Relief in Poland is a “rotten mess,” Clarence Pickett, director of the American Friends’ Service Committee, said today after a conference with President Roosevelt.
Pickett said the Quaker organization, through which the Commission for Polish Relief intended to operate, had been blocked by the German authorities in every attempt to get American relief administrators into the occupied territory and that it had ceased, at least temporarily, in its attempts to provide relief within Poland.
“We will not send supplies into Poland,” he said, “unless we feel that the Jews will not be deprived of their share. We have promises, but we cannot send American-purchased goods into there unless the distribution is supervised by Americans.”
Pickett said that some cod liver oil had been sent to Warsaw to be distributed among children by Polish-American residents of that city. The future of distribution on a large scale remains uncertain until the Germans agree to allow American supervisors into Poland, he added.
The Quaker leader visited the President, together with representatives of the Dunkers and Mennonites, which three faiths are considered the traditional “religions of peace,” to discuss peace plans and European relief matters.
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.
