Review of the Year Review of the Year

REVIEW OF THE YEAR REVIEW OF THE YEAR CONTENTS I. UNITED STATES 205 II. BRITISH EMPIRE Great Britain 292 Irish Free State 307 Canada 308 Union of South Africa 309 III. OTHER WEST EUROPEAN COUNTRIES Belgium 313 France 314 Netherlands 321 Portugal 322 Spain 323 IV. GERMANY ,. 325 V. OTHER CENTRAL EUROPEAN COUNTRIES Albania ' 354 Austria • *....,, 354 Czechoslovakia : .'....:.••'.•.../. O.'!i 357 Danzig 362 Denmark 364 Hungary 365 Italy 369 Norway 376 Sweden 377 Switzerland 377 VI. POLAND 380 VII. ROUMANIA 433 VIII. OTHER EAST EUROPEAN COUNTRIES Bulgaria 449 Estonia 450 Greece 450 Lithuania 451 Soviet Russia 453 IX. PALESTINE -458 X. OTHER COUNTRIES Argentina 488 Brazil 489 Cuba 490 Iraq 490 Japan 491 Turkey 493 XI. INTERNATIONAL MATTERS 494 REVIEW OF THE YEAR 5697* BY HARRY SCHNEIDERMAN I. THE UNITED STATES For the first time since the spring of 1933, when the present regime in Germany began, there were indications, during the period under review, that, although it is con- tinuing to follow with lively attention events of Jewish interest abroad, the Jewish community of the United States is again beginning to give the major part of its thought to domestic interests. This change of trend is probably due, principally, to three factors, namely, first, the feeling that the Jewish situation in foreign lands has become more or less stabilized, albeit on a very low plane; second, the general conviction that the community's agencies for overseas relief and reconstruction have become geared to the changed conditions abroad; and, third, the consensus that the conditions in the United States were favorable for the resumption of the normal operation and development of communal activities which had been functioning on a restricted emergency basis during the depression. Events of Jewish interest abroad and happen- ings at home connected with foreign affairs continued, however, to engage much of the attention of the community. Unquestionably up to the end of the period, coinciding with the eve of the publication of the report of the British Royal Commission recommending the partition of Palestine, developments in, and related to, Germany remained in the foreground of this interest. *The period covered by this review is from July 1, 1936, to June 30, 1937. It is based on reports in the Jewish and general press of the United States and a number of foreign countries. 205 206 AMERICAN JEWISH YEAR BOOK A. OVERSEAS INTERESTS Reaction to Events in Germany The Olympic Games Our account in last year's Review of the controversy regarding American participation in the Olympic Games, held in Berlin in the summer of 1936, concluded with a reference to the difficulties experienced by the American Olympic Committee in raising the funds required to enable a full contingent of American athletes to go to Berlin. (See American Jewish Year Book, Vol. 37, pp. 181- 187). On July 6, 1936, Gustavus Town Kirby, treasurer of the American Olympic Committee, denied emphatically the accuracy of widely circulated reports that anti-Nazi sentiment had anything to do with the deficit of nearly $150,000 that confronted the Committee a little more than a week before sailing. His denial followed a statement to that effect by Jeremiah T. Mahoney, former president of the Amateur Athletic Union and the leader of the move- ment to boycott the games. On July 13, Mr.- Kirby announced that the American Olympic team, largest numerically and strongest athletically in history, would sail for Berlin on the following day, in debt. What the total indebtedness was, Mr. Kirby did not say, but it was known that the cash deficit for the sports budget was $57,709, that an additional $50,000 was needed for the operating expenses of the Committee for the next four years, and to pay a $25,000 debt. Various incidents combined to render the games unpop- ular in the United States. Even before the games began, the tactics of the American Management Committee, headed by Avery Brundage, evoked much unfavorable criticism. The Committee's action in discharging Mrs. Eleanor Holm Jarret, popular swimmer, for alleged in- fractions of training regulations while the American team was en route, was generally deplored as an unnecessarily drastic step. But the action of the International Olympics Committee in dropping Ernest Lee Jahncke, an American member, who, in November 1936, had publicly advocated REVIEW OF THE YEAR 5697 207 American non-participation in the games, aroused even more criticism. In addition, the political speeches made by Goebels and other members of the Nazi cabinet, obvious evidences of the exploitation of the festival for propaganda purposes, the numerous signs of German "goose-step" discipline everywhere prevalent, the cool reception given to the American team by the Germans assembled at the stadium, reports that Hitler had declined personally to congratulate American winners of events, especially Negroes, — these and other factors considerably marred the general rejoicing with which the victories of American teams were received in the United States. Finally, the appearance of Avery Brundage as a speaker at German Day exercises at Madison Square Garden in New York City on October 4, 1936, and his speech in which he praised Germany under the Nazis, attacked the opponents of American participation in the Games, and said that America had much to learn from Germany, convinced many who had theretofore doubted, that the Olympic Games had been exploited to promote Nazi political propaganda. On December 6, 1936, Jeremiah T. Mahoney was returned to the presidency of the Amateur Athletic Union after a bitter convention floor fight against Patrick J. Walsh, candidate of the Brundage group. The election of Mahoney who had led the opposition to American participation in the Olympics was seen as a rebuke to the group which had led America into the Olympic Games. Mr. Mahoney immediately named Ernest L. Jahncke, who had been dropped from the American Olympic Committee, one of the delegates-at-large of the A. A. U. for 1937; Mr. Mahoney vigorously attacked "athletic nationalism" and declared himself opposed "to having the Olympic Games taken over by any country which surrenders its athletic functions and prerogatives to its Government as did the German Olympic Committee." Quite in harmony with this pronouncement, the executive and foreign relations committees of the A. A. U., at a joint meeting in Milwaukee, Wis., on July 2, 1937, declined to permit a track and field team which was to visit Sweden, the Netherlands, and Hungary, to compete in Germany. 208 AMERICAN JEWISH YEAR BOOK Petition to League of Nations On August 3, 1936, a petition signed by liberal, Jewish and refugee aid organizations appealing to the League of Nations to intercede in behalf of persecuted groups in Germany on the principal ground that their forced emigration imposed unwarranted burdens on neighboring nations was made public by the American Jewish Com- mittee at a press conference. Among those present at the conference were Prof. Morris R. Cohen, chairman of the Committee on Jewish Relations, who emphasized legal precedents for intercession ; Dr. Henry Smith Leiper, secretary of the American Christian Committee for German Refugees, Sol M. Stroock, chairman of the executive committee of the American Jewish Committee and Louis Fabricant, of B'nai B'rith. Simultaneously, it was announced that definite assurance had been received from an important state member of the League, the name of which could not be divulged, that the petition would be formally presented to the eighteenth plenary meeting of the League Assembly in September. The petition which supported the letter of resignation of James G. McDonald, former High Commissioner for Refugees, was accompanied by a 36,000 word annex giving precedents and legal grounds for international action in behalf of persecuted groups in the Reich. Among the organizations sponsoring the petition were the American Christian Committee for German Refugees, the American Jewish Committee, B'nai B'rith, Women's International League for Peace and Freedom, Alliance Israelite Universelle, Comite Pour la Defense des Droits des Israelites, Comite National de Secours aux Refugies, Comite Central d'Assistance aux Emigrants Juifs, and the Ligue des Droits de l'Homme et du Citoyen. The petition points out that "the discriminations against and persecutions of Jews, 'non-Aryan' Christians, Catholics, Protestants and others which have been made a matter of national policy by the German National Socialist Govern- ment, and the relentless increase of this oppression, have, because of their far-reaching effects in many other countries where the oppressed are forced to seek refuge, become REVIEW OF THE YEAR 5697 209 issues of international concern, meriting consideration and intercession by the League of Nations." Emphasizing the League's obligation to "achieve international peace and security," the document charges that Germany had violated fundamental principles of the law of nations and the rights of other States which have been forced to assume the burden of a refugee problem; this burden has been increased by denationalization of thousands after entering neighboring countries. The petition quotes historic examples of such international action beginning with the Peace of Augsburg in 1555 and including the United States protest in 1902 against persecution of Jews in Rumania. Declaring that no State can be obliged to suffer in silence the consequences which may follow from the unqualified freedom of action adopted by the German state with respect to its own citizens, the annex lists the following as violations of the rights of other States: 1. The forced emigration from Germany of thousands of individuals and their imposition upon the territory of neighboring states; 2. The denationalization of and refusal to accord full diplomatic protection to thousands of individuals who have thereby been cast stateless upon other countries; 3.

Load more