Adolf Hitler Branded Outlaw of Humanity at Garden Trial

Adolf Hitler today stands convicted in the eyes of the world as the arch-tyrant of all time.

Branded as an outlaw by twenty-three speakers at the trial of “The Case of Civilization Against Hitlerism” in Madison Square Garden last night, while the Garden rocked with deafening tumult, the German chancellor was weighed and found wanting.

The High Court of Humanity found the present German government guilty “by its own acts of a crime against civilization.” In the verdict and resolution presented by United States Senator Millard E. Tydings of Maryland Hitlerism was convicted on twenty-one major counts, ranging from instigation of a Twentieth Century Inquisition to enslaving, degrading and insulting the German masses and the people of the world.

Marking the first anniversary of the Nazi coup d’etat, 22,000 American citizens, sitting in judgment on Hitlerism last night, solemnly declared “the National Socialist government of Germany has turned its face against historic progress and the positive blessings and achievements of modern civilization. It has shown itself by doctrine and practice to be the avowed enemy of those methods of peace and freedom by which the march of civilization has been enabled and the progress of mankind accomplished.” A giant overflow crowd outside the Garden hailed the verdict. Millions more heard the judgment broadcast over the radio.

ARRAIGNS NAZI CRIMINALS

Judge Samuel Seabury, scourge of municipal corruption, turned the eyes of civilization to the full significance of Hitlerism in his summation as counsel for public opinion at large His battery of charges reviewed the indictments handed down by the twenty-odd witnesses who preceded him.

“Public opinion as the force, and boycott as the weapon, will break the power of Hitlerism,” Prosecutor Seabury thundered at the conclusion of his stirring summation “It will clear it from the pathway of the developing and advancing civilization which it now obstructs and thus accord to the world the only opportunity it has for the preservation of world peace.”

Dispassionately opening the summation with a review of the meaning of civilization, the counsel averred that. “the meeting which brings us together is no ordinary occasion. We have discussed a momentous issue, the Cause of Civilization against Hitlerism.”

FACTS, NOT PROPHECY

The witnesses for the plaintiff, he maintained, “have not dealt with prophecy, but with facts. He castigated religious persecution and war as “the twin plagues” of mankind, “banners under which Hitlerism is seeking to make its advance.”

Nazi barbarism was appraised by Judge Seabury in its true colors “The hideousness of the events, their promise of further oppressions and their menacing character, threatening the very foundations upon which Western civilization rests, justly alarm all those who are interested in the advancement of that civilization and are opposed to its being disrupted by another fiery ordeal of battle which these Hitler tactics, if not prevented, foreshadow.” Quoting Garrison on slavery, he called the Nazi state the “sum of all villainies,” castigated its fanaticism and sounded the note of public wrath as the higher force which will overcome Hitlerism.

Nazi criminals were arraigned in logical, challenging and consecutive order in the depositions of the witnesses for the plaintiffs, as they were called to the stand by former Secretary of State Bainbridge Colby, who presided at the first trial of its kind in history.

The unique court session was called into being under the auspices of the American Jewish Congress, in cooperation with the American Federation of Labor and more than fifty liberal groups. Nineteen prominent Americans formed the sponsoring committee, while the Governors of thirteen States of the Union joined in sponsoring the collateral indictment of Hitlerism.

OUTRAGED BY BRAUTALITY

“The love of justice, which is the highest attribute of man, has been stirred to its depths by the unending story of outrage and brutality which, despite all efforts at suppression, flows steadily out of Germany,” declared Mr. Colby in his opening remarks. “The truth is mighty and the truth will prevail.”

As a son of the ever-tolerant State of Maryland, Senator Tydings belabored those who “think this meeting vain and illy-conceived,” declaring that “we cannot secure tolerance for ourselves without safeguarding tolerance for others.” Speaking of his resolution, now pending before the Senate, he said, “if it is adopted it will be done in an atmosphere of real friendship to the masses of the German people and it will be within our proper sphere.”

He affirmed the intention of the gathering to continue to keep the crime of Hitlerism “pilloried before all the world, in the fervent hope that, in the councils of the present German government, a calmer view and a more civilized action may evolve.”

Pleading the case of the trade unions, vice-president Matthew Woll of the American Federation of Labor summed up labor’s indictment against Nazism. “The American labor movement,” he repeated, “has declared its unwillingness to have dealings with Germany under present conditions and we stand ready to help German trade unionists regain their rights with every resource at our command.”

THE “HUN” MENACE

Mayor LaGuardia and former Governor Al Smith, witnesses for American public opinion, ripped into the Hitler terror with scathing attacks on the Hun menace to the civilized world. The case of labor was stated by Matthew Woll, vice-president of the American Federation of Labor, representing President William Green, who presented the trade unions indictment. Speaking for the liberals, Professor Raymond Moley charged Hitlerism with throttling progress, while Dr. Stephen S. Wise, honorary president of the American Jewish Congress, delivering an impassioned address, pleaded the cause of the martyrs of the Hitler regime–the scapegoat Jews. Dr. Stanley High, contributor to the Literary Digest and a recent visitor to Germany, arraigned Hitlerism as an expert witness for the writers.

Professor Morley declared that “this is not merely a battle in behalf of Jews. It is a fight for the integrity of American principles,” he said, assailing the Hitler regime which, he added he hated because “it is the enemy of my country, of my faith and of my right to be free.”

Professor Moley then went on to discuss the question of asylum for the refugees from the Hitler terror:

“A certain minor public official, whose name is unimportant,” he said, “was confronted some time ago by a demand that in view of the sacred principle of asylum established and cherished in this country from its origin, certain citizens of Germany should be admitted to this country. He replied that the demand was backed merely by a few small groups along the Atlantic Seaboard, and that he, as a public official, representing the nation, was not impressed. I want the answer to this assertion to be clear and unequivocal.

“It is not a small group or a special interest or even a group of special interests that is concerned in this question, It is the whole American people. It is everybody who is living under the American flag and who loves his country. And with regard to the specific question that the public official was discussing when he made that statement, public opinion broke the bonds of callous bureaucracy and put this country on record once and for all on the question of asylum. That issue has been settled and settled in the only possible American way.”

Called to the stand in the name of American public opinion, Bernard S. Deutsch, president of the Board of Aldermen and of the American Jewish Congress, placed five major crimes at the doors of Nazism. Nine counts were contained in his charge that the Hitler cohorts are attempting to reproduce Hitlerism in the countries of the world. “Hitlerism menaces all that is humane and civilized,” he stated, pleading for the jury of enlightened public opinion to render an unprejudiced verdict that will “serve as an expression of the horror of civilization over what has transpired.”

Mr. Deutsch, the first witness summoned by the presiding officer, was followed by the Rev Arthur J. Brown, chairman of the American Committee on Religious Rights and Minorities, an expert witness for the Protestant Churches. Dr. Brown leveled the indictment of Protestantism against Nazism, appealing to world opinion to voice their protest against one wrongs to which their “oppressed brethren” are boing subjected.

Speaking as a layman, Michael Williams, editor of The Commonweal, voiced the protest of the Catholic laity against the persecution of the Church. He declared that “the pressure of paganism, I believe, is increasing, instead of lessening.” The cause of medicine and scientific progress was taken up by Dr. Llewellys F. Barker, professor emeritus of medicine at Johns Hopkins University, who charged that medicine throughout ## world is threatened by the anti-civilization course of Hitlerism.