Jews and descendants of Jews in Germany are being carefully checked through the special card system of the racial department of the Ministry of the Interior, an article in today’s Voelkischer Beobachter, leading Nazi newspaper, asserted.
Dr. Anchim Goerke, chief of the racial department, informed the Beobachter that his department has a file containing the names of three million Jews and descendants of Jews who live in Germany, another file containing 13,000 names ordinarily used by Jews to check Jews who use Nordic names; a staff of 870 people throughout Germany investigating local records in order to establish definitely which Jews became Christian converts and Aryans who bear Jewish or biblical names, and a list ot those-Uermans who, cannot prove that their ancestors were Aryans as far back as 1800.
The Beobachter reported that Goerke’s department is crowded j with people asking for racial purity. certificates, which cost ten marks-Jewish converts are refused such i certificates on the ground that their I desertion of the Jewish religion does not make them non-Jews.
Illegitimates who apply for the certificates are compelled to prove that their mothers were Aryans as far back as 1800. (
According to Goerke, Aryanship is sometimes decided by the appearance of the applicant.
The racial department chief explained that the date 1800 had been i chosen as a line of demarcation be-! cause before 1800 there was no intermarriage between Jews and Gentiles. At that time the Jews strongly observed their community principles and they were isolated in ghettos in the larger cities.”
New regulations were announced today by the race department of the Ministry of the Interior which will make it more difficult for Jews with distinctive Jewish names to change them to German-sounding appelations.
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.
