Robert H. Jackson Center

Robert H. Jackson Center Dynamic programs, exclusive exhibits, and curated collections housed in an historic 1858 mansion

08/29/2026

in - August 29, 1946 - Trial Day 214:
Sir David Maxwell-Fyfe opened the Prosecution's rebuttal to the organizations' defense, dismissing warnings that a criminal declaration would forever brand ordinary members and asking bluntly of the guilty, "ought they not to be so branded?"

He tore into the defense witnesses' denials as incredible, noting that Morgen had described Dachau as "a recreation camp," and quoting Himmler's own wartime address to the Waffen-SS boasting of the "toughness... to shoot thousands of leading Poles."

After the recess, Thomas J. Dodd rose to deliver the United States' closing argument on the organizations, opening, warning that stripping the conspirators of these organizations would have been fatal to their plans: "Take away the SA and they would have lost the mastery of the streets; take away the SS and they would have had no concentration camp system; take away the Gestapo and they would have had no means of illegal arrest and unlimited detention."

Dodd dismissed the organizations' defense counsel for blaming each other in turn, the Gestapo pointing to the SS, the SS to the SD, the SD back to the Gestapo, countering flatly that "all of these executive agencies participated in the commission of these vast crimes against humanity."

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08/28/2026

in — August 28, 1946 — Trial Day 213:
A letter from General Warlimont was read into the record, recounting Colonel Buerker’s statement that in autumn 1943 three officials proposed extending bacteriological research beyond purely defensive purposes. According to Buerker, when the matter reached Field Marshal Keitel, Keitel became “extremely angry” and declared that such measures had long been forbidden and were out of the question.

Counsel Kubuschok then opened the closing plea for the Reich Cabinet, arguing that declaring the Cabinet a criminal organization would in practice condemn individual ministers without separately proving each minister’s personal guilt.

Kubuschok invoked constitutional scholarship, including Bieberstein’s 1930 work, to argue that German constitutional practice did not recognize English-style “cabinet solidarity”; ministers, he argued, bore personal rather than collective responsibility.

He traced Hi**er’s absorption of the Reich President’s powers after the Enabling Act and argued that ministers who tried to break with the regime faced direct consequences: Schacht was sent to a concentration camp, while Popitz was executed for his role in the 20 July 1944 plot.

08/28/2026

in — August 27, 1946 — Trial Day 212:
Counsel Laternser tried to call Colonel Buerker to challenge witness Schreiber's bacteriological-warfare testimony from the day before, but Soviet prosecutor Pokrovsky objected that Schreiber had already been sent back to his POW camp and that the new witness "does not... refute the fact itself that there was a secret session of the OKW."

The President signaled how close the organizational case was to closing, telling counsel the Tribunal expected "to finish the entire hearing of the case this week, certainly by Saturday evening."

Counsel Gawlik opened the SD's legal argument, contending that Article 9 of the Charter created new law that could not apply retroactively, and that only Defendant Kaltenbrunner's own SD membership could ever justify condemning the organization as a whole.

American Tribunal member Francis Biddle pressed Gawlik in rapid exchange over his analogy to the "Sedition Law" of 1940, walking him through why, under that precedent, a finding against one member could not bind the case against another.

08/27/2026

🎶 Lucas West finalist on The Voice, will perform two unforgettable sets at the Center at Jackson After Dark!

Join us Saturday, September 12, 2026 | 6–9 PM at the Jackson Center for an evening of live entertainment, craft cocktails, hors d'oeuvres, and fellowship. 🎟️ Get your tickets now at RobertHJackson.org — we'll see you there!

Thank you to our sponsors: Evans Wines & Liquors, Wicked Warren's, Johnson Estate Winery, and M&T Bank. Special performances by Sukanya Burman Dance and others.

08/26/2026

in — August 26, 1946 — Trial Day 211:
Soviet-called witness Major General Walter Schreiber, a military bacteriologist, testified that a secret 1943 OKW conference put Göring in charge of preparing bacteriological warfare, leading to an institute near Posen under Deputy Reich Physicians' League chief Blome for large-scale bacterial cultivation.

Schreiber also described Luftwaffe freezing experiments on Dachau inmates, recalling that the presenting doctor, Kramer, told his audience that Göring had ordered the tests and that Himmler had "kindly made available the subjects for the experiments."

In the afternoon, counsel Pelckmann opened the SS closing plea by quoting Churchill's own 1938 letter to Hi**er wishing England "a man of your strength of will and spirit," arguing the world's own flattery of the regime had confirmed ordinary SS men's belief in its legitimacy.

Pelckmann also attacked the reliability of prosecution witnesses on SS identification, describing how one witness misidentified two men in a photograph as SS based on their uniforms, when a second witness immediately recognized the insignia as belonging to the ordinary Police.

25 Years of Asking Questions: What Is Justice?Join us September 9 at 6:00 PM at the Robert H. Jackson Center for a lectu...
08/25/2026

25 Years of Asking Questions: What Is Justice?

Join us September 9 at 6:00 PM at the Robert H. Jackson Center for a lecture with Hon. Stephen J. Sfekas, Senior Judge of the Circuit Court for Baltimore City and host of the podcast "Trials That Shaped Us."

From Nuremberg to modern war crimes, from Supreme Court decisions to local community courts, what does justice really mean? Judge Sfekas explores the question, and what Justice Robert H. Jackson's view of the law still has to teach us today.

Thanks to our series sponsor, Southern Chautauqua Federal Credit Union for their support.

roberthjackson.org/events

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☎️ (716) 483-6646

08/25/2026

Something is brewing for Jackson After Dark...

Thanks to our sponsor, Wicked Warren's, busy crafting a new honey amber lager to celebrate Justice Robert H. Jackson's legacy and the Center's 25th anniversary.

Join us September 12 at the Kent Mansion for an evening honoring 25 years of RHJC, featuring live music from Lucas West and performances by the Sukanya Burman Dance Company and others.

Tickets on sale at roberthjackson.org

08/23/2026

in — August 23, 1946 — Trial Day 210:
Counsel Servatius opened the Political Leadership Corps' closing plea, arguing over Bormann's May 1944 circular ordering Party officials to tolerate the lynching of downed Allied fliers, insisting the Gauleiter who testified had quietly refused to pass the order down to their Kreisleiter.

Servatius spent long stretches disputing whether lowly Blockleiter and Zellenleiter truly counted as "Hoheitstrager," bearers of authority, on par with Gauleiter, prompting the President to press him repeatedly on what the argument actually meant.

In the afternoon, counsel Merkel opened the Gestapo's closing plea by distancing the organization from the Einsatzgruppen's mass killings, quoting the witness Naujocks stating flatly, "I cannot identify Muller with the organization of the Gestapo."

Merkel also addressed the shooting of recaptured Royal Air Force officers from the Sagan camp escape under the so-called "Kugel-Erlass," calling it one of the war's "most regrettable and dishonorable things" while arguing it was a special case, not typical Gestapo conduct.

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