Saint v. Jew

Splashed on the front pages of Nazi newsorgans in Germany last week was not the story which the rest pf the world was devouring (see p. 14) but the Homeric tale of that martyr, Nazi Leader Wilhelm Gustloff, who is a likely candidate for canonization when the Paganists in Germany can spare time from their baiting of Jews and Christians to develop a ritual.

In the chill afternoon of Feb. 4 last, Saint Gustloff was sitting in his home in Switzerland where for many years he had been spreading the Germanic gospel as a Nazi missionary. Suddenly the door opened and in walked a 26-year-old Yugoslav youth, David Frankfurter, whose blue eyes and rosy cheeks gave him the appearance of a respectable Aryan. As he entered the room he heard Saint Gustloff spitting into the telephone: "Ah, these pigs of Jews and Communists, we will see an end of them!" This was too much for David Frankfurter, who calmly plucked a revolver from his pocket, shot five deadly bullets into the body of the saintly missionary. Into the room rushed the Saint's wife screaming, "Why did you do that?" David held his peace. ''Why did you do that?" she screamed again. Replied David Frankfurter quietly, "Because. I am a Jew."

At Chur, Switzerland, last week Jew Frankfurter stood trial before five sombre-robed judges whose duty was to decide whether or not he had shot Saint Gustloff "in high emotion born of natural cause." If he had acted "in high emotion" the killing would be condoned under Article 50 of the Swiss Criminal Code. With the air of one enjoying the star part in a stage play, David Frankfurter declaimed: "I read Der Stunner, that notorious anti-Semitic German organ, in which there are written things too revolting for any human being to endure whether he be Jew or Gentile. I decided, however, not to assassinate Chancellor Adolf Hitler and Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels because it would cause too great suffering among the Jews in Germany." David then willingly admitted that he had once scribbled on the back of a cigaret package the following note in Slavic "to serve him as a reminder": ''I am going out to do one or two shootings. The time for judgment has arrived."

Into the courtroom stalked black-gowned Widow Gustloff to give her evidence. Immediately 24 Nazis jumped to their feet, raised their right arms in the Nazi salute. Next witness was the Swiss State's alienist. Dr. J. B. Joerger. The common-sense people of Switzerland have no time for rival alienists who dispute interminably the sanity of a prisoner. They appoint one man like Dr. Joerger whose opinion is final. "Frankfurter suffers mental and physical disturbances, factors causing limitation of responsibility."

Meantime the Swiss Federal Council was fearful that Dictator Hitler might produce his big stick and drub Switzerland. As a Chicago Daily News headline put it, the Saint Gustloff murder case had become a "trial of Jews, Nazis and Switzerland itself." Eager to convince the furious Fuehrer that they were on the right side of the Nordic fence, the Federal Council last week introduced a drastic, antiCommunist bill making even the most innocent Swiss flirtations with Moscow a penal offense.

Since capital punishment does not exist in the Canton of Grisons where Frankfurter's trial took place, the Swiss court appeased the Nazis as best they could by bringing in a verdict of guilty, sentencing the Jew to 18 years' imprisonment.

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