A $5,100,000 quota for 1938 was adopted yesterday by 120 delegates at a meeting of the Plan and Scope Committee of the Joint Distribution Committee, which declared that the widening crisis of European Jewry warranted the increased quota.
The J.D.C. raised $3,350,000 in 1937, Isidor Coons, campaign director, reported, representing $700,000 more than the sum raised in 1936.
Rabbi Jonah Wise was elected national chairman of the campaign. Other officers are: Paul Baerwald, William Rosenwald and William J. Shroder, co-chairmen; Governor Henry Horner of Illinois, Dr. Cyrus Adler, Max Epstein, Louis E. Kirstein, Governor Herbert H. Lehman of New York, James N. Rosenberg, Aaron Waldheim and M.C. Sloss, honorary campaign chairmen; Sidney Lansburg, treasurer; Joseph C. Hyman, secretary; Morris Troper, controller, and Mr. Coons, campaign director.
George Backer, Jack Israel, Donald Kaffenburgh, Lee J. Loventhal and Nathan M. Stein were elected as new members of the Plan and Scope Committee.
Governor Horner, addressing the conference, declared that “our people overseas have been heaved into a maelstrom of unhappiness and desolation.” He attacked foreign dictatorships, declaring that “the tyrants abroad, in denying their people liberties, encourage a reign of terror against the ideas we regarded as sacred.”
The conference declared that the 1938 campaign was a life and death matter for millions of Jews. Expressing concern for the welfare of Jews overseas, the J.D.C. leaders dedicated themselves to aiding their stricken brethren.
Stating that the widening crisis of European Jewry warranted the increased campaign quota, the conference called upon American Jews to give generously for the survival of their brethren in Eastern and Central Europe.
Another resolution expressed regret over “the irreparable loss to mankind” in the death of Felix M. Warburg, who was honorary chairman of the J.D.C. campaign.
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.
