Stand of Republican Party on Immigration Criticized by 35 Groups

The American Immigration and Citizenship Conference, composed of 35 religious, welfare and labor organizations, including many large Jewish groups, has denounced the Republican Party’s platform plank dealing with immigration as “innocuous to the point of being meaningless,” it was revealed here today.

The immigration plank in the Republican platform, as adopted at the party’s San Francisco convention, pledged that the party would urge “immigration legislation seeking to reunite families and continuation of the ‘fair share’ refugee program.”

While the GOP convention was still under way in San Francisco, it was disclosed today, the executive committee of the American Immigration and Citizenship Conference sent a telegram to Republican leaders denouncing the plank and calling upon them “promptly to issue a forthright statement in support of an American immigration policy that would do away with the discriminatory national origins quota system and correct other inequities in our present law.”

James P. Rice, executive director of United Hias Service, is a vice-chairman of the Conference, and the organization’s board of directors includes Philip Soskis, executive director of the New York Association for New Americans. Both signed the telegram on behalf of their organizations, and the list of signers included also the following Jewish organizations:

American Jewish Committee, American Jewish Congress, the National Community Relations Advisory Council, Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith, Jewish War Veterans of the United States, the Social Actions Committee of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations, Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Philadelphia, and the New York section of the National Council of Jewish Women.