Vancouver city authorities, plagued by an epidemic of swastikas on buildings, fences and even the sidewalks of the city, complained this week that anti-Nazi elements had broken the law by putting up posters condemning the anti-Semitic manifestations.
The posters, put up in the hundreds. sounded a warning to “neo-Nazis. Mosleyitea, Ku Klux Klan, all racists. ” They bore the message that “it’s not up to the Jews to answer these atavistic outrages… it is up to every man to defend the practice of freedom… so that we will not be turned in hate upon one another. ” The posters, said the police, violated a city by-law since they had been put up without authorization.
Earlier, Mayor Tom Alsbery and Vancouver newspapers sharply criticized Dr. W.B. Hoerter, editor of a German-language weekly newspaper here. Der Nordwester, for telling German residents to establish a vigilante committee to prevent the anti-Semitic manifestations for which the German element might be blamed. The editor later said he merely intended that the Germans should be on the watch for manifestations to report them to the police.
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