Anti-semitism Gains Momentum in Czechoslovakia; Jewish Students to Leave Universities

Anti-Semitic movements today gained momentum in commerce, sports and education, but met a rebuke in the law profession.

Many shops in Praha and the provinces belonging to persons whose names do not sound Czech display birth certificates, occasionally also baptism certificates, and the inscription: “The owner of this shop is not a Jew; here is proof.” An extraordinary meeting of the German sports Union in Praha, which was hitherto liberal, decided in the future to run the organization on Nazi lines and to bar Jews as members.

Meanwhile, the Czech bar Association sent a letter to advocate Kochloeffel advising him to remove the shingle displayed outside his office: “Aryan Czech law office.”

The number of Jewish professors and lecturers given “indefinite leave” from the German university and German technical high schools in Praha and Brno was revealed today as 35.

More than 70 per cent of Jewish students are unwilling to continue their studies in view of anti-Semitism in universities and the impossibility of their finding careers in the liberal professions. An investigation made by the Praha Jewish students’ organization shows that those willing to continue their studies include 40 of the 108 Jewish advanced medical students, four of 53 law students, two of 12 philosophy students and 12 of 28 technical students.

The situation for Jewish students is considered hopeless. It is almost impossible for Jews now to matriculate, despite the fact that the majority of the Czech professors and students in Praha disapprove of radical anti-Semitism. Anti-Jewish feeling is rampant in the German university in Praha and the Slovak university in Bratislava.