Cabinet Decree on Jobs Reveals Animus Against Rumanian Jews

representative of the Adjutant Major of the Army.

3. All enterprises are obliged at the end of every year, at latest by February 1, to submit to the Minister of Industry a table giving by name every Rumanian and every foreigner employed in the enterprise.

The Minister of Industry has on the basis of the above issued an order, setting up a form of tabulation for this purpose, and every industrialist is under the obligation of filling in this table and sending it to the Minister. This table contains instead of the two columns, Rumanians and foreigners, three columns: Rumanian citizens, nation (ethnic origin) and foreigners.

HOLD QUERIES ILLEGAL

The Union of Rumanian Jews has issued a communique declaring this tabulation unconstitutional and illegal, and demanding that the words “Rumanian citizen and nation (ethnic origin)” be struck out and that in their place there should be only the word “Rumanians” which should include all who are not subjects of a foreign state.

On February 3, the Union of Rumanian Jews issued the following communique: “The Union of Rumanian Jews protests against the campaign which is contesting the most elementary and sacred right of the Rumanian Jews—the right to work. The Union places on record the fact that the constitution expressly prohibits any distinction whatever being made between Rumanian citizens or Rumanian subjects on the ground of religion, confession, ethnic origin, or language in relation to their civil, or political rights. It declares that any law or ministerial order which enforces such distinctions must be considered as unconstitutional. It places on record further-more that in no circumstances can the economic crisis, or the financial crisis be overcome by changing the personnel of one religion by personnel of another religion; that on the contrary, such measures will not ease the economic and financial crisis, but on the contrary, they can only create more profound and far-reaching difficulties.”

SEE “HUMAN RIGHTS” IN DANGER

On February 9, the Union of Rumanian Jews published another statement in which it said:

“The Union of Rumanian Jews, after examining the latest events, places on record that the Rumanian Jews are in danger. Not only their citizen rights, but their human rights are in danger. The Union of Rumanian Jews assures the Rumanian people that the Rumanian Jews, without distinction, are attached to the Rumanian land. The Jews have not had, and they have no other interest than to consolidate greater Rumania and to see the Rumanian people that for twenty years has possessed the plenitude of cultural, economic and political rights, bring this plenitude into consummation.

“It declares, however, that any action that will violate the human, or citizen rights of the Jews, will only mislead the Rumanian people.

HITS FAVORITISM

“State problems are not solved by threatening to take the bread out of the mouths of certain citizens in order to give it to other citizens, but by assuring their bread to all, not by the method of creating privileges, to favor one section of the population and to do harm to another section of the population, but by stimulating the initiative of the entire population, can a situation be created that is good for the entire population.

The Jews protest against the accusation that Jews have monopolized everything and against the false statistics on the basis of which it is sought to justify these unjust and illegal laws.

“The Jews did not make the laws of the Rumanian State. They have only carried out these laws. The Jews did not order the State taxes, they have only paid them. The Jews have not disposed over the army or the police, they have only served in the army and submitted to the police force. The Jews, therefore, did not prevent Rumania from entering into any intellectual professions, or creating any economic enterprise, nor could they have any possibility of doing so.

“The Union of Rumanian Jews calls again to the Rumanian Jews without distinction of political or religious distinction to rally to the work of self-defense. It proclaims that the order of the day is the unification of Rumanian Jewry. No one may stay outside, only those who have no conscience.”