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Council for Judaism Says There is No “jewish Community” in U.S.

November 20, 1952
See Original Daily Bulletin From This Date
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The action of the American Jewish Committee and the Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith in withdrawing from the National Community Relations Advisory Council was hailed by the American Council for Judaism in a statement released for publication today.

“The Council’s deep and genuine approval” of the recent actions by the Committee and the League, Mr. Rosenwald declared, “is merely a logical extension of Council thinking over a long period of time. The concept of an ‘overall Jewish community’ which failed in the American Jewish Conference a decade ago has been dealt another telling blow in the failure of the N.C.R.A.C. to put the idea over behind the skirts of “efficiency.’

Mr. Rosenwald pointed out that the American Council for Judaism had no direct organizational stake in the series of events leading from the issuance of the Maclver Report. “The Council has never been a member of the N.C.R.A.C.,” the statement says, “but had been gratified to note that the philosophical sections of the report by Columbia University Professor Robert M. Maclver had confirmed two of the Council’s basic convictions, namely: L That there neither is nor ought to be a ‘Jewish Community’ in the United States. 2. That outside of their religion Jews do not and ought not to possess a unity in interest or objective.”

Certain organizational recommendations of the Maclver Report, however, seemed to the Council'” to be inconsistent with Dr. Maclver’s philosophical understanding.” Their effect, the Council thinks “would be to centralize authority and control for Jews and Jewish affairs, creating an authoritarian Jewish community,” Mr. Rosenwald declared.

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