Report Big Stores Observe Boycott

of the women’s division have visited department stores, checked their books and examined their counters. They reported to Mrs. Harris that no store could be found selling German merchandise.

What little German goods remained from pre-Hitler purchases, the stores for the most part disposed of by sales to their employes at next-to-nothing prices, Mrs. Harris said.

There are thirty-five committees of women in as many districts of the city organized by Mrs. Harris to keep vigilant watch over neighborhood retail stores. When one is found selling German goods, the owner is asked to observe the boycott. If he refuses, housewives of the neighborhood are asked by mail and at mass-meetings not to patronize that store.

There is no picketing, no violence. The boycott against those who refuse to boycott usually works.

FEW EXCEPTIONS

For the most part, Mrs. Harris revealed, storekeepers throughout the city are faithfully eschewing purchases of German goods. There are a few notable exceptions, particularly among the five-and-ten-cent chains. Kress and Kresge stores still have German merchandise, she said.

Mrs. Harris believes that the boycott stands or falls with the housewife. It is the housewife who does eighty per cent of the buying and directs most of the remaining twenty per cent.

To strengthen the boycott, the women’s division is launching a membership drive. Already there are 1,200 women’s organizations affiliated with the division. Now, Mrs. Harris is going after individual women who are not members of clubs and societies.

It is now more than two years that Mrs. Harris has been devoting her time to boycott activities, consulting with retailers and wholesalers, writing, lecturing and organizing, but she promises not to let up until full equality of rights is restored to Jews in Germany.