Hadassah, Women’s Zionist organization, concluded its 25th annual convention today with a pledge of “full hearted cooperation” with the Palestine Jewish community and adoption of a record fund goal for the year 1940.
The organization set itself the task of raising, between now and September of next year, a total of $1,150,000 with which to carry on its various activities. Of this sum, the largest Hadassah has ever attempted to secure in any one year, $175,000 has been earmarked for Palestine land reclamation; $500,000 for the Youth Aliyah movement; $400,000 for hospitalization and public health, and $75,000 for child welfare.
The convention elected a new slate of officers, including Mrs. David de Sola Pool, former vice-president, who succeeds Mrs. Moses P. Epstein as president. Officers re-elected included Mrs. Herman Shulman, secretary, and Mrs. Alexander Lamport, treasurer. The four vice-presidents, Miss Julliet N. Benjamin, Mrs. Samuel J. Rosensohn, Mrs. Joseph M. Ehrlich and Mrs. Adolph Sieroty were also re-elected. A new vice-president, Mrs. Sundel Doniger, of New York, was named. A budget of $104,000 for administration of Hadassah’s activities in this country, was unanimously accepted.
Speakers at the closing session included Rabbi Milton Steinberg and Miss Susan Brandeis, daughter of former Supreme Court Justice Louis D. Brandeis.
The resolution on Palestine expressed the hope that by adoption of “an increased emergency budget for its welfare work in Palestine,” Hadassah might “in some small measure help lighten the burden of these tragic days.” It also expressed the “determination to strive to emulate the unparalleled example they (the Yishub) present of the indomitable and undying Jewish will that shall surmount every obstacle.”
Other resolutions expressed “gratitude for the guidance and inspiration” given Hadassah by its 78-year-old founder, Miss Henrietta Szold, who is now heading the organization’s child refugee work in Palestine, and pledged continued support to Hadassah Medical Organization and Palestine Council workers who administer the public health, hygiene, child welfare and hospitalization activities of the organization in the Holy Land.
A program of education for its 85,000 members, stressing preservation of American democratic institutions, Jewish traditions and Zionist ideals was adopted at last night’s session. The program takes the form of a course in “Jewish Survival in the World of Today,” which, Education Chairman Mrs. Samuel Schulsinger announced, has already been mailed to 500 study groups throughout the country.
The resolution inaugurating the program stressed that small peoples could not survive under totalitarian systems of government, that “Jewish tradition and Jewish ideals have consistently striven for freedom for all humanity” and that the present crisis “demands of every citizen of the United States unequivocal support of civil, political and religious liberties.”
Only democracy can solve the problem of small peoples, it was stressed by speakers at the session, including Dr. Frank Kingdon, president of Newark University; Prof. Oscar Janowsky, of the College of the City of New York, and Maurice Samuel, the author.
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