A Detroit circuit court judge has postponed for a month hearings on a bid for a court order to restrain officials of the Detroit Jewish Community Center from providing programs on the Sabbath.
Credit for the postponement was claimed by the Committee for the Center Sabbath Closing which is headed by Morris J. Brandwine, Detroit Jewish communal leader, and which includes Joseph Holtzman, who is active in national United Jewish Appeal work.
Circuit Judge Thomas J. Murphy initially refused to grant the temporary restraining order asked by Ben Wrotslavsky, and ordered both sides to submit briefs. He also urged the plaintiff to withdraw the plea and to submit the case to a Jewish conciliation commission. Mr. Bradwine said that Mr. Wrotslavsky agreed to ask Judge Murphy for the postponement so that the contending factions might work out a solution to the dispute privately.
At the same time, Mr. Brandwine said that the request to the plaintiff did not mean that the Committee had altered its determination to seek not only a halt to programs on the Sabbath in the Center, but also to have the Center closed on that day. After a lengthy debate, the Center was opened on Saturdays several months ago to permit cultural activities for children. The later dispute developed over a decision by the Center board to allow use of some health facilities on the Sabbath.
Mr. Brandwine also announced that his committee was mailing an appeal to 10,000 Detroit Jews. Each appeal will contain a card to be filled in pledging support to the effort to halt Sabbath programming at the Center.
Plans also were pushed today to complete naming of a committee of 50 Jewish leaders to meet with the executive committee of the Detroit Jewish Welfare Federation, which provides an annual grant to the Center to meet its deficit.
The Detroit Jewish News urged in a front page editorial this week that every effort be made to end the dispute outside of the courts and to end the “threat” to the unity of the Detroit Jewish community.
“It is not the public hearing that will be held in the courtroom of Circuit Court Judge Thomas J. Murphy that matters,” the Jewish News said. “Nor is it even the major issue involving the Sabbath that is at stake at the moment. Our community should be concerned at this time about the threat to its unity, the danger that lurks that a sound and a solid kehillah, the well organized social organism known as Detroit Jewry, may be disrupted as a result of an inner conflict out of which have arisen two warring factions whose leaders are unwilling to come to terms through mediation, by way of reasonable compromise.”
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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.
