Crime, courts & justice
The Nuremberg trials and the invention of crimes against humanity
12 min
After World War II, the world faced an unprecedented question: how do you put a regime on trial? Trace how Nuremberg built the legal machinery for prosecuting atrocity and shaped international law ever since.
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Show notes
The London Charter established the International Military Tribunal to replace summary executions with formal legal proceedings.
Hersch Lauterpacht shifted international law by prioritizing individual human rights over the traditional shield of state sovereignty.
The war nexus compromise initially limited crimes against humanity prosecutions to actions taken during wartime.
Prosecutors relied on captured Nazi documentation and film footage rather than witness testimony to secure convictions.
The Nuremberg trials rejected the superior orders defense and established individual responsibility for international crimes.
Control Council Law Number Ten eventually allowed for the prosecution of atrocities committed during peacetime.
In this episode
- 1Intro1 min
- 2The Legal Vacuum of 19452 min
- 3Hersch Lauterpacht and the Individual3 min
- 4The Trial of the Major War Criminals3 min
- 5The Nuremberg Legacy and the Rome Statute3 min
- 6Outro1 min
Sources
- Crimes Against Humanity and the Development of International Law | The National WWII Museum | New Orleans
- International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg | Holocaust Encyclopedia
- Crimes Against Humanity, a New Concept in International Law - The Holocaust Today
- The International Military Tribunal | American Experience | Official Site | PBS
- The Nuremberg Trial and the Tokyo War Crimes Trials (1945–1948)
- The Nuremberg Judgment | Origins
- War Crimes Trials | Holocaust Encyclopedia
- Short History Of... - The Nuremberg Trial - BBC Sounds
- The Nuremberg Trials - The Holocaust Today
- The Nuremberg Trials | The National WWII Museum | New Orleans
- The London Agreement & Charter | The National WWII Museum | New Orleans
- London Charter of the International Military Tribunal - Wikisource, the free online library
- Bohuslav Ečer, the UN War Crimes Commission, and the Intellectual History of the Nuremberg Charter | Modern Intellectual History | Cambridge Core
- The Avalon Project : International Conference on Military Trials : London, 1945 - Memorandum to President Roosevelt from the Secretaries of State and War and the Attorney General, January 22, 1945
- The Avalon Project : London Agreement of August 8th 1945
- Charter of the International Military Tribunal - Annex to the Agreement for the prosecution and punishment of the major war criminals of the European Axis ("London Agreement")
- https://um.edu.mt/library/oar/bitstream/123456789/79213/1/Hersch_Lauterpacht_and_early_formulations_of_crimes_against_humanity_2021.pdf
- Historical Origins of ICL vol 1
- The Avalon Project : Judgment : The Law of the Charter
- LEGAL FLOWS: CONTRIBUTIONS OF EXILED LAWYERS TO THE CONCEPT OF “CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY” DURING THE SECOND WORLD WAR | Modern Intellectual History | Cambridge Core
- The Avalon Project : International Conference on Military Trials : London, 1945 - Report to the President by Mr. Justice Jackson, October 7, 1946
- The Avalon Project : Judgment of the International Military Tribunal for the Trial of German Major War Criminals
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