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American Inheritance Claims Exempted from Nazi Anti-semitic Decrees

December 21, 1938
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German Charge D’Affaires Hans Thomsen assured Acting Secretary of State Sumner Welles in a visit this morning that Americans’ claims for inheritances will be exempted from the Reich’s anti-Jewish decrees, Mr. Welles revealed at his press conference this afternoon. Dr. Thomsen said all inheritance and credits in American cases would be transferred to the beneficiaries.

Mr. Welles told the press he had discussed the question of inheritance claims with German Ambassador Hans H. Dickhoff before the latter returned to Berlin on orders from his Government and that this assurance was in reply to the earlier request that Americans should not be discriminated against.

The question of transfer of money from Germany to the United States came up only yesterday in a case in New York. A former Chicago resident now living in Berlin, Bruno Reinicke Jr. had sought a loan from the Chase National Bank on the basis of the remainder of his $670,000 trust fund. The bank had refused to transmit the loan on the ground that German restrictions made its repayment impossible.

The referee, William H. Chorosh, filed a report with the Supreme Court in New York which approved the bank’s action, pointing to “unquestionable restrictions” in the Reich against export of money for repayment of loans, and recommended liquidation of the trust fund. The report also denounced as “revolting to the mind and sickening to the heart” the Nazi persecutions.

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