Poland’s Constitution

A brief paragraph in today’s cables from Warsaw states that the Constitutional Committee of the Polish parliament has begun the examination of the draft of a new constitution for Poland.

This deserves the utmost attention of our Jewish leaders. It deserves the continued vigilance of those who are interested in protecting rights of the national minorities in Poland.

It was to the present Polish constitution that Colonel Beck, Polish Minister of Foreign Affairs, referred in Geneva a few months ago when he renounced Poland’s national minority obligations under the League of Nations. The Polish minister then stated that the Polish constitution sufficiently guarantees the rights of the national minorities in Poland and that no other obligations are therefore necessary.

Now the Polish constitution is going to be revised. Will this new constitution contain the same paragraphs guaranteeing national minority rights for the Jews and other national minorities in Poland, or, will these paragraphs also be modified?

We hear that the Government Party is now definitely determined to see to it that no Jewish deputy should be elected to the next Polish parliament. This would amount to practically disfranchisement of the entire Jewish population. This would also mean that the Jewish voice in Poland would be silenced.

It will be a calamity for the Jews of Poland if the new constitution does not contain at least the same provisions for national minority rights which the present constitution contains and to which Colonel Beck referred before the League of Nations.

With national minority obligations under the League of Nations being renounced and with the Jews being deprived of representation in the next Polish parliament, something must be done to make sure that the changes which the Polish constitution is now about to undergo will not affect the Jews as a national minority. The duty of our central Jewish organizations is to look into this matter—the earlier the better.