The Senate Foreign Relations Committee today voted 12 to 8 to table the Wagner-Taft resolution on Palestine which asks for unrestricted immigration of Jews to Palestine and for the ultimate establishment of a Jewish Commonwealth there.
No action will be taken on the resolution during the present session of Congress, Senator Tom Connally, chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, announced. He added that the State Department would issue a statement on the subject. He also revealed that his committee had acted pursuant to the State Department’s feeling that action on the resolution now would be undesirable owing to the current international situation.
Secretary of State Edward R. Stettinius, Jr. testified before the Foreign Relations Committee today, prior to the vote. Earlier in the day he received a delegation of Zionist leaders composed of Dr. Abba Hillel Silver, Dr. Stephen S. Wise, and Dr. Israel Goldstein.
STATE DEPARTMENT ISSUES STATEMENT DEFINING ITS ATTITUDE
A statement issued later in the day by the State Department emphasizes that the department considers passage of the Palestine Resolution at the present time “unwise.” The statement reads:
“Resolution pertaining to Palestine have recently been before the appropriate committees of the Congress, and the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations has inquired as to the attitude of the Department of State towards these resolutions.
“The Department has the utmost sympathy for the persecuted Jewish people of Europe and has been assisting them through active support of the work of the War Refugee Board and in every other possible way. The Department considers, however, that the passage of the resolutions at the present time would be unwise from the standpoint of the general international situation, and has so informed the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations.”
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.
