Oscar Cohn, 66, Reich under-secretary of the Ministry of Justice under President Ebert and an exile from Nazi Germany, where he had been active in the Social Democratic Party and the Poale Zion, Socialist Zionist group, died here today. His body will be transferred to Palestine for final interment.
Herr Cohn was born in Guttentag, Germany. After his graduation from college he turned to the law and became a practicing attorney in Berlin, specializing in labor cases. In 1909 he was elected to the Berlin city council as a Social Democrat and three years later became a member of the Reichstag. He was a Reichstag deputy from 1912 to 1918 and fought vigorously against wartime autocratic army control of Germany.
For a short time after the revolution Herr Cohn was under-secretary of the Ministry of Justice. From 1921 to 1924 he was a member of the Reichstag under the Weimar Republic.
In the Reichstag Herr Cohn frequently defended the Jews from anti-Semitic attacks, particularly against attempts to incite the Germans against East European Jews who had settled in Germany after the World War.
Since 1925 he had represented the Poale Zion on the executive body of the Federation of Prussian Jewish Communities and on the Berlin Jewish community.
He was also active in a number of German Jewish organizations devoted to helping Jewish emigrants from Germany.
When Hitler came into power Herr Cohn was compelled to flee for his life.
In exile he devoted himself to
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.
