The Joint American Committee for Protection of Minorities, in a petition signed by 123 civic, religious and educational leaders, appealed to President Roosevelt today to make a declaration of non-recognition of Germany’s Austrian annexation, lest dictatorship be encouraged “to run amuck.”
The petition, copies of which were sent to 32 foreign embassies in the United States, protests persecution of minorities, commends the President’s proposal for aid to refugees and appeals to “the family of nations still believing in democracy” to welcome the oppressed minorities.
In a letter of transmittal accompanying the petition, A. Alan Lane, chairman of the committee, suggests that unless Germany permits reasonable evacuation of refugees, “we should prevent the hundreds of thousands of German aliens here from sending or carrying out of the country funds gathered within our borders.”
Signers of the petition include William Green, Herbert Bayard Swope, Lillian D. Wald, Bishop Francis J. McConnell, Samuel Untermyer, Dr. Charles S. MacFarland, George Gordon Battle, Rev. John Haynes Holmes, Morris L. Ernst, Dr. George S. Counts, and Col. Edward M. House, who signed the petition as one of the last acts before his death.
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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.
