Three Americans who have served as leaders “in applying the principle of human equality” were cited here tonight at a public session at Columbia University of the Conference on Science, Philosophy and Religion. The citation winners, the second such group in the Conference’s fifteen years of meetings, were Rabbi Mordecai M. Kaplan of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America, Nelson A. Rockefeller and Roy Wilkins of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.
The citation for Rabbi Kaplan noted his “long, fruitful life as preacher, as dean and professor, as orator and writer” and declared he had “combined scholarship in the ancient Jewish tradition and in contemporary American patterns of life and thought, and has striven for unity in diversity.”
The Conference, which brought together 85 scholars and government officials for a discussion of barriers faced by minority groups seeking to improve their status, heard Dr. Louis Finkelstein, chancellor of the Jewish Theological Seminary, describe the complexity of the problem.
One example of this complexity, Dr. Finkelstein asserted, is the fact that standards which seemed fair often contained conditions restricting some persons. “Persons differently endowed ought to be given different types of opportunity, including different types of education,” he declared.
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.
