Election Day in Bucharest Begins in Peaceful Atmosphere

No Anti-Jewish Excesses on Student Day; Defeat of Opposition Parties Predicted as Heavy Vote Is Coming In; Results Will Be Known Friday (Jewish Telegraphic Agency)

Election day in Roumania, which will decide the fate of the Maniu government, started in a peaceful atmosphere, with a large number of citizens going to the polls. Official statements were issued that the election booths are under the strict supervision of the authorities, which will guard the freedom of the elections.

Up to noon no reports of election riots or anti-Jewish excesses were received at the capital. Student Day, December 10, which in previous years resulted in anti-Jewish attacks, passed without disorders of any kind, only small student demonstrations having been held.

The final returns from all parts of Roumania will not be available before Friday. Political observers, however, are venturing the prediction that the Liberal party, as well as the other opposition parties and groups, will be defeated. The maximum number of deputies belonging to the various opposition parties will be no more than 25, according to these observers. Included in this number will be five anti-Semitic deputies of the Cuza party and several anti-Semitic deputies of Magyar groups, while the groups headed by former Prime Minister Averescu, by Jorga and Lupu will secure no mandates. The fate of the Jewish candidates on the opposition lists will be that of their parties. According to the same observers, there seems to be no doubt that the candidates of the Union of Roumanian Jews of Bucharest, allied with the Liberal Party, will be defeated, while the candidates on the government lists are sure of election.

In the government organ “Dimineatza,” the member of the Maniu cabinet, Madgearu, published an article taking exception to recent statements reported to have been made by Dr. William Filderman, president of the Union of Roumanian Jews. Mr. Madgearu criticises Dr. Filderman for the policy he pursued in behalf of the Union during the election campaign. He protests in particular against the statement ascribed to Dr. Filderman that the Maniu government was in sympathy with the anti-Semitic student organizations. “Suspicions of such a sort are an insult to the honor and the dignity of the Maniu government whose unalterable program it is to seek to establish in the country a reign of freedom and law for all citizens without difference as to race or religion.”

The Maniu government, Mr. Madgearu declares, will never allow the revival of anti-Semitism in Roumania, adding that the fact that student day passed in the country for the first time without acts of anti-Semitic violence is an indication of the new situation.