Judge Proska Cr Criticizes N.c.r.a.c.: Urges Support for J.d.a.

Criticism of the recent action of the National Community Relations Advisory Council, which would allocate “primary responsibility” for community relations work among six organizations, was voiced here last night by Judge Joseph M. Proskauer, honorary president of the American Jewish Committee, addressing a session of the Joint Defense Appeal, the joint fund-raising arm of the American Jewish Committee and the Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith.

Judge Proskauer asserted that this would destroy the N.C.R.A.C. as an advisory body and make it a functioning organization. “You cannot allocate functions by majority votes or any other way unless you have an effective staff, which would have to be created by N.C.R.A.C., ” he said. “This would cost the Jewish communities of America infinitely more than is being fruitfully expended today.”

The venerable Jewish leader declared that the American Jewish Committee and the Anti-Defamation League are doing 95 percent of the effective work being done in America today to combat Anti-Semitism. “They have developed a technique, a sureness of touch and an informed approach through years of study and experience which no other organization in America can faintly approach,” he said.

Answering charges of some “duplication,” Judge Proskauer added: “Duplication is of the essence in this work. Nothing is more vital in handing a public relations problem, whether it is in politics or in human relations, than treatment of it from different points of view and with essential duplication.”

Declaring that the fight against Anti-Semitism is basic to all community work and stressing the need for receiving adequate support for the work of the Joint Defense Appeal agencies from community welfare funds, Judge Proskauer said that “the last thing we wish to do is to destroy the unity of appeal for funds which the welfare funds have developed.”