Our Foreign News Letter

Our Argentine Correspondent

It is well known by now that the Argentine government, and particularly the present Minister of Agriculture, Dr. Thomas Le Breton, is inclined very unfavorably toward the idea of Jewish colonization in Argentine. This attitude of the government is not, so far as we know, based on anti-Semitic motives. There are deeper causes, causes for which it would be no mis-statement to say that Jews themselves are to blame.

For many years the Ica has been conducting colonization work in Argentine, settling thousands of Jews as farmers on the land. It was a work based essentially on worthy motives, but the manner in which it was performed by the managers of the Ica organization has been such that today the Ica finds itself in a peculiar predicament. The truth must be told, as it has, in fact, been told over and over again in the past, that the Ica never approached its task in the proper spirit. Its attitude was one of looking down at the very colonists whom it was helping and it made the impression on the Argentine government that the Jewish colonists were really an unreliable sort of men, former hucksters, store keepers, merchants and peddlers who must be kept under the strictest supervision lest they abandon their land and return to their former occupations. The Ica has always practiced the method of leasing out the land to the Jewish colonists in such a way that they were actually slaves to the organization.

The Argentine Government was well aware of the attitude of the Ica, for the latter let no opportunity pass to inform the leaders of the republic of the supposed unworthiness of the Jewish colonists. It is sufficient to recall that incident in 1916 when, during the heated debate in Parliament on the subject of colonization, the Minister of Agriculture, Dr. Calderon, made very disparaging remarks about the Jewish colonists, quoting in substantiation of his assertions the words of directors of the Ica. This was but one of many incidents which indicates the manner in which the Ica issued false information about the Jewish farmers whom she had helped to settle on the land.

For let it be said now that the Jewish colonists in Argentine have acquitted themselves wonder fully and are equally as good as, if not superior to, the other Argentine farmers. In face of the most adverse conditions, fighting against the unbearable and constantly changing policies of the Ica, and the hostility of the elements, the Jewish colonists have stubbornly and bravely stuck to the soil, so that today they are a firmly established, hard-working, vigorous class of farmers with no intentions of quitting their land.

The motives behind the behavior of the Ica are very apparent. A condescending attitude toward the colonists combined with a desire to justify its rigid contract system in the eyes of the government-could anything be more natural for a benevolent but bureaucratic organization?

No wonder then that now the Minister of Agriculture is hostile to the Jewish colonists and that, in connection with this, he is opposed to any further immigration and settlement of Jewish farmers in the Argentine.

The facts should be made known to the Jewish world, for it involves a matter of the utmost importance not only to the colonization of Jews in Argentine, but likewise to all efforts at colonization of Jews anywhere. Such methods as those employed by the Ica must be discarded. The Ica has been working toward its own undoing as well as to the detriment of the Jewish colonists in Argentine. The Ica is now trying to suppress the facts with regard to the attitude of the Argentine government. But it is too late. It – can neither recover its own position nor improve the opinion of the Minister of Agriculture on the subject of the Jewish colonists.

The government regards the Jewish colonists as failures, when the contrary is the fact, and looks at the Ica as an organization that has made false pretenses and failed in its purpose.

The only thing that can save the situation is a systematic, consistent effort on the part of the Jewish colonists themselves to enlighten the government on the true state of affairs. Above all, it must be proven to the government, and this can easily be done on the basis of actual statistics, that when Jewish colonists are given absolute title of ownership to their land they do not sell it and go back to the city, as the Ica claims, and that those colonists who were given such title have not only remained on the soil but have, in nearly every case, enlarged their holdings and prospered much better than before.