Complete Text of the Jewish Community Law Adopted by Jugo-slavia

In view of the fact that the question of legalization of the Jewish communities is at present a topical problem in many of the States created by the Peace Conference, and that revision of the existing regulations is being carried out in Italy, Germany and other countries, the Jewish Daily Bulletin publishes the full text of the law as promulgated by King Alexander I of Jugoslavia. The question of whether the Jewish community should be recognized as a national or religious body is one of the outstanding problems in many of these countries. The Jugoslavian law attempts to combine in its provisions recognition of both the secular and the religious character of the Jewish community.

Drawing attention to the conditions prevailing in Poland, Roumania and Palestine, the “Paix et Droit,” organ of the Alliance Israelite Universelle, points to Jugoslavia as “a favorable exception.” “Thanks to the authority and liberalism of the King,” the paper says, “a new law has been adopted which regulates the status of the Jewish communities in a very broad-minded spirit. Complete equality of rights has long existed between the citizens without any difference of ethnical or religious origin. This measure has been extended to the religious collectivity and the Israelitic cult. It has been placed, not only from the budgetary viewpoint but also in every other regard, on the same level as the Christian cults.

“The law authorizes the Federation of Communities, recognizes the financial and cultural autonomy of the Orthodox communities; it exonerates the rabbis and all functionaries of the cult from all obligations which are prohibited by the Jewish religion; it provides for leave for the soldiers and the students during the Jewish holidays—in short, the Jews of Jugoslavia congratulate themselves on this new law and they display sincere gratitude to the King, who wished to accord them the maximum of freedom, the maximum of welfare and protection.”