Allegations that Jewish country clubs in this city barred non-Jews from membership were denied today by Harold Tivol, vice chairman of the American Jewish Committee, in a letter published in the Kansas City Jewish Chronicle. Mr. Tivol wrote in reply to recent letters from readers of that paper who questioned the rectitude of Jewish complaints against discrimination by non-Jewish clubs if Jewish clubs indulged in like discriminatory practices.
“We have received assurances that non-Jewish applicants at both Oakwood and Meadowbrook Country Clubs (Jewish) would be accepted,” Mr. Tivol wrote. He added that “until applications are made and rejected on a discriminatory basis, let us not assume that they are closed clubs.”
The issue of discrimination was opened here by a disclosure in the National Catholic Reporter that several of the city’s major business clubs barred Jews. One response to that disclosure, reported by the Jewish Telegraphic Agency last week, was the decision by the Kansas City Club, the largest of the downtown business clubs, to end its anti-Jewish policy.
Mr. Tivol, in his letter, also answered the complaint of another reader that Jewish applicants for club membership want to be admitted on their own qualifications “without a publicized crisis,” Mr. Tivol wrote, “we believe publicity is a last resort and should be used with discretion.”
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
