Resolutions urging President Eisenhower “to assert his leadership in behalf of embedment of legislation to revise the McCarran-Walter immigration law,” and calling upon the Senate and House Judiciary committees to hold hearings promptly on all pending immigration legislation, were adopted here today at the closing session of the four-day annual conference of the National Community Relations Advisory Council, coordinating body of six national and 32 local Jewish groups active in the fight against anti-Semitism and in the protection of civil rights.
The conference also asked President Eisenhower to convene a meeting of the governors of all the states to consider what action the various states can take “to eliminate those forms of discrimination that continue to mar our society.”
President Eisenhower was also asked by the conference to appoint a commission on national security and individual liberty,” empowered to present to the nation a security program consistent with all our needs and our traditional liberties.” At the same time, the conference adopted a resolution affirming again its “unalterable opposition to communism as a totalitarian conspiracy which denies the dignity of the individual and opposes those freedoms of religion, the press, and assembly, which are indispensable attributes of democracy.”
OPPOSES RELIGIOUS OBSERVANCES IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS
The conference expressed opposition to religious holiday observances, or joint religious observances in the public schools. It asserted the right of Jewish children to refrain from participating in such observances.
Early ratification by the Senate of the United Nations Convention on Genocide was requested by the conference in one of its resolutions. Another resolution hailed the recent Supreme Court decision on segregation cases as a ruling which “has inspired all Americans with due understanding of the principle of equality that is fundamental to American democracy.” The resolution pledged the organizations associated with the NCRAC to “do all that lies within their power to help make the transition required by the decision as harmoniously and as rapidly as possible.”
A resolution expressing “regret and consternation” over the report of the research director of the House committee to investigate tax-exempt organizations was also adopted. “The session expresses its conviction of the worth and value of the work done by the leading foundations attacked in the report and expresses its strong support for free inquiry in the social sciences,” the resolution said.
The conference condemned the persecution of Jewish leaders in Rumania. It commended the President of the United States for having protested this campaign and urged other nations of the free world to do likewise.
The conference declared its determination “to continue to explore all possible efforts of expanding the area of common planning and cooperative action until the NCRAC embraces all responsible Jewish organizations engaged in community relations activities. It also called for the establishment of more local Jewish community relations councils.
Increased local community participation in national programs, improved service to communities, greater and more effective joint planning, and fresh, critical joint evaluation of programs and methods were cited as achievements of the National Community Relations Advisory Council in reports by its chairman, Bernard H. Trager, and its executive director, Isaiah M. Minkoff. Mr. Trager called for full cooperation among all Jewish community relations agencies.
“Grave and urgent threats menace freedom and peace and the great purposes that we in the Jewish community relations field pursue,” he declared. “This is no time, if there ever was a time, for separatism, for doing it alone, for lone wolfing. Those who choose such a way are not only flying in the face of what I think is clearly a trend; they are endangering the realization of objectives common to all.”
A. J.C. AND B’NAI B’RITH URGED TO REJOIN N.C.R.A.C.
In an evident reference to the American Jewish Committee and the B’nai B’rith, both of which withdrew from the NCRAC in 1952, Mr. Trager said: “We shall continue to strive for the involvement in our cooperative enterprise of all agencies of the Jewish community dedicated to the same ends. We shall always regard division as a disservice to the common cause. We shall not cease to labor for unity of effort within a frame-work that assures independence of opinion and action. We shall always keep open the door to participation in our joint process for any who find themselves outside it.”
Mr. Minkoff traced the impact on Jewish community relations of major changes in the world during the past ten years. “In 1944, when the NCRAC was formed,” he said, “the principal concern of Jewish community relations agencies was anti-Semitism in its most direct expressions–Nazi-inspired literature, the canard of the domestic anti-Semites that the Jews had finagled the United States into the war, physical assaults on Jews, desecrations of synagogues, and the like.”
He contrasted this with the present basic principles of Jewish community relations. These, he said, rested on the conviction that “the conquest of anti-Semitism could be achieved only through the triumph of egalitarian principles.” The change, he noted, made the Jewish agencies “advocates of great, positive purposes, rather than mere watchmen of our own rights.” This change, with the added factor of the cold war and the activities of native demagogues, he continued, had made the problems of Jewish community relations more and more complex. This demanded “more and more joint consultation and joint planning.”
Isaac S. Heller, prominent civic leader of New Orleans, told the conference that the decision of the U.S. Supreme Court declaring segregation in the public schools unconstitutional “must be accepted and carried out according to its present terms.” He predicted a long period of litigation and urged the Jewish organizations composing the NCRAC to join in testing in the courts various “subterfuges to circumvent the law.”
Isaiah L. Kenan, executive director of the American Zionist Committee for Public Affairs, told the conference that peace between Israel and the Arab states is essential if America is to develop and to defend the Near East and make it safe from the threat of Communist subversion and aggression.” He spoke against the U.S. arming of Iraq.
The NCRAC conference reelected the following officers: Mr. Trager, chairman; Isaac Pacht, Sidney Hollander and Lewis H. Weinstein, vice-chairmen; Julian A. Kaiser, secretary; and David L. Ullman, treasurer.
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.
