Between the Lines

The new presidential elections in the United States are still distant, but campaign drums are already being sounded. And for the first time in the history of the United States, one of the candidates has projected a definitely anti-Jewish platform.

Completely repudiated in the last elections, a group of individuals has now organized a so-called “Independent Republican Party” and, under the slogan “Christianity against Judaism,” has launched a campaign with Louis T. McFadden as its candidate for President of the United States in the 1936 elections.

From the Mayflower Hotel in Washington, where the large Zionist convention concluded last Monday, the country is now being flooded with the campaign propaganda for McFadden, replete with poisonous anti-Jewish allegations. The old story that “the League of Nations is a tool of world Jewry to enslave the Christian nations” is one of the legends spread by the Independent Republican Party in its propaganda campaign for the forthcoming presidential election. The not so original story that the Roosevelt administration is dominated by Jews is another legend upon which the McFadden party is building its campaign propaganda.

THE FORCES BEHIND

It is needless to say that the new party, whose ambition it is to bring McFadden into the presidency through anti-Semitic slogans has nothing to do with the real Republican party. It is, however, of importance to know that there are politicians in America who believe that by agitating against the Jews they can make their way through to the White House in the 1936 elections.

The fact that the Independent Republican Party has deliberately adopted anti-Semitic slogans as a basis for its campaign propaganda should put Jewish leaders in America on guard. A presidential campaign based on anti-Semitism is undoubtedly backed financially by forces interested in spreading anti-Semitism in the United States. The campaign conducted by the new party, though it will not bring McFadden to the White House, should nevertheless not be minimized as to the effect it may have in instilling millions of Americans with anti-Semitic thoughts.

ALLEGATIONS OF BIGOTS

The allegations spread by the new anti-Semitic party, that “the League of Nations is a Jewish institution,” are made in view of the expected suggestion that America become a member of the League of Nations and of the World Court. Some of the most powerful individuals and groups in the United States hold that unless the United States enters the League of Nations the world’s peace machinery will not function properly.

Whether the movement to bring America into the League of Nations will be successful or not, the propaganda carried on by the Independent Republican Party that “the League is a tool in the hands of world Jewry” will be ridiculed by every right-thinking person. In the light of the recent action of the League with regard to the Jews in the Saar, only bigoted anti-Semites can assert that “the League of Nations is controlled by Jews.”