A charge that Jewish and other minority group skaters in the Detroit area are barred from national and international competition because the Detroit Skating Club excludes them on racial and religious grounds has been made by the local Anti-Defamation League and the Jewish Community Council of Detroit.
The charge was made by Judge Burton R. Shifman, social discrimination chairman of the Michigan Board of the ADL, in a letter to F. R. Shumway, president of the United States Figure Skating Association. Under rules of the association, skaters must take tests at an affiliated club to compete in national and international contests. The Detroit Skating Club is the only one in this city authorized to hold official tests for the national association.
The Jewish News of Detroit reported that Wendell Young, president of the Detroit club, denied the charge in a telephone call to the Jewish weekly. He promised a statement in writing, which the weekly said had failed to arrive by press time. "We are a private club and as such retain the right to choose our members, " he said in the telephone conversation. "We have no policy of exclusion. All members are screened by the membership committee and a decision is made in accordance with the recommendation of the committee."
Judge Shifman asserted that the ADL had received and verified many complaints against the skating club during the past two years and that club officials had freely admitted a discriminatory membership policy at a meeting with the ADL officials.
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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.
