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Authority and accountability · Claim record

The American Consul General in Berlin reported to Washington on 12 July 1933 that he had read some of the Society’s pamphlets and “can see that objection could reasonably be raised to them by the German Government”, and that although the Society was “acting as a religious society, the pamphlets contain comment of not a purely religious character”. He had told Rutherford that the Consulate General could use its good offices “only to protect the physical property of the organization excluding pamphlets, booklets and brochures which the police had condemned as being anti-revolutionary and communistic in tendency”. On 9 September 1933 the Secretary of State instructed the Ambassador to protest to the German Foreign Office that the Society’s property had been seized and its activities suppressed “by administrative action without judicial process” and to request the restoration of the property, while authorising him to subordinate, as a matter of expediency, the question of resuming the Society’s activities.

Claim ID claim-authority-de33-us-diplomatic-recordConcerns 12 July 1933Independent finding
Independent finding · 12 July 1933 Verified

The American Consul General in Berlin reported to Washington on 12 July 1933 that he had read some of the Society’s pamphlets and “can see that objection could reasonably be raised to them by the German Government”, and that although the Society was “acting as a religious society, the pamphlets contain comment of not a purely religious character”. He had told Rutherford that the Consulate General could use its good offices “only to protect the physical property of the organization excluding pamphlets, booklets and brochures which the police had condemned as being anti-revolutionary and communistic in tendency”. On 9 September 1933 the Secretary of State instructed the Ambassador to protest to the German Foreign Office that the Society’s property had been seized and its activities suppressed “by administrative action without judicial process” and to request the restoration of the property, while authorising him to subordinate, as a matter of expediency, the question of resuming the Society’s activities. Foreign Relations of the United States: Diplomatic Papers, 1933, Volume II, 12 July 1933Foreign Relations of the United States: Diplomatic Papers, 1933, Volume II, 12 July 1933Foreign Relations of the United States: Diplomatic Papers, 1933, Volume II, 9 September 1933

The organisation’s position or later explanation: The organisation's own accounts record that the American State Department acted on its behalf and that the Magdeburg property was returned in October 1933 while the ban on its activities remained.

Show the evidence (3 sources)
Official public record Verified

Foreign Relations of the United States: Diplomatic Papers, 1933, Volume II, “The Consul General at Berlin (Messersmith) to the Acting Secretary of State, No. 1428”

12 July 1933 · pp.409-410 · George S. Messersmith · United States Department of State

“I have gone into the activities of the Society and of its agents, and have read some of the pamphlets which have been distributed by the Society widely in Germany, and I can see that objection could reasonably be raised to them by the German Government. Although acting as a religious society, the pamphlets contain comment of not a purely religious character.”

Messersmith's own assessment, sent to Washington three weeks after the Berlin convention. A separate telegram of the same month states that the Embassy and Consulate General “have considered it impossible to object to ban on activities”.

Official source

Provenance and verification note

Confidence note. Opened on the US Department of State Office of the Historian site on 19 September 2026 and read in full; the companion telegram is document 287 in the same volume.

Accessed. 19 September 2026 · Source ID. src-de33-frus-consulate-view

Official public record Verified

Foreign Relations of the United States: Diplomatic Papers, 1933, Volume II, “The Consul General at Berlin (Messersmith) to the Acting Secretary of State, No. 1428”

12 July 1933 · p.408 · George S. Messersmith · United States Department of State

“The work of the Society has been at an utter standstill in all the states of Germany except Prussia; but on June 24 a decree was issued by the Prussian Ministry of the Interior and signed by Dr. Grauert, the Under Secretary of State in that Ministry. . . . In the decree of June 24 forbidding the activities of the Society throughout Germany, it was also provided that the property be confiscated.”

A despatch from the American Consul General in Berlin reporting on the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society. It records that Rutherford had been in Europe for a number of months, came to Germany “a number of weeks ago” and had a long interview at the Consulate General with Consul Geist, and that it was pointed out to him that the Consulate General “would be unable to make any representations to the German Government regarding the ban that had been put upon their activities and that it could use its good offices only to protect the physical property of the organization excluding pamphlets, booklets and brochures which the police had condemned as being anti-revolutionary and communistic in tendency”.

Official source

Provenance and verification note

Confidence note. Opened on the United States Department of State Office of the Historian site on 19 September 2026 and read in full. Both sentences quoted stand on p. 408 of the printed edition, whose page breaks are marked in the text; the despatch as a whole runs pp. 407-410. The ellipsis stands for three sentences about the copy of the decree enclosed with the despatch, about the legal complexities it raised, and about the powers conferred by the Reich President’s decree of 28 February 1933.

Notes. This confirms from a contemporaneous, non-Witness record that the Prussian ban was decreed on 24 June 1933, the day before the Berlin convention.

Accessed. 19 September 2026 · Source ID. src-de33-frus-messersmith-1428

Official public record Verified

Foreign Relations of the United States: Diplomatic Papers, 1933, Volume II, “The Secretary of State to the Ambassador in Germany (Dodd), No. 111”

9 September 1933 · pp.412-413 · Cordell Hull · United States Department of State

“It is unfortunate that purely administrative action entailing such drastic consequences without other than ex parte proceedings should be taken and maintained in Germany, and that apparently the obligation to administer justice by orderly processes of law has been disregarded. . . . You should request that prompt steps be taken to restore the property to the possession and control of the Society. You are authorized in your discretion to subordinate as a matter of expediency the question of the resumption of the Society’s activities, keeping in mind, however, that the principle upon which a complaint rests regarding this ban on the activities is the same as in the case of the confiscation or destruction of property, namely, the absence of a proper judicial hearing as provided for under Article 12 of the Treaty of 1923.”

A telegraphed instruction from the Secretary of State to the American Ambassador in Berlin, sent two days after the telegram about the burning of the Society’s books. It sets out that the Society was organised under the laws of Pennsylvania, that its property at Magdeburg was taken and its activities suppressed on or about 24 April 1933 “without explanation”, and that “the German authorities have not instituted proceedings in which they are required to specify and prove charges and in which representatives of the Society would be given opportunity to answer and defend”. The material omitted at the ellipsis is the sentence citing Article 12 of the Treaty of 1923 and the sentence instructing the Ambassador to communicate with the German Foreign Office.

Official source

Provenance and verification note

Confidence note. Opened on the United States Department of State Office of the Historian site on 19 September 2026 and read in full. The telegram begins on p. 412 and the passages quoted stand on p. 413, the page break marked in the text falling inside the words “on or about April 24, 1933”.

Corroborated by. src-de33-frus-burning-telegram

Notes. This is the United States protesting the absence of any judicial process, not endorsing the Society’s case on the merits: the same volume carries the Consul General’s opinion that objection to the pamphlets “could reasonably be raised” by the German government.

Accessed. 19 September 2026 · Source ID. src-de33-frus-hull-instruction

Claim page Correct or update

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