Mr. James N. Rosenberg,
New York Allied Jewish Campaign,
Hotel Biltmore,
New York City.
My dear Mr. Rosenberg:
It is with real satisfaction and pride that I accepted the position as one of the Honorary Chairmen of the Allied Jewish Campaign. I was influenced to do this because of my conviction that the money which is to be raised is needed to complete work that was started years ago and that the abandonment of this work at the present time would be leaving undone a job that was well begun.
I am glad to do my modest share in helping to complete a work which we in the United States undertook during the war, continued after the conflict was over and now must bring to a conclusion or risk the charge that we have failed to live up to an obligation—a moral obligation, perhaps, but all the more an obligation on that account. A failure to continue the material assistance to the Jews in Eastern Europe and Palestine would deprive them not only of physical and economic relief but also of spiritual hope. Without spiritual hope we cannot expect a rehabilitation, material or moral, of the peoples themselves.
Six million dollars is needed this year in the United States (two and one half millions of which is New York’s quota) to achieve our object. For the first time in foreign relief there is a unity of American Jews on behalf of the requirements of the Jews overseas. We were the saviors of these people in the time of their greatest economic need. Today they are slowly getting into a position which will mean economic independence. It is our job to make this altogether possible—in other words, to give the final impetus which will help the Jews in Eastern Europe and in Palestine to help themselves.
Sincerely yours,
Arthur Lehman.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
