The Bulletin’s Day Book

The second issue of the Economic Bulletin, official organ of the Non-Sectarian Anti-Nazi League to Champion Human Rights, has just appeared. The editorial board is headed by Dr. Abba Hillel Silver, Dr. A. Coralnik, Dr. B. Dubinsky, and J. George Fredman. Writing under the captain, “The Boycott Bites In,” Dr. Silver again strikes at the “defeatists,” as he terms them:

“Some irresponsible Jews have been talking recently about the failure of the boycott in the United States. Some editorials have even appeared in the Anglo-Jewish press to that effect. This is defeatism and sabotage of the worst sort. Such falsehood, even if not deliberate, tends to undermine our morale and gives aid and comfort to the enemy.

“The Jewish situation in Austria has become dangerously poised. Anything might push the Austrian Jewish communities over into the abyss. If, in the next few months, the Austrian government will witness the growing demoralization of Germany’s economic life resulting from the world-wide boycott, its leaders will hesitate long before they commit their own country to Hitler’s ruinous racial policies.

“It is, therefore, of utmost importance at this critical juncture to prosecute the boycott with the utmost rigor.”

In my experiences, I have found most “anti-boycotters” to be “proboycotters.” Their argument, which has much merit, is colloquially stated: “If a boycott, then a boycott.” In other words, a weak boycott can wrreck untold harm, and strike where we least wish it to strike … an effectively organized economic boycott on a tremendous scale may hit hard and get the intended results.

As one whispers to another in Berlin:

“I saw you a while ago with a nice looking blonde, a blue-eyed lady. Was that your wife?”

“Oh, no. You may not believe me, but that is my new ‘Aryan grandmother.”

“Did you get any winter relief?”

“Oh, yes–a long vacation in a concentration camp.”