Hitler’s latest conquests in Europe have weakened him immensely and have done more than any other event to check extreme anti-Semitism in European countries, James G. MacDonald, chairman of President Roosevelt’s Advisory Committee on Refugees, declared today in an address to the annual luncheon of the women’s division of the American Jewish Congress at the Hotel Astor.
The luncheon, attended by nearly 2,000 persons, raised $30,000 for the establishment of a third Congress House for Refugees. Speakers in addition to Mr. MacDonald were Newbold Morris, president of the City Council, representing Mayor LaGuardia, who urged Christians to intensify the anti-Nazi boycott; Dr. Stephen S. Wise, Mrs. Wise, who presided, Mme. Irenee Harand and Mrs. James Lees Laidlaw.
Mr. MacDonald, in a plea against “defeatism” among the Jews, declared that Germany’s advances in recent days had weakened rather than strengthened Hitler in three ways — 1) awakening the world to the menace of Hitlerism, 2) solidifying the parties within democratic states, and 3) “bringing within the Reich elements which will never be loyal to the Reich, and which will constitute a source of decay and destruction as they did within greater Austria.
“Every adventure beyond this point leads further to the inevitable disaster,” he asserted.
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
