The plan to establish a national advisory budgeting service to assist local communities in allocating funds to national and overseas agencies will be submitted to a referendum of the 203 groups holding membership in the Council of Jewish Federations and Welfare Funds, following approval by the council’s board of directors.
The plan was advanced by Sidney Hollander, reelected president of the council, after dissolution of the United Jewish Appeal. Representatives of the three erstwhile UJA agencies–the Joint Distribution Committee, United Palestine Appeal and National Refugee Service–have given assurances that they will not undertake independent campaigns in welfare fund cities in 1941, Board Chairman William J. Shroder announced yesterday.
The member agencies of the council, located in 167 cities, will receive the budgeting service plan with the supporting majority report of the council’s Committee on National Budgeting Proposals and an opposing minority report. Action by April 1 will be asked.
The majority report also recommended immediate steps toward reestablishment of the United Jewish Appeal in 1941 in response to “the overwhelming desire of the welfare funds and their contributors” throughout the country. Although no united fund may materialize this year, local communities should continue to do their utmost in support of overseas and refugee agencies, the report declared. The committee was headed by Jacob Blaustein of Baltimore.
Following a report on the status of the General Jewish Council, the assembly passed a resolution authorizing the president to appoint a committee “to determine how the council can be helpful in working out joint fund-raising in the civic-protective field.” In his report on efforts by the American Jewish Congress, American Jewish Committee, B’nai B’rith and Jewish Labor Committee to coordinate their activities and financing, Amos P. Deinard, of Minneapolis, urged patience with the rate of progress so far made.
The business session, in addition to reelecting Hollander as president, also reelected Shroder chairman of the board; William Rosenwald, Greenwich, Conn., Henry Wineman, Detroit, and Ira M. Younker, New York, vice-presidents; Elias Mayer, Chicago, secretary, and Dr. Solomon Lowenstein, New York, treasurer. Albert Lieberman, Philadelphia, was added to the board.
Today’s session at the Biltmore Hotel was devoted to “auxiliary meetings” under the sponsorship of the American Association for Jewish Education, Joint Distribution Committee, Hebrew Sheltering and Immigrant Aid Society, United Palestine Appeal, American ORT Federation, Hadassah, National Council of Jewish Women, National Refugee Service and American Jewish Congress.
Morris C. Troper, chairman of the JDC European council, stressed that it was the duty of private agencies to save lives while governments were seeking to save civilization. “Every life salvaged is a victory won,” he said, “and an asset preserved for the upbuilding of a new Europe which must follow war’s holocaust.”
Dr. Bernard Joseph, legal adviser of the Jewish Agency, speaking at the UPA meeting, urged support of the UPA $12,000,000 campaign in order to make possible mass immigration and colonization in Palestine of Jews from Europe at the end of the war. “There is only one country in the world that can solve the problem of the Jews, and that is Palestine,” he said.
At the NRS meeting, Executive Director William Haber declared “it is up to American Jews to answer with dollars if the service of NRS is to continue.” Brig. Gen. Eugene Oberdorfer, retired, of the Georgia National Guard and president of the Georgia Farm School and Resettlement Bureau, emphasized the part each community must play in relieving the burden of port cities.
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.
