Jacob Dehaas Replies to Critics of His Plan for the Reorganization of Zionist Organization of Americ

In the following letter to the Jewish Daily Bulletin, Jacob de Haas replies to the critics of his plan for reorganizing the Zionist Organization of America, a plan that was published in English in the Bulletin and in Yiddish in “The Day”:

February 7, 1930.

Editor, Jewish Daily Bulletin,

Every criticism of my plan for the reorganization of the Z. O. A. is welcome, including the typical acerbity of Jacob Fishman in the “Morning Journal.”

There are, however, a few points that I would like to make clear.

1. So far the whole discussion misses the point. If the Zionist Organization during the past nine years has been successful and its policies correct then the present administration is justified and should continue. If the organization has been demoralized and its policy in Palestine has failed of success and holds out no hope of progress then the administration should go. If my plan for action in Palestine is good and correct it requires men fitted to direct the work in the spirit in which it is conceived. Surely the men who consistently, earnestly and whole-heartedly have opposed it all these years are not thus qualified.

2. The Z.O.A. today is not a mass organization. Its male membership, I am told, throughout the U. S. does not exceed 16,000 persons. These members must decide what is to be done and what will be done by the Z.O.A.

3. Democracy is not necessarily effected by tearing a page out of a telephone book and calling it a National Committee or anything else. I have not pledged myself to the I.O.B.B. system. I said that as an organization form it seems to have been more successful than the one hitherto adopted by the Z.O.A. At one time the organization was divided into two parts, with two annual conventions. No one thought that undemocratic. A governing group drawn from the four corners of the country is nothing but a paper organization. In practise it means nothing but control concentrated in New York City and influenced by Zionists from Boston to Baltimore. Anyone looking at the situation must deal with concrete facts. The acceptance of the I.O.B.B. system, if it is desirable, does not prevent an annual or biennial convention of the whole organization. As I stated that my plan in detail would call for the activity of perhaps as many as 10,000 persons it should be obvious that I am opposed to cliquism, that I do not favor super-government and that my plan would be impossible of success if it was not based upon frequent meetings and constant conferences. I left something to the imagination and I am leaving something now because such a plan cannot be formulated “on one foot”