Thank you all, the past year’s many newcomers and all of the past years’ veterans. I truly appreciate your interest in the Jackson List, your “forwards,” your recruitments of new subscribers, and your comments.
For your reading in this season, here are some previous Jackson List posts that relate to the holidays:
- “Heartfelt Words, Good Will & Wishes True (1913) (click here)
- “Christmas Cards from Nuremberg (November 1945)” (click here)
- “Lighting the First Candle: Holocaust Film and Chanukah at Nuremberg, 1945” (click here)
- “Holiday Note, Chief to Staff (December 1945)” (click here)
- “Jackson in the Holiday Season” (click here)
- “Christmas Celebration, Nuremberg, 1945” (click here)
- “Jackson on Holiday in Athens, December 22, 1945” (click here)
- “Supreme Court at Christmastime (1951)” (click here)
These and many more posts are on the Jackson List archive site, which is word- and phrase-searchable: http://thejacksonlist.com/. (Thank you, Michael Zhang.)
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On this date in 1945, Justice Jackson, as United States chief of counsel in Nuremberg, was one month into trial work before the International Military Tribunal (IMT), prosecuting the principal Nazi war criminals.
Last month, on the 70th anniversary of the trial’s commencement, I had the honor of participating in the City of Nuremberg’s commemoration event, held in Palace of Justice Courtroom 600, the trial site. After delivering an introductory lecture, I moderated a conversation with three men who worked in the IMT trial process:
- Yves Beigbeder, then an assistant to the French judge;
- Father Moritz Fuchs, then the bodyguard of Justice Jackson; and
- George Sakheim, then a U.S. interpreter and translator.
For streaming video of the event, click here. After welcoming remarks (in German) from Nuremberg’s Lord Mayor and then the Vice President of the Nuremberg Higher Regional Court, my lecture (in English) begins at 16:45, followed by the group conversation (in English) beginning at 30:40.
The conversation was and is, thanks to these great men and their memories, quite wonderful and very powerful. I encourage you, in a quiet time during your (I hope) holiday break, to view it. It shines new light on the enduring importance of the international decision to conduct a Nuremberg trial as the decision makers and participants of 1945 and 1946 did; on the principles that they followed and advanced; on the evidentiary proof that they gathered and presented, for the case and for history; and on how all of that is a young, growing, hopeful part of our time and the years ahead.