Editorials

The Most effective protest against the persecution of German Jewry has come from England. Leading statesmen in Parliament have castigated Germany for its indefensible actions against its Jewish citizens. Not only have the most prominent Jewish leaders such as Lord Reading and Sir Herbert Samuel raised their voices, but also Winston Churchill and Sir Austin Chamberlain. Their protests visibly perturbed German public opinion and government circles.

American Jewry has itself to blame if the protest movement in our country has not resulted in as direct and impressive action. British Jewry met the challenge of Hitlerism with a united front. The greatest disaster which has befallen our people since their expulsion from Spain finds American Jewry divided.

Early in March, a Committee of Fifteen, consisting equally of representatives of the American Jewish Congress, the B’nai B’rith and the American Jewish Committee, was formed. The intention was to work out a program of united action. The Administrative Committee of the American Jewish Congress, at a meeting in the Hotel Commodore, decided to conduct a Madison Square Garden meeting, and immediate publicity was given to this decision. The Committee of Fifteen was faced with a fait accompli. Either it bowed to the dictum of the American Jewish Congress or it had to see the Congress go its own way. The Congress assumed grave responsibility by breaking away from united action.

The Lack of unity has had a weakening influence on the Jewish protest action. The Congress of the United States and the administration would have acted with more determination if the Jewish community had shown proof of being united. When Dr. Wise and Bernard S. Deutsch went to Washington on two occasions, they were received each time only by Under-Secretary Phillips and were unable to obtain a hearing with Secretary of State Hull or President Roosevelt.

The leaders of the Congress will recognize, if they will view their actions in retrospect, that not every one of them was wisely thought out. They appealed to Washington for the letting down of the bars to permit the entry of German-Jewish refugees. A hearing was arranged before the Immigration Commission. The State Department sent a representative who opposed the proposal of the Congress. This gave Hitler the opportunity, in a scathing statement, to declare that the sympathies of the United States government were obviously not strong enough to permit the German-Jewish refugees to enter the United States. Nobody, knowing the sentiment of the American public, could have entertained any illusion with regard to the practicability of an appeal for the reception of German-Jewish refugees, at this time of widespread unemployment.

The American Jewish Committee has not given publicity to all the steps it took. Dr. Cyrus Adler, President of the American Jewish Committee, and Judge Alfred M. Cohen, President of the B’nai B’rith, went to Washington and were received by Secretary of State Hull. Other important steps were taken. Although the American Jewish Committee, through the death of Louis Marshall, sustained a serious loss, it has as its supporters some of the most influential members of our community, who have taken a leading and vital part in many an important movement in Jewish life. The Committee has never pretended to be more than a body of men anxious to be of service to the Jewish community whenever vital Jewish interests are jeopardized. Dr. Wise and his friends, though terming themselves the “Congress”, are also really not more than a committee. The only difference between the two bodies is that, with the exception of Dr. Wise, the individual members of the Congress are less influential than those belonging to the Committee and hardly command the respect of the public at large to the same extent. For a considerable number of years the Congress has held no real elections, the delegates to the Congress representing but a small part of the community. No large direct membership has been built up by the Congress.

The fight against anti-Semitism will unquestionably be the most important task confronting our community for the next decade. To organize American Jewry for this task is the imperative challenge of the moment. Today, nothing is so vital as is the menace of Hitlerism, which aims at the destruction of the equal status of the Jew as a citizen. Unless this peril is checked in time, the poison emanating from Hitlerite Germany is bound to spread to many other countries, not excluding the United States.

In Germany 60,000 Jews (in other words, every other Jewish family), are organized in the Central Association of German Citizens of the Jewish Faith. The Zionists, too, possess a powerful and efficient organization. Both these groups to a large extent are representative of German Jewry.

In Poland the members of the Jewish Parliamentary Club, elected by hundreds of thousands of Jewish votes, are the recognized spokesmen of the Jewish community.

In England, the Board of Jewish Deputies is a Parliamentary institution, affording a regular contact between the masses and the Jewish leaders. There exists, in addition, a Joint Committee of the Board and the Anglo-Jewish Association, which deals with problems outside Great Britain.

Some of the Jewish leaders in England were also originally opposed to the staging of protest meetings, and the Neville Laskis and the d’Avigdor Goldsmids threatened to resign if such meetings were insisted upon, but after discussion, a compromise was reached, to the end that a protest meeting should be held, but that the date should be selected by the leaders, who decided to arrange for a non-Jewish protest meeting.

No such contact between the Jewish masses and the influential Jews exists in this country. In England, also, there exist great differences of temperament, viewpoint and tactics. But they are adjusted in frank and deliberate discussion in the Board enabling mutual adjustment of views and united action.

There is an inclination to criticize members of the American Jewish Committee, to term them indifferent and ridicule them as “shtadlonim”. The truth is that the Warburgs, Lehmans, Rosenwalds, etc., have been the exception to the rule of indifference which characterizes the Baruchs, the Speyers, the Eugene Meyers, the Guggenheims and many other of the wealthy Jews in this country who keep aloof from all matters Jewish. To antagonize and estrange the men of influence who for decades have rendered great service would merely result in the weakening of Jewish influence at a moment when all Jewish forces should be gathered together for a truly united effort. It would be wiser policy to endeavor to utilize the present emergency to attract the Speyers, Baruchs, etc.

Protest meetings may be necessary, but rhetoric alone is of little avail. It is the lack of a fully representative organization which enables irresponsible and unscrupulous publicity seekers to exploit an unfortunate situation for their own purposes. Congressmen and ex-congressmen, judges and would-be judges, are coming forward with wild proposals, without consulting either committee, injecting themselves without the slightest regard for the exigencies of the situation and imposing their rash acts on a harassed community. Veterans’ societies insisting upon forcing the hand of the community, appeals addressed to Henry Ford humiliating not only the sender but also the entire community are other features in this situation, characteristic of the complete chaos which encourages wilful and arbitrary action and enables irresponsible elements to further complicate the situation.

For the fight against anti-Semitism American Jewry should be united. Today when many a hitherto indifferent Jew has been aroused by the tragic occurrences in Germany, the time is ripe for the creation of a fully representative organization, either a real Congress as we had it fifteen years ago, when hundreds of thousands were represented in its vote, or an organization of from three to four hundred thousand members,—or a Joint Foreign Committee as in England connecting the mass population with the group of influential leader could be attempted.

We believe that loyalty and common sense will prevail over arbitrary and chaotic laissez faire. The fight against the annihilation of emancipation in Germany is not an act of charity. We are threatened everywhere if such a development is possible in the very heart of Europe in one of the most highly cultured countries of the world. To conduct this fight in an intelligent, well-organized and well-planned manner, is our duty,—and a duty which brooks of no delay.