News Brief

(Communication to the Editor)

Sir:

In several issues of the Jewish Daily Bulletin recently you published a number of statements to the effect that there is no religious issue involved in the present campaign and supporting Mr. Hoover’s candidacy. For the sake of fairness and impartiality, I urge you to give space in your valuable publication to the following quotation from the “Chicago Daily Tribune,” a Republican newspaper, on the same subject. I believe that this information should be presented to your readers, who must be interested in it both as decent Americans and as the first victims of intolerance.

The “Chicago Tribune” writes: “Governor Smith’s denunciation of certain influences working in or for the Republican party was a true statement of facts. It is accepted as such by many Republicans. The Klan and the Anti-Saloon League are twin calamities working for the election of the Republican national ticket. Their practices are intolerable. Their intolerance is disgraceful. . . The Republican Party has these two allies, and its connection with them is sufficiently apparent to expose it to the properly indignant language of Gov. Smith. The Tribune feels precisely as he does in the matter.”

I suggest further that for the same purpose you disclose the facts bearing on Mr. Hoover’s reception of the campaign waged in his behalf. On that subject the following excerpt from “The World’s” editorial of today may suffice to furnish the facts, though the record might be effectively expanded by adducing further evidence of acquiescence:

“Mr. Hoover found himself last July the recipient of support from those organized forces which threaten the integrity of our national life. He has issued two or three Platonic disclaimers. But never in the course of this campaign has he done one indignant and effective thing to discourage them. They are more active and enthusiastic today in his behalf than they ever were. It is idle to say that Mr. Hoover could not have done more. His helplessness is either pretense or weakness. A man of force and character who did not want organized bigotry to support him could have found ways of stamping upon it.

“The reason Mr. Hoover’s mild disclaimers have never discouraged his disreputable following is to be found in his moral collapse in the Willebrandt affair. That was the acid test in this campaign of whether or not Mr. Hoover really meant to discourage sectarian support. Mrs. Willebrandt’s appeal to the Methodist Conference in Ohio provided the supreme occasion for an effective disavowal. When Mr. Hoover declined to disavow her, no generalities he could utter had any effective force. For if Mrs. Willebrandt in her official position could do what she did, there was no longer any reason why the unofficial fanatics should stop. The acceptance of Mrs. Willebrandt was an acquiescence in the whole campaign of bigotry.”

Further, you would render a service to those whom facts may affect by pointing out or permitting it to be pointed out by publishing this letter, that in 1924 the Republican leaders saved the Ku Klux Klan from extinction.

As to this, too, the record is clear and indisputable.

Early in the campaign of that year, Mr. Davis and Senator LaFollette, the Democratic and Progressive candidates for the presidency united in denouncing the Klan by name and invited Mr. Coolidge to join in that denunciation to the end that the Klan be blotted out as a crying disgrace to American civilization and to American political life. Had Mr. Coolidge accepted the proposal and joined in the denunciation, the Klan would have been a political pariah, and its extinction for all purposes would have been but a matter of brief time.

But Mr. Coolidge preferred to capitalize a vote-catching opportunity and refused to join while Mr. Dawes, the vice-presidential candidate, speaking for the party, held the Klan up to the admiration of the American people as “brave men” and “adventurous spirits” and “law-abiding citizens banded together for law enforcement.”

To be sure, he coupled this high praise with tactful generalities about the inconsistency of secret societies, and private law enforcement with the spirit of American institutions. But no one who reads the speech can see in it anything but a servile bid for Klan votes. (See Mr. Dawes’ speech on August 23, 1924.)

And finally, and in a similar manner, you might ask your readers to consider whether Mr. Hoover’s election will not immeasurably add to the political influence of the Klan and other agencies of intolerance; and whether a vote for Mr. Hoover is not a vote to enhance the prestige of the Ku Klux Klan, stimulate bigotry, and to lend countenance to such despicable publications as the “Fellowship Forum”; and whether they can be confident that if Mr. Hoover were elected the Republican party could clean house as the “Chicago Tribune” would have it do or whether a group of allies that had played so large a part in his campaign may not be expected to insist upon and compel recognition for themselves and support of their policies by his administration.

Very respectfully yours, Howard S. Gans.