The Rev. W.A. Burk, S.J., faculty director of St. Louis University’s Radio Station WEW, has written to the Code Compliance Committee of the National Association of Broadcasters warning that if Charles E. Coughlin is barred from the air as a result of the code, “you are going to be responsible for stirring up such a deluge of anti-Semitism in this land as we have never seen or experienced before and which would be most deplorable.”
Declaring that Coughlin’s broadcasts were credited by the Gallup poll with having four-and-a-half million listeners, Father Burk said: “Think of the indignation of all this audience against the Jews who will inevitably be credited, despite any endeavor of Father Coughlin to quell the indignation, with having brought about the denial of Father Coughlin’s undoubted right as an American–the right of free speech on the air.” The letter is published in the current issue of Coughlin’s organ, Social Justice.
JTA has documented Jewish history in real-time for over a century. Keep our journalism strong by joining us in supporting independent, award-winning reporting.
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.