Gardner, Lelyveld Urge Overcoming of Rifts Between Minorities in Cities

The chairman of the Urban Coalition and the president of the American Jewish Congress today forecast a bleak future for New York and other cities unless blacks and whites stopped turning their backs on each other and joined hands in working for racial peace. John W. Gardner, former Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare, termed the “fragmentation” of cities a breeding-ground of “fear and hostility.” The most “ominous” rifts, he said, were those involving minority communities. Rabbi Arthur J. Lelyveld of Cleveland, accused “extremists of the right and left” of seeking to break “the natural alliance between Negroes and Jews.” He said the AJ Congress was working to keep open its lines of communication with the Negro community. They were the principal speakers at the annual Stephen S. Wise Awards dinner of the AJ Congress. Mr. Gardner received the organization’s 1968 award “for advancing human freedom.” Rabbi Lelyveld made the presentation. An award also went to David Arnow of New York, industrialist and philanthropist, who was honored “for dynamic leadership in strengthening Jewish life.”