B’nai B’rith Insists N.c.r.a.c. Must Remain Coordinating Body

Calling upon all Jews “to recognize the threat to a democratic Jewish life implicit in the proposals for a single centralized community relations agency, “B’nai B’rith’s national executive committee, at its annual meeting here, ratified the position taken by its constituent agency, the Anti-Defamation League, at the plenary session of the National Community Relations Advisory Council in Atlantic City last November, it was announced here today.

The same resolution “deplores the coercive implications of the C.J.F.W.F. resolution on this subject” adopted at the General Assembly of the C.J.F.W.F. in Chicago, on Dec. 2, 1951. “These resolutions would substitute conformance to the C.J.F.W.F. concept of unification of the community relations field for competence and performance of work in that field as the test in allocations of funds, “the B’nai B’rith executive committee stated.

Declaring that “proposals for dismemberment of the A.D.L. will affect adversely the whole Jewish community. “the executive committee resolution directed B’nai B’rith representatives “not to enter into, or authorize, or participate in any agreements or actions which would affect the autonomy of B’nai B’rith or its Anti-Defamation League.”

Harry Lurie, executive director of the Council of Jewish Federations and Welfare Funds, today indicated that the B’nai B’rith statement–as well as a similar statement made several days ago by the American Jewish Committee–seems to bring into question the meaning of the decision on the Maclver Report adopted unanimously at the meeting of the National Community Relations Advisory Council in Atlantic City last November.

He said that the N.C.R.A.C. Special Committee on Evaluative Studies will meet on March 1 in New York and that it is hoped that the two agencies will at that meeting declare what they intend to do about carrying out the resolutions which were adopted at the November N.C.R.A.C. meeting.