Digest of Public Opinion on Jewish Matters

[The purpose of the Digest is informative: Preference is given to papers not generally accessible to our readers. Quotation does not indicate approval.–Editor.]

Former Kaiser Wilhelm now classes President von Hindenburg “with the Socialists, Jews, Catholics and international financiers as the betrayer of his fatherland and Emperor,” we read in a despatch appearing in the New York “Herald-Tribune” of Nov. 8 from its Berlin Bureau.

“This interesting glimpse into Wilhelm’s mental development,” the story proceeds, “was brought by the ‘Neue Leibziger Zeitung,’ which tells the story of an unhappy luncheon which Herr von Oldenburg-Januschau, intimate friend of the former Crown Prince and gentleman-in-waiting under the imperial regime, had with his former master at Doorn recently.

“Von Oldenburg-Januschau during the conversation waxed eloquent on the patriotic devotion of the ‘Hero of Tannenberg’ in taking over the duties of the Presidency, despite his advanced age. The former Kaiser, who had betrayed his displeasure with this opinion, finally could stand it no longer, and, rising in wrath, left the table, exclaiming: ‘You are all traitors!’

“The former Kaiser’s anger toward his old field marshal apparently was due to Von Hindenburg’s failure to use his powers as President to bring about the return of the empire.”

SUGGESTS “NATIONAL PILGRIMAGE THROUGH AIR” TO HONOR “UNKNOWN SOLDIER”

A suggestion that various Jewish Catholic and Protestant organizations of the country combine for a “National Pilgrimage Through the Air” on Armistice Day to do mutual honor to the Unknown Soldier at Arlington is made by a Jewish reader of the “New York American.” The paper, in its Sunday edition, quotes the letter, written by Julius Hyman, as follows:

“Our ‘Unknown Soldier’ may be one of the 3,000 Americans of the Jewish faith, the 16,000 of the Catholic faith. the 58,000 of the Protestant faith, who fried for us across the waters. During the war the lay associations of these churches–the Jewish Welfare Board, the Y. M. H. A., the Knights of Columbus, the Young Women’s Christian Association and the Young Men’s Christian Association, the Salvation Army–all these worked heroically and unintermittently, here and ‘over there,’ to aid and comfort the American boys in uniform.

“To honor the memory of the boys who died for U. S–for all of us–would it not be fine for all these patriotic groups, in addition to their separate acvtivities in their clubhouses, to dedicate in common ceremony one object of common reverence, a wreath, this wreath to be carried by airplane and dropped on the tomb of the ‘Unknown Soldier’ at Arlington on Armistice Day, when President Coolidge conducts the national ceremonies on that impressive occasion? Let us make a ‘Pilgrimage through the Air’ to the nation’s shrine.

“And if other cities along the Atlantic Coast within a morning’s airplane flight to Washington, from Maine to Florida, and as far West as the cities in the Mississippi Valley, should each send its common symbol of communal patriotic devotion from all these religious groups, then these winged messengers, freighted with a people’s love and precious memory for its departed son, converging that morning along the continental air-lanes on Armistice Day to Arlington, would make a ‘Nation’s Pilgrimage through the Air’.”

JUSTICE BRANDEIS REACHES SEVENTY

The career and personality of Louis D. Brandeis, Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court, who will reach his seventieth anniversary on Nov. 13, are described in the “New York Times Magazine” of last Sunday.

The writer of the article, Carson C. Hathaway. observes, in part:

“As they see him there (in the Supreme Court), the thoughts of countless Americans go back to the period about 1910, when the present Associate Justice was attracting national attenttion. Men called him radical then because his ideas were new. There remains today a curiosity concerning Mr. Brandies, the Massachusetts attorney.

“Of his appearance, the most impressive thing that can be mentioned is to repeat the statement that in facial expression he somewhat resembles Abraham Lincoln. There is a quiet friendliness about it that seems strangely unlike that of a former fighting lawyer. He is of middle height, with hair now turned quite gray. His hands are those of an artist. In conversation his voice is that of the traditional cultured Bostonian.

“Looking back through his 70 years one finds a story of achievement and human interest.

“Now reaching 70, he is the next to the oldest member of the court. He is perhaps its hardest-working member, beginning his day at 7 o’clock and continuing late. He still has a mania for facts, and when he delegates a research problem he demands infinite details down to the last essential point.”

THE LARGEST COMMUNITY CHEST IN THE WORLD

The work of the Federation for the Support of Jewish Philanthropic Societies of New York City is lauded editorially by the “Herald-Tribune” of yesterday, on the occasion of the Federation’s tenth anniversary campaign. Says the paper:

“As the Federation for the Support of the Jewish Philanthropic Societies of New York City enters on its tenth anniversary campaign it has the distinction of managing the largest community chest in the world, both in money spent by its constituent agenand the number of agencies maintained.

“The membership now embraces ninety-one institutions which expend $8,500,000 annually. To meet the need beyond the income from trust funds and other assured sources the federation purposes to raise in this campaign $4,720,000. Philanthropic work on such a scale requires a high degree of organization. The experience of the federation has developed a skill in the field of charitable enterprise which stands at the peak of business efficiency. The collection and administration of the fund are conducted with the utmost economy.

“The community method has done away with the wastage of many individual drives and relieved the Jewish community of the burden of repeated solicitations which can better be answered, promptly and collectively, at the outset of the annual campaign. The scope of the Jewish philanthropies is vast, but the response to their annual appeal through the federated body in the last ten years has been unfailing. This year the hope is for still more general support of a great humanitarian undertaking.”

Leopold Auer, master teacher of the violin, who is in his eighty-second year, became an American citizen yesterday.

Auer came to America in 1918 after the revolution in Russia, where he had been violinist to the Court of the Czar under Alexander II, Alexander III and Nicholas and was professor at the Conservatory in St. Petersburg.

Mayor Walker announced the appointment of Maurice H. Gotlieb as City Magistrate to succeed the late Moses R. Ryttenberg for the unexpired term ending June 30, 1932.