FOREIGN OPINION
Are there any judges in Leipzig?

The proceedings of the trial brought against the secret organization Consul by the Supreme Court of Leipzig ended yesterday.

The court sentenced the main accused: Hofmann, Killinger, Mueller and Kautter to eight months in prison, taking into account the two months of preventive detention. Six accused were acquitted. The other accused were sentenced to prison terms varying between six and one month.

In the grounds of the judgment, the court states that the accused acted in the interest of the country by creating an organization intended to maintain the law.

As the socialist Vorwaerts observes, this procedure would almost arouse "the impression that these unfortunate accused are the most faithful and the best defenders of the German Republic."

Confidence in the courts of the Republic will not be strengthened by the strange verdict which has just been handed down in Leipzig. When one compares the severity displayed against the communists with the condescension shown towards the organizers of the secret associations, one comes to regret that social-democratic assessors were obliged to attend these scandalous debates without being able to intervene in the least. But one must take it for granted that the German nation, at the next elections, will pronounce its verdict against the members of the Consul association and against a justice system which delights in encouraging such actions against the Republic.

The Berliner Tageblatt declares this judgment scandalous and asks whether there is a republican minister of justice in Germany.

The nationalist press, on the other hand, naturally cries out with joy and declares that nothing remains of the accusation and that the Consul organization emerges absolutely justified by the indictment of the attorney general.