Document No. 1678-PS
International Military Tribunal · 1900AUTHOR — International Military Tribunal
Nazi Conspiracy and Aggression Volume IV
Document No. 1678-PS
TRANSLATION OF DOCUMENT 1678-PS
DOCUMENTS OF GERMAN POLITICS, VOLUME 5, PAGES 372, 373 AND 376
Statement of accounts of the Reich Organization Leader of the NSDAP, Dr. Ley, at the 5th yearly session of the German Labor front in Nurnberg, on 11 September 1937.
In speaking of "Soldiers of Labor" I have to demand that such soldiers of labor exist in reality. I have to demand that everybody march at the same cadence and in the same spirit. The factory-community is only then complete when every manager takes his place as an ordinary work-crew member among his crew. We shall not rest or relax before this is accomplished. Otherwise everything would be reduced to beautiful phrases resulting only in beer sessions and distribution of cigarettes. No, same cadence and stride, same pack and same marching, then no outward distinction betwen the entrepreneur and the worker shall exist anymore, and sometimes a worker might even look better from a racial point of view than the entrepreneur. And if the latter was adequately polished and drilled, he will lose his feeling of superiority and "curse" exactly like the others. That is necessary, and with this I come to another point.
My collaborators and myself found no rest. We too wanted to to have laws and legal foundations, I was constantly pursued with that request. I asked the Fuehrer myself: "My Fuehrer, can't we too get a law?"
The Fuehrer refused. That's why I say: He was of greatest help to us. Had the Fuehrer given in at the time, we would be in bad shape now. The Fuehrer said: "I think it's wrong. For once I want you to make a law through habit in Germany. For once I want to try if it isn't possible in Germany to set up an authority without having to issue laws and decrees on the part of the State. it must be possible to create a great institution and establishment, based only on a law through habit and it must be possible to make this law through habit of a much greater force than any other law and justice."
Once I said to the Fuehrer: "My Fuehrer, actually I am standing with one foot in jail, for today I am still the trustee of the comrades "Leipart" and "Imbusch", and should they some day ask me to return their money, then it will be found that I have spent it, either by building things, or otherwise. But they shall never again find their property in the condition in which they handed it over to me. Therefore I would have to be convicted."
The Fuehrer laughed then and remarked that apparently I felt extremely well in this condition.
It was very difficult for us all. Today we laugh about it.
We have only 70,000,000 altogether. Therefore we must use everybody. We have work for at least 300,000,000 and that figure is increasing from year to year. We must have new space. We want to repeat that again and again. We have told the world often enough. We are a people without space and we shall never forget that factor in all our social measures.
We need space, and we must never give this up in all our measures. We must never lose sight of that. That's why we need a healthy people and healthy men.
We succeeded-and this is about the most important accomplishment for the German Labor Front-in eliminating the association-character of the tradeunions and the employer-associations, and for it we have substituted the conception "Soldier of Labor" \[Soldat der Arbeit\].
Source:<br>Nazi Conspiracy and Aggression Volume IV<br>Office of the United States Chief Counsel for Prosecution of Axis Criminality<br>Washington, DC : United States Government Printing Office, 1946