UJA Launches Its 1953 Drive at Two-day Inaugural Conference

More than 600 of America’s foremost Jewish leaders, faced with the urgency of mapping a program of preparation to provide aid and sanctuary for Jews fleeing Soviet-inspired anti-Semitism, will meet at the Saxony Hotel here this Saturday night and Sunday to launch the United Jewish Appeal’s 1953 nationwide campaign.

Scheduled to report to the conferees on the repercussions brought on by the rise of anti-Semitism in the Soviet Union and its satellites and its effect upon the UJA campaign is Edward M.M. Warburg, general chairman of the United Jewish Appeal and chairman of the Joint Distribution Committee, and Dr. Joseph J. Schwartz, executive vice-chairman of the United Jewish Appeal.

Last year, at a similar inaugural conference, meeting under less urgent conditions, more than 500 of the country’s foremost Jewish leaders announced pledges totaling over $11,300,000. This proved to be an all-time record for the opening of a nationwide UJA campaign. In the light of current emergencies, the expectancy at this year’s inaugural is that both the attendance and the final sum of pledges will greatly surpass that of last year.

Nineteen members of the UJA National Campaign Cabinet meeting here today in advance of the inaugural conference, voted unanimously to substantially increase their personal gifts to this year’s drive, and called on contributors throughout the country to emulate their example in view of the present emergency in Eastern Europe.

Samuel H. Daroff of Philadelphia, newly-elected chairman of the cabinet, disclosed that gifts by this same group last year totalled more than $750,000. He said that in addition to voting to increase their personal gifts to the 1953 campaign, each cabinet member pledged that he would make himself fully available to the UJA.