A strong defense of the anti-Semitic policies of the Nazi regime in Germany was made here last night by Dr. Hans Luther, German ambsasador to this country. Speaking before over a thousand people attending the 67th anniversary of the Wartburg Orphans Farm School, Dr. Luther asserted that these policies were political and not religious.
Prejudice against the Jews, he said, was due to their tendency toward movements of a communistic nature, and to the fact that nearly fifty percent of the government officails have been Jews, although the total Jewish population was only one percent. He denied emphatically that there had been any “atrocities”.
He asserted that limitation of Jewish influence in Germany was being conducted with the greatest possible consideration toward the old native Jewish families who, he said; had proven themselves good Germans and indicated that it was directed against the Eastern European Jews who had overflooded the country since the War. Dr. Luther was accompanied to Mt. Vernon by Victor Ridder, co-publisher of the Staats Zeitung, German language paper of New York.
MONOPOLY IN PROFESSIONS
Dr. Luther described the misery of German students who had to wait for years after graduating in order to obtain positions in the professions. Even before the War, he said, the legal and medical professions in Berlin, Frankfurt and other large cities were almost monopolized by certain people whose activities the German people could not consider as German.
After the War, came the influx of East European Jews, he declared. Because of Germany’s political prostration, there was no means of excluding undesirable immigrants such as other nations had. Before the War, he said, anti-Semitism in Germany had no political importance. Later, this inclination against the elements which had a leading role in Marxist stories contributed greatly to the embitterment of the people.
Dr. Luther asked newspapermen present not to forget that of 1,700 Jewish lawyers in Berlin, 1,200 had been considered worthy of being readmitted to practice. The measures against the Jews, he asserted, were taken only that those Jews who are alien to the German nation, should not continue any longer in important judicial and administrative posts.
He also praised the character of the Nazi revolution which he described as bloodless.
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.
