Secretary of State Cordell today received a delegation of the Federation of Polish Jews in America in a half-hour interview during which a memorandum was read asking Mr. Hull to use his influence with the Polish Government against the Parliament bill to ban kosher slaughtering.
Mr. Hull expressed interest in the memorandum and sympathy with the plight of the Jews. He took the memorandum under advisement, voicing regret that the American Ambassador to Poland was not in Washington at the time. At one point during the reading of the memorandum he asked why the Polish Government, if it was against anti-Semitism, was not opposing the bill.
The delegation of four, including Benjamin Winter and S. Tygel, president and executive secretary, respectively, of the federation, was introduced to Mr. Hull by Representative Emanuel Celler, of Brooklyn.
The memorandum declared that the anti-shechita bill was an infringement of religious and civil liberties and violated the Polish constitution, the Minority Treaties of 1919 between Poland and the Allied Powers and Foreign Secretary Joseph Beck’s promise in 1934 to respect minority rights.
Enactment of the bill, the memorandum continued, would deprive the Jews of an important food item and throw thousands of families out of work. American intervention was held justified because of American aid in setting up the Polish Republic and because of the traditional policy of the American Government “to use its influence in behalf of those oppressed because of race or religion.”
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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.
