is also in the case of air force courts which were subordinate to the Commander in Chief of the Air Force, that is Goering. Thus, I could count an understanding for my suggestion in the case of Goering, and, therefore, I secured his support through a special oral report on my suggestion.
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CROSS-EXAMINATION
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Mr. LaFollette: Doctor, I would like to go back, now, to Prosecution Exhibit No. 75, which is Document NG-102. Briefly that was the series of letters and correspondence beginning in May 1942, which contains your proposed method of handling clemency matters after Hitler’s speech of 26 April 1942. Do you remember?
Defendant Schlegelberger: Yes, it is a question of confirming the sentences.
Q. Yes. On 6 May 1942, you wrote Dr. Lammers—addressed the letter to Reich Minister Dr. Lammers—