DR. WALTER
GROSS
Head of
the Reich Bureau for Enlightenment on Population Policy and Racial Welfare
Of
all the measures introduced in the new Germany those bearing on National
Socialist racial policy caused the greatest stir internationally, for here was a
State setting its feet upon paths hitherto almost untrodden and leading through
untouched preserves, whose aims were in many respects liable to clash with
established Liberal views. Relevant legislation served to corroborate and
achieve these aims and it was no wonder, therefore, that – in the beginning at
least – this particular phase of National Socialist reconstruction met with
universal misunderstanding and prejudice. We are happy meanwhile to be able to
discern that other nations have come to realise that Germany is, indeed, taking
to new paths, but they are right ones and are necessary and, more than that,
Germany is in many respects blazing a trail for others; mention need only be
made of our law for the prevention of the transmission of hereditary diseases
(Sterilisation Law) which has been followed in Norway, Sweden, Denmark and
Finland by similar laws or draft proposals. However, no one will wholly
understand or sympathise with our legislation who is not wholly familiar with
the fundamental change in the philosophical. conception. of life which has come
with National Socialism in the light of history.
Whereas formerly, and more
especially under the powerful influence of Marxist teachings, the development
and decline of States and civilisations was attributed to economic or purely
political causes, we see to-day the determining role played by the human being
in sustaining and shaping economy, the State, culture, politics, art and
intellectual thought. We have come to feel that the protection and preservation
of the people who, after all, are originally responsible for the achievements of
the State and culture, is the chief factor in retaining these achievements; for
good blood and the strength that comes from good blood is given a people only
once and if allowed to degenerate cannot be regenerated as one would rebuild a
city or restore devastated lands. Thus, wise statesmanship will place the
preservation of the biological, that is, racial energy of its people before its
political and economic concerns. The endless series of past empires and
civilisations which have flourished and declined forcefully remind us how
inexorable are the consequences of ignoring this truth.
History and the study of
the science of population show that there are three biological stages which
inevitably lead to the destruction of the vitality of a people and with it the
destruction of the foundations of the State and culture as such. These three
stages are:
A decreasing population,
An increase of the
hereditary unfit,
The promiscuous mingling of
races.
In these respects,
Germany’s position in 1933 was alarming. A declining birth-rate among the fitter
inhabitants and unrestrained propagation among the hereditarily unfit, the
mentally deficient, imbeciles and hereditary criminals, etc., had led, for
instance, to a state of affairs in which the increase of the healthier section
of the population in the past 70 years was only 50 per cent., while the
unhealthy and, in fact, those only fit to live in asylums, had multiplied
ninefold in the same time, or 450 per cent. The care of the latter costs the
working population of Germany the not inconsiderable sum of 1 billion
reichsmarks yearly, while the entire administrative costs of the Reich,
Provinces and Communes amount to 713 million reichsmarks. It was, therefore, an
act of self-preservation which caused the National Socialist State to promulgate
the Law to prevent the transmission of hereditary disease. It was a measure
taken in self-defence and much more besides. For a large portion of the
hereditary unfit had brought children into the world in ignorance of the
consequences of their own afflictions, and many – those still possessed of a
sense of responsibility – were horrified at seeing the “sins of the fathers”
visited upon their children. To this unfortunate category the National Socialist
State lends a helping hand in freeing them from possible mental torment.
Sterilisation relieves their conscience of the frightful burden of causing
further pain and suffering to innocent beings.
It is frequently claimed
abroad in circles hostile to Germany that the politically undesirable are hauled
up for sterilisation. Anyone versed in German Law and the thoroughness and
precautions attendant on the whole procedure knows full well the absurdity of
such allegations and that no one can be sterilised simply on request or as a
result of political pressure. The law for the prevention of the transmission of
hereditary disease is only applicable in acknowledged cases of physical and
mental deficiency such as congenital idiocy, schizophrenia, manic-depressive
insanity, hereditary epilepsy, chronic St. Vitus dance, hereditary blindness,
deafness and serious bodily defects; in addition, it applies to chronic
inebriates. The procedure in regard to the act of sterilisation can take place
upon application being lodged with the special Court of Heredity by the person
concerned, his relatives, a local physician or such official persons as are
connected with matters of public health. The competent Court, which is composed
of an officiating judge, a medical officer and a doctor, decides whether
sterilisation is called for or not. If the applicant or person under
consideration does not agree with the decision of the Court, an appeal may be
lodged with the Higher Court which has a similar composition as the Lower Court,
although the individuals are never the same. The decision of the Court of Appeal
is final. Even then the operation may be avoided by taking life-long sojourn –
or at least for as long as the faculty of procreation exists – in a private
home, provided such sojourn entails no costs for the Government. This clause was
included in order that possible adherents of the Catholic faith who might have
conscientious objections on the grounds of the Papal encyclical be given the
opportunity of observing their religious tenets at all costs.
These measures of the
National Socialist State, despite their broadmindedness, have been attacked
mainly for political or dogmatic reasons. Such criticism is based on a number of
objections which appear unfounded and extravagant. They may be summarised in
three groups.
The first arises purely
from the individualist standpoint which resents any intrusion into the life of
the individual. According to its advocates, the individual has the right to be
without children if he prefers or, despite obvious hereditary afflictions,
procreate at will, or indeed, by transcending all frontiers and racial barriers,
to contract marriage to his own taste. Fundamentally, that is, any restriction
on the life of the individual demanded by the collective interests of the
community is categorically rejected. Obviously, such an attitude must be
deplored in every State since, if applied in all spheres, it would render
communal and State institutions, both economic and cultural, impossible.
Civilisation is only
possible through the individual becoming part of the whole and just as
collective authority in the interests of all limits the egoism of the individual
by, say, taxation laws or measures to combat epidemics, etc., it similarly has
the right to implement such measures for the benefit of the community as are
scientifically proved expedient in the way of population policy or eugenics. The
need for such action prevailed in Germany.
The second set of
objections is mainly based on humanitarian grounds. It is argued, for instance,
that the act of sterilisation represents such a weighty sacrifice for the person
concerned that society should only accept it if made voluntarily. But it is not
humane that among civilised peoples the standard of living of that section of
the population which is fit and able to work is lowered by burdening it with the
excessive levies necessary for the maintenance of and keeping within its midst
the hereditarily diseased who, despite these heavy costs, can never be healed of
their ailments. After all, the healthy members of the race are also entitled to
a share of compassion and humane considerations.
Nor is it justifiable to
argue that sterilisation will not do away with the possible recurrence of
similar cases. In arguing thus one might just as well refrain from putting out a
fire because another might happen to break out elsewhere at some other time.
Incidentally, sterilisation is and remains a humane duty to the individual. How
great is the mental agony of a person suffering from some hereditary disease in
the pitiful knowledge that not only he himself is incurable but that his
children frequently begotten in ignorance of the complications of his own
trouble, are doomed to a similar or worse fate. Timely sterilisation rids the
hereditarily unfit of such mental torment.
Other objectors insist that
the operation should only be performed with the consent of the individual. It is
foolish, however, to want acquiescence from a human being who has no command
over his morbid instincts or of one who is to be prevented from procreation for
the very reason that he is suffering from some mental debility.
Everywhere in organised
society, justice and morals are bound to interfere with personal liberty to a
greater or lesser extent, even with that of the healthy individual. If an
epidemic breaks out endangering the welfare of the community everyone, whether
he wants to or not,
must be vaccinated;
similarly, just as the doctor takes preventive measures on this score, the
specialist in the sphere of hereditary transmission, both medical and legal,
backed by the knowledge of biological necessities must, if called upon, take
upon his shoulders the responsibility which the individual patient is unable to
bear.
A third and last group
fears lest the suggestion of a biological stratification of society or the
racial classification of humanity should lead to serious conflicts. As to this,
it may be said that racial peculiarities are natural and any social or human
system of differentiation will last only so long as it is in harmony with
natural phenomena. Why, the very knowledge and acknowledgment of the social
claims of the race, of racial hygiene, and its practical application, is
calculated to limit, even prevent wars. For war, even if successful, signifies
biologically an irretrievable loss of the best hereditary tendencies. Since
National Socialist Germany frankly thinks along biological lines she wants
nothing but peace. The National Socialist idea of State is the most peaceful
conceivable, for it of all others sees its duty in the preservation of the pure
racial continuity of its people. Nothing but sheer want of sense could accuse
the new Germany of hankering after war. For we are only too well aware what
irreparable damage has been done and how heavy has been the toll taken of our
people in the way of hereditary values through centuries of retrogressive
selection, declining birth-rate and, finally, through the frightful decimation
of the flower of our manhood in the War. If we need peace and quiet for the
political and economic regeneration of our people tried almost beyond endurance,
we need it doubly so to effect the reconstruction and vital racial aspirations
of our population policy directed along biological lines, for nothing could be
more disastrous than war with its ruthless destruction of the best and
consequent indirect preferential selection of the less valuable.
Even a victorious war is
biologically a loss. The true statesman is aware of this and will never take to
the sword except as a last necessity. Here it becomes manifest that the
national-racial principle – contrary to the aims maliciously attributed to it –
is in itself the surest guarantee for a policy fundamentally peaceful.
Most open to
misinterpretation are National Socialist views on the relations between the
various races of the world. It has been questioned whether the fundamental
racial principles of the new world theory must not breed condescension, even
contempt of people of different race. Quite the contrary; these very principles
offer the very best guarantee for mutual tolerance and for the peaceful
co-operation of all.
We appreciate the fact that
those of another race are different from us. This scientific truth is the basis,
the justification and, at the same time, the obligation of every racial policy
without which a restoration of Europe in our day is no longer practicable.
Whether that other race is “better” or “worse” is not possible for us to judge.
For this would demand that we transcend our own racial limitations for the
duration of the verdict and take on a superhuman, even divine, attitude from
which alone an “impersonal” verdict could be formed on the value or lack of such
of the many living forms of inexhaustible Nature. But we of all people are too
conscious of the inseparable ties of the blood and our own race to attempt to
aspire to such an ultra-racial standpoint, even in the abstract.
History, science and life
itself tell us in a thousand ways that the human beings inhabiting the earth are
anything but alike; that, moreover, the greater races are not only physically
but especially spiritually and intellectually different from each other.
Yesterday one passed this fact by, and in attempting to unify political,
economic, cultural and religious standards for all nations of the earth, one was
sinning against Nature, violating the natural attributes of various racial and
national groups for the sake of a false principle. To-day we bow to the racial
differences existing in the world. We want every type of being to find that form
of self-expression most fitted to its own particular requirements.
The racial principles of
National Socialism are, therefore, the surest guarantee for respecting the
integrity of other nations. It is incompatible with our ideas to think of
incorporating other nationalities in a Germany built up as a result of
conquests, as they would always remain – because of their alien blood and spirit
– a foreign body within the German State. Such foolhardy thoughts may be
indulged in by a world which has as its goal economic power or purely
territorial expansion of its frontiers, but never by a statesman thinking along
organic, racial lines whose main care is the preservation of the greatness and
along with it the essential unity of his people held together by the ties of
blood relationship.
For this reason, we have
nothing in common with chauvinism and imperialism because we would extend to
other races peopling the earth the same privileges we claim for ourselves: the
right to fashion our lives and our own particular world according to the
requirements of our own nature.
And if National Socialism
would wish to see the unrestricted mixing of blood avoided for the individual,
there is nothing in this to suggest contempt. After all, we Germans ourselves,
viewed ethnologically, are a mixture. The National Socialist demand is only that
the claims of the blood and the laws of biology should be more closely observed
in future.
Here again our standpoint
is not so very far removed from that of other people with a sound mental
outlook. The American Immigration Laws, for instance, are based on definite
racial discrimination. The Europeans and the inhabitants of India, the Pacific
Islands, etc., have instinctively held aloof from a mingling of the blood, and
both sides genuinely regard any transgression as very bad form. Nevertheless,
this natural attitude in no way detracts from the possibility of close
co-operation and friendly intercourse. And, speaking on behalf of the new
Germany, let me once more emphasise:
We do not wish our people
to intermarry with those of alien race since through such mingling of the blood
the best and characteristic qualities of both races are lost. But we will always
have a ready welcome for any guests who wish to visit us whether of kindred or
foreign civilisation, and our racial views only lead us to a fuller appreciation
of their essential peculiarities in the same way as we would want our own
peculiarities respected.
On the basis of this
reasoning, the National Socialist State was bound to object to the imperialistic
designs of the Jewish people on German soil. Thus it is purely an internal
concern of the German people who could no longer tolerate the domination – a
result of political errors in the past – of an alien race having neither
sympathy nor understanding for them. During the political regimes of the past
the Jews had managed to obtain an increasing hold on politics, art, culture and
commerce. Since 1910, as many as 13 of them had immigrated every day into
Germany from the East. Thus Berlin had –
32.2 per cent. Jewish
chemists
47.9 ”
“ doctors (60 per cent, panel doctors)
50.2 ”
“ lawyers
8.5 ”
“ newspaper editors
14.2 ”
“ producers and stage managers
37.5 ”
“ dentists
No people on earth with a
vestige of pride in itself and its national honour will be willing to put up
with such domination of the key professions by members of a completely alien
race. At the same time, the Jews were a determining factor in those political
parties which were against any reconstruction on national lines. As to the
so-called State Party, for instance, 28.6 per cent. of its parliamentary members
were Jews, and in the Social Democratic Party the figure was 11.9 per cent. It
is of some political significance that the founders of the German Communist
Party, a branch of the Moscow Comintern, that destructive force, were Karl
Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg, both Jews.
This predominance of alien
influence foreign to the German nature in politics, science and things cultural,
provided the objective for the law for the restoration of professionalism in the
Civil Service and what has since come to be known as the Nuremberg Laws. The
Jews in Germany constitute a group of aliens who can expect to enjoy the
hospitality of the country just like the members of other races. But no
Frenchman would wish to have his leading offices of State occupied by
Englishmen, and no Englishman would want to see the key positions in the
politics, art and culture of his country occupied by, say, Japanese. Who then
can reasonably object to the Germans removing the Jews from the prominent
positions in their country? As to the higher percentage of crime which is an
additional factor of importance in judging the Jewish question in Germany, it
may be mentioned that the majority are immigrants from Eastern Europe, whose
cultural and moral ideas could never be in harmony with those of the German
people. The Nuremberg Laws, therefore, exclude members of the Jewish race from
obtaining Reich citizenship. Persons of mixed parentage – some 300,000 in all –
can become citizens of the Reich, but are excluded from holding office in the
Civil Service, the Army and the medical and legal professions. Exemptions are
possible as provided for in the Laws. The regulation forbidding marriage between
a Jew and a German and making illicit intercourse liable to punishment was
designed primarily with a view to preventing the birth of further individuals of
mixed blood whose fate is a sorry one everywhere in the world, because they are
neither one thing nor the other. For those already in existence a distinction is
made between those having two Jewish grandparents and those with only one. The
former require the approval of the authorities for contracting marriage with
someone of German or allied blood. The latter may not marry a Jew or a member of
the former category. They may only marry people of German blood and their
children are exempt from the restrictive regulations (Army Laws and the Law for
the restoration of professionalism in the Civil Service, etc.). In short, their
children become full members of the German community.
These measures were
necessary because we realised that a nation or a people can only preserve its
culture and its intellectual individuality by keeping the blood pure. It has
been said that “every race is a divine inspiration” – a shaft incidentally aimed
at the racial policy. We would re-join, however, “just because every race is a
divine inspiration, the foremost task of civilisation is to keep that
inspiration pure and reject the least contribution towards detracting from its
purity.”
