The sixth commission of the League of Nations in which all member nations have representations today adopted the Assembly’s 1922 resolution by reaffirming it against the continued opposition of the Reich delegates.
The resolution, which must now go before the League Assembly and receive the unanimous vote of delegates before it is adopted, originally proclaimed the obligation of all League members to maintain the same standard of rights toward minorities embodied in certain special treaties.
The second paragraph now extends the 1922 resolution, interpreting it merely in these words:
“The Assembly considers that the foregoing principles are applicable to all categories of nationals who differ from the majority by their race, language and religion.” The original wording said that no interpretation excluding any category could be admitted as valid.
Dr. Friedrich von Keller of Germany declared, following the adoption of the resolution, that it must be confined to actual minorities and that the Jews do not constitute a minority.
Nevertheless the discussion at the sessions of the sixth commission and the subcommittee clearly showed that the second part of the resolution distinctly aims to include Jewish treatment by the Nazis in the Reich. Von Keller insisted that the question of the Jews is an internal matter in Germany and on these grounds he rejected the second part of the resolution.
In League circles it is declared that the German attitude is an open confession of discrimination against the Jews, and of a determination to continue the anti-Jewish repressions.
Germany’s opposition to the resolution at the session of the Assembly tomorrow is bound to discredit the country, and isolate it from 55 states which favor adoption.
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.
