The National Community Relations Advisory Council endorsed yesterday a statement by a group of Negro leaders, calling for reliance on peaceful means to achieve the goal of full equality for the Negro “in an integrated plural society.” An Orthodox rabbinical leader warned today that the slogan “black power” and the reported deterioration in Negro-Jewish relations should not discourage rabbis from encouraging support of civil rights programs.
The NCRAC, representing nine national Jewish organizations, and 79 state and local Jewish community relations councils, endorsed the “Crisis and Commitment” statement issued recently by the Negro leaders. The NCRAC statement asserted that the rate of peaceful progress toward the goal of full equality for American Negroes “must be accelerated dramatically to reverse the dangerous drift toward polarization, social disorganization and violence.” The NCRAC said it agreed with the Negro leaders that they could not achieve these goals alone but only through “a coalition of all groups and individuals committed to the attainment of equality, under law and within the American political system.” On that basis, the NCRAC pledged its member organizations to “full cooperation” in building and maintaining such a coalition.
The Orthodox spokesman, Rabbi Emanual Rackman, assistant to the president of Yeshiva University, also said rabbis should increase their involvement in the war against poverty, even to the extent of urging congregants to “welcome the necessary heavy taxes as a privilege rather than a burden.” Dr. Rackman spoke at the 23rd annual Yeshiva University Rabbinic Alumni Convention in Monsey, N.Y.
He said that rabbis should recognize the advocates of “black power” were referring to the “power of the vote, not violence.” He said that statements by such advocates that they wanted Negroes to run their own movements should not be “exaggerated” by Jews, Such statements, he said, were made “in the same voice as Zionists in Israel, who have complained that American Zionists are interfering in their affairs.”
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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.
