An oddity that cropped up in today’s House debate on the conscription bill was the spectacle of Rep. John C. Schafer (Rep.,Wisc.), member of the so-called “pro-Nazi bloc,” accusing Rep. Emanuel Celler (Dem. N.Y.) who is Jewish of making an anti-Semitic speech.
Celler, in an attack on the Peace Mobilization Group, which has been campaigning against the Burke-Wadsworth bill, said: “Unfortunately, a number of them are of the race of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, from whence I sprang, and I repudiate them. I am no part of them and they are no part of me.” He urged the House not to “judge my people by these renegades.”
Schafer, one of the bitterest opponents of the conscription bill, sought unsuccessfully to cut off Celler with a point of order. Later he observed, with a perfectly straight face: “It is very unfortunate that the gentleman from New York made an anti-Semitic speech on the floor of the House today. Let it be remembered that many thousands of men of Jewish extraction volunteered and faithfully served our common country during all the nation’s wars.”
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.
