The Nuremberg Principles: The Seven Principles, the Trials and the Law That Followed
At Nuremberg in 1945 and 1946 the victorious powers put the surviving leaders of Nazi Germany on trial, and the judgment settled, for the first time before a tribunal of this kind, that individuals can be punished under international law, and that following orders or holding high office is no shield. In 1950 the United Nations International Law Commission distilled the Charter and the judgment into seven short principles, the Nuremberg Principles. This page sets them out in plain words, shows what the tribunal decided, and follows the law that grew from it: the Genocide Convention, the Geneva Conventions, the tribunals for Yugoslavia and Rwanda, and the International Criminal Court.
1919Trials and tribunals· A trial or tribunal
The Treaty of Versailles
Articles 227 to 230 of the Treaty of Versailles provided for the trial of Kaiser Wilhelm II and of those accused of war crimes. The Kaiser was never tried, and the later Leipzig trials of 1921 were few and mild.
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The seven Nuremberg Principles in plain words
These are the seven principles as the International Law Commission formulated them in 1950, put into everyday language. The wording of the originals is on the United Nations website, linked under the sources.
Principle I: individuals can be punished
Anyone who commits an act that is a crime under international law is responsible for it and can be punished. It is not only states that can break international law.
Principle II: national law is no excuse
It is no defence that the national law did not make the act a crime. If international law forbids it, the person remains responsible.
Principle III: rank is no shield
A person who acted as head of state or as a responsible official is not freed from responsibility because of that position.
Principle IV: following orders is not a defence
Acting on the order of a government or a superior does not remove responsibility, as long as a moral choice was in fact possible for the person.
Principle V: a fair trial
Anyone charged with a crime under international law has the right to a fair trial on the facts and the law.
Principle VI: the three crimes
The crimes named are crimes against peace (planning or waging aggressive war), war crimes (violations of the laws and customs of war) and crimes against humanity (murder, extermination, enslavement, deportation and persecution of civilians).
Principle VII: complicity is a crime
Helping or taking part in a crime against peace, a war crime or a crime against humanity is itself a crime under international law.
What the Nuremberg tribunal decided
Twenty-four men were indicted. One, the industrialist Gustav Krupp, was found unfit for trial, and one, Robert Ley, killed himself before it began, so 22 were tried, one of them (Martin Bormann) in his absence.
| Outcome | Number | Defendants |
|---|---|---|
| Death by hanging | 12 | Goering, Ribbentrop, Keitel, Kaltenbrunner, Rosenberg, Frank, Frick, Streicher, Sauckel, Jodl, Seyss-Inquart and Bormann (in his absence). Goering killed himself the night before the sentences were carried out; ten were hanged on 16 October 1946. |
| Life imprisonment | 3 | Hess, Funk, Raeder |
| Imprisonment for a term of years | 4 | Speer and von Schirach (20 years each), von Neurath (15 years), Doenitz (10 years) |
| Acquitted | 3 | Schacht, von Papen, Fritzsche |
The four counts in the indictment
Count one: a common plan or conspiracy
Planning and carrying out the other crimes together. The tribunal accepted conspiracy only in relation to crimes against peace.
Count two: crimes against peace
Planning, preparing, starting or waging a war of aggression, or a war in breach of treaties.
Count three: war crimes
Violations of the laws and customs of war, such as the killing and ill-treatment of prisoners and of civilians in occupied territory, and plunder.
Count four: crimes against humanity
Murder, extermination, enslavement, deportation and persecution of civilian populations on political, racial or religious grounds.
Questions people ask
What are the Nuremberg Principles?
Seven short statements of international law, drawn from the Charter and judgment of the Nuremberg tribunal and formulated by the United Nations International Law Commission in 1950.
Are the Nuremberg Principles a treaty?
No. They were formulated by the International Law Commission and are not a treaty that states sign. Their substance is widely regarded as part of customary international law, and later instruments, such as the Rome Statute, build on them.
Did Nuremberg invent new law?
That was the main objection of the defence: that crimes against peace and crimes against humanity were punished without a law that existed beforehand. The tribunal answered that the Hague rules and the Pact of Paris already made the acts unlawful, and that justice does not require letting grave crimes go unpunished. The question is still discussed by lawyers and historians.
What is the “following orders” defence?
The defence that a person only obeyed a superior. Principle IV says it does not remove responsibility if the person had a moral choice. It may be taken into account when deciding the sentence.
The story in each strand
Trials and tribunals
From the attempts after the First World War, through the Nuremberg and Tokyo trials and the twelve further Nuremberg trials, to Eichmann in Jerusalem in 1961.
Charters and principles
The London Charter of 1945 defined the crimes; the General Assembly affirmed the principles in 1946; the International Law Commission formulated the seven principles in 1950.
Treaties and conventions
The Hague rules, the Kellogg-Briand Pact, the Genocide Convention, the four Geneva Conventions and the 1968 convention that removes time limits for the gravest crimes.
Courts that came later
Ad hoc tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda in the 1990s, then a permanent court, the International Criminal Court, whose treaty was adopted in 1998.
Every turning point, in order
Trials and tribunals
1919 The Treaty of Versailles
A trial or tribunal
Articles 227 to 230 of the Treaty of Versailles provided for the trial of Kaiser Wilhelm II and of those accused of war crimes. The Kaiser was never tried, and the later Leipzig trials of 1921 were few and mild.
1946 The judgment at Nuremberg
A trial or tribunal
The International Military Tribunal tried 22 men from November 1945 and gave judgment on 30 September and 1 October 1946: twelve death sentences, three of life imprisonment, four of 10 to 20 years, and three acquittals.
1946 The Tokyo trial begins
A trial or tribunal
The International Military Tribunal for the Far East opened in Tokyo in May 1946. It convicted 25 defendants, seven of them sentenced to death, and gave judgment in November 1948.
1947 The further Nuremberg trials
A trial or tribunal
From 1946 to 1949 American military tribunals held twelve more trials at Nuremberg, among them the Doctors’ Trial and the Judges’ Trial.
1961 Eichmann in Jerusalem
A trial or tribunal
Adolf Eichmann was tried in Israel in 1961 for crimes against the Jewish people and crimes against humanity, a national court applying principles drawn from Nuremberg.
Charters and principles
1943 The Moscow Declaration
A principle, charter or UN resolution
The Allies declared that those responsible for atrocities would be sent back to the countries where they committed them, and the major criminals punished by joint decision.
1945 The London Charter
A principle, charter or UN resolution
On 8 August 1945 the four Allied powers signed the Charter of the International Military Tribunal. Article 6 named three crimes: crimes against peace, war crimes and crimes against humanity.
1946 The General Assembly affirms the principles
A principle, charter or UN resolution
On 11 December 1946 the General Assembly unanimously affirmed the principles of international law recognised by the Charter and the judgment of the Nuremberg tribunal.
1947 The Commission is asked to formulate the principles
A principle, charter or UN resolution
The General Assembly asked the International Law Commission to formulate the principles recognised in the Charter and judgment, and to draft a code of offences against peace and security.
1950 The seven Nuremberg Principles
A principle, charter or UN resolution
The International Law Commission adopted its formulation of the Principles of International Law Recognised in the Charter of the Nuremberg Tribunal and in the Judgment of the Tribunal.
Treaties and conventions
1907 The Hague Conventions
A treaty or convention
The Hague Conventions of 1899 and 1907 set down laws and customs of war on land, the rules later used to define war crimes.
1928 The Kellogg-Briand Pact
A treaty or convention
Dozens of states renounced war as an instrument of national policy in the Pact of Paris of 1928, which the Nuremberg judges later cited.
1948 The Genocide Convention
A treaty or convention
The Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide was adopted on 9 December 1948 and entered into force in 1951.
1949 The four Geneva Conventions
A treaty or convention
The Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949 protect the wounded, the shipwrecked, prisoners of war and civilians, and require states to punish grave breaches.
1968 No time limit
A treaty or convention
The Convention on the Non-Applicability of Statutory Limitations to War Crimes and Crimes Against Humanity was adopted in 1968, so that these crimes cannot lapse through time.
1977 The Additional Protocols
A treaty or convention
Two Protocols of 1977 added to the Geneva Conventions, strengthening the protection of civilians and of victims of non-international armed conflicts.
Courts that came later
1993 The Yugoslavia Tribunal
A court set up later
The Security Council created the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in 1993, the first international war crimes court since Nuremberg and Tokyo.
1994 The Rwanda Tribunal
A court set up later
The Security Council created the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda in 1994 to try genocide and other serious violations committed that year.
1998 The Rome Statute
A court set up later
States adopted the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court on 17 July 1998. It covers genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes and the crime of aggression.
2002 The International Criminal Court begins
A court set up later
The Rome Statute entered into force on 1 July 2002 and the permanent International Criminal Court, seated at The Hague, began its work.
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