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To the Editor Jewish Daily Bulletin:
With the violent element taking charge up in Yorkville, there no doubt are many Jews who think the development a good thing, but I wonder.
Now that Haegele and his fellow hotspurs are at the helm, it would seem fairly reasonable to expect that their strong-arm methods would alienate the sympathies of the decent citizens in the community. In this notion there is a good deal of merit.
However, I wonder if it occurs to such observers as are taking satisfaction in the change of command in Yorkville that at all times in every community there are large numbers of ruffians and lowbrows. These raw characters are good prospects as recruits to the brutal movement that is Nazism—provided that is sufficiently hard-boiled to satisfy them.
Until the Haegele gang gained the ascendancy, these tough boys, it seems to me, were inclined to stand aloof from Nazism because as it was in Yorkville, it was a comparatively mild and sort of lily-white business. The tough boys, as everybody knows, have no patience with sissy manifestations.
The altered situation, with plenty of emphasis put on hoodlumish activity, should attract these nasty men in large numbers, in the view of this practical psychologist, and when this comes to pass there will be reason for poignant regret at the passing of the velvet-gloved Nazi chieflets.
Sadie G. Fullis
New York City,
Dec. 17, 1934.
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.
