Beyond Belief (52 page)

51
.
Literary Digest
, June 18, 1932, p. 19; Edgar Mowrer,
Germany Puts the Clock Back
(New York: Morrow, 1933), p. 239.

52
.
Cleveland News
, September 17, 1935;
Cincinnati Enquirer
, September 18, 1935;
Boston Transcript
, September 16, 1935;
Macon
(Georgia)
Telegraph
, September 19, 1935;
Flint
(Michigan)
Journal
, September 19, 1935;
Pueblo Springs
(Colorado)
Gazetteer
, September 18, 1935;
Fort Worth
(Texas)
Star Telegraph
, September 19, 1935;
Memphis Commercial Appeal
, September 18, 1935;
Denver News
, September 21, 1935;
Newsweek
, September 21, 1935. Many papers which had not previously commented on Nazi persecution did so on the occasion of the Nuremburg Laws. Shirer,
Nightmare Years
, p. 226.

53
.
New York Herald Tribune
, July 28, 1935;
New York Sun
, August 2, 1935;
Washington Post
, August 1, 1935;
Lynchburg
(Virginia)
News
, August 2, 1935;
Richmond Times Dispatch
, August 4, 1935;
Kenosha
(Wisconsin)
News
, September 9, 1935;
Easton
(Pennsylvania)
Express
. September 10, 1935.

54
.
Newsweek
, September 21, 1935, p. 12.

55
.
Los Angeles Times
, September 16, 1935. The headline in the
New York Herald Tribune
did make the ban on citizenship the lead item, but it referred to the change in flag twice:

NAZIS BAR JEWS AS CITIZENS,

MAKE SWASTIKA SOLE FLAG

IN REPLY TO N.Y
. ‘INSULT'

SUBSERVIENT REICHSTAG IN EXTRA SESSION

OUTLAWS MIXED MARRIAGES, PUTS JEWS BACK IN MIDDLE

AGES

Memel ‘Tortures' D
ecried by Hitler

World Anti-Jewish Flag ‘Insulted' by Semites in New York

Replaces the Reich Imperial Banner

New York Herald Tribune
, September 16, 1935.

56
.
Washington Herald
, September 16, 1935.

57
.
New York Times
, September 16, 1935.

58
.
Baltimore Sun
, September 16, 1935.

59
.
Christian Science Monitor
, September 16, 1935, p. 10.

60
. In another example of an obfuscated reaction to the news, the
Troy
(New York)
Record
, September 17, 1935, believed the most important part of the laws was the limits placed on Jewish children's education. “One might digest some of these proscriptions without gagging if it were not for the inhuman Asiatic practice recently embraced in Germany, of punishing children for fancied shortcomings of their ancestors.” The
Record
decried punishing children whose parents “are
socially objectionable”
(emphasis added). The
Record's
description of Jews as “socially objectionable” indicated failure to comprehend the demonic place Jews occupied in Nazi ideology. The paper compared their treatment with Stalinist treatment of middle-class children and concluded the lot of Russian children was more trying because they were denied any education, while the Nazis promised state aid for “separate Jewish taught schools.” See also
Meridan
(Mississippi)
Star
, September 18, 1935;
Beaumont
(Texas)
Enterprise
, September 16, 1935;
Boston Transcript
, September 16, 1935.

61
.
Cleveland News
, September 17, 1935.

62
.
New York Times
, September 22, 1935.

63
.
Christian Science Monitor
, October 17, 1935. See also Memo, Dodd to Hull, August 20, 1935, DS 862.4016/1538.

64
.
Boston Transcript
, September 16, 1935.

65
. Diplomatic dispatches from the period indicate that as a result of previously issued antisemitic legislation the status of the Jew was quite dire. See, for example, report by Ralph C. Busser, American Consul in Leipzig, July 22, 1935, DS 862.4016/1503; report by American Consul General in Stuttgart Samuel W. Honaker, August
23, 1935, DS 862.4016/1543; memo, Dodd to Hull, October 17, 1935, DS 862.4016/1568.

66
.
Memphis Commercial Appeal
, September 18, 1935.

67
.
New York Times
, September 1, 1935, p. 12. Memo, Chargé in Germany J. C. White to Hull, August 20, 1935, DS 862.4016/1538; Dodd to Hull, September 26, 1935, DS 862.4016/1561.

68
.
Los Angeles Times
, September 18, 1935, sec. II, p. 4;
St. Louis Post Dispatch
, November 17, 1935;
Cincinnati Enquirer
, September 18, November 18, 1935.

69
.
St. Louis Post Dispatch
, May 22, 1935; Margaret K. Norden, “American Editorial Response to the Rise of Adolf Hitler: A Preliminary Consideration,”
American Jewish Historical Quarterly
, vol. 30 (October 1968), pp. 290-301.

70
. Memo, Dodd to Hull, September 26, 1935, DS 862.4016/1561; memo, Dodd to Hull, October 31, 1935, DS 862.4016/1573;
Voelkischer Beobachter
, October 23, 1935, as cited in Eliahu Ben Elissar,
La Diplomatie du III Reich et les Juifs, 1933-1939
(Paris-Julliard, 1969), pp. 160-162.

1
.
New York Times
, May 29, 1933.

2
.
New York Times
, June 8, 1933, p. 1.

3
. Richard D. Mandell,
The Nazi Olympics
(New York: Ballantine Books, 1971), p. 78. The Amateur Athletic Union of the United States (AAU) was scheduled to meet in November 1933. At that meeting, in a near-unanimous vote, it agreed not to certify athletes for the Games unless Germany's position regarding Jewish athletes changed “in fact as well as in theory.” The AAU stated that the German Olympic Committee had violated the ideals of the Olympic Games and of sports competition by depriving German Jews of the right to “prepare for and participate in” Olympic competition.
New York Times
, November 21, 1933, p. 1, November 22, 1933, p. 28;
Nation
, November 29, 1933, p. 607;
Literary Digest
, December 2, 1933, p. 22.

4
.
Newsweek
, April 22, 1933, p. 13. On July 2, 1933, the Nazi Minister of Education announced that Jews would henceforth be excluded from youth, welfare, and gymnastic organizations and that use of the facilities of all athletic clubs would be denied to them. Later that month Jews were forbidden from serving as lifeguards in Breslau. Eventually all swimming resorts were closed to them. It was
not long before Jews who wished to train for the Games found the requisite playing fields and training camps off limits. Mandell, pp. 64-66;
New York Times
, November 28, 1933, p. 25.

5
. Mandell, p. 81; Arthur Morse,
While Six Million Died: A Chronicle of American Apathy
(New York: Random House, 1967), p. 174; Eliahu Ben Elissar,
La Diplomatie du III Reich et les Juifs
(Paris: Julliard, 1969), pp. 167-170; Shlomo Shafir, “The Impact of the Jewish Crisis on American-German Relations, 1933-1939,” pp. 581, 584-585;
New York Times
, November 27, 1935, p. 14.

6
.
Literary Digest
, July 11, 1936, p. 35;
New York Times
, November 23, November 26, December 1, 1933, October 22, p. 1, October 23, 1935;
Grand Junction
(Colorado)
Sentinel
, October 29, 1935.
   Sherrill's resignation from his ambassadorial post had been “joyfully accepted” by the State Department. See entry for January 11, 1934, Phillips Diary, Phillips Papers, as quoted in Shafir, p. 584; memo of Sherrill's visit to Hitler in Munich on August 24, 1935, in Roosevelt Papers, President's Secretary's File, box 7, Franklin D. Roosevelt Library, Hyde Park, N.Y., Elissar, pp. 173-175; Morse, pp. 181-182;
New York Times
, September 27, 1934, p. 28.

7
. Morse, p. 174; list of places forbidden to Jews is contained in Ambassador Dodd's dispatch, May 17, 1935, DS 862.4016/1457. From the middle of 1933 on, warnings had come from American embassy officials in Germany, particularly George Messersmith, to the effect that German promises could not be trusted regarding Jewish participation in the Games. Memo, Messersmith to Hull, June 17, 1933, DS 862.4016/1181, and November 28, 1933, DS 862.4063/01 Games 1, as cited in Shafir, p. 581.

8
.
New York Times
, December 7, 1934, p. 31, August 2, 1935, p. 8.

9
. William Johnson,
All That Glitters Is Not Gold
(New York: Putnam, 1972), p. 176.

10
. Ibid.

11
.
New York Times
, August 12, 1935, p. 1; memo, Dodd to Hull, December 10, 1935, DS 765.84/3007, as cited in Shafir, p. 587.

12
. H. J. Resolution 381 opposing the expenditure of public funds on the Olympics was introduced by Emanuel Celler of New York on August 16, 1935.
Congressional Record
, 74th Cong., 1st sess., 1935, 79, part 12 (Washington: Government Printing Office, 1935), 13332;
New York Times
, August 16, 1935, p. 4.

13
.
Springfield
(Massachusetts)
News
, July 27, 1935.

14
.
Commonweal
, August 16, 1935;
Norfolk
(Virginia)
Pilot
, August 8, 1935.

15
.
Norfolk Pilot
, August 24, 1935.

16
.
New York World Telegram
, September 16, 1935;
Troy Record
, September 9, 1935;
East St. Louis Journal
, August 8, 1935;
Trenton Gazette
, August 10, 1935.

17
.
New York World Telegram
, September 16, 1935.

18
.
Boston Globe
, July 30, 1935.

19
.
Trenton Gazette
, August 10, 1935.

20
.
Springfield
(Illinois)
Journal
, August 11, 1935.

21
. Johnson, pp. 175–176.
Allentown
(Pennsylvania)
Call
, September 8, 1935.

22
.
Saturday Evening Post
, May 6, 1933, p. 71.

23
.
Chicago Tribune
, July 5, 1936, p. 16.

24
.
Des Moines Register
, November 5, 1935.

25
.
Superior
(Wisconsin)
Telegram
, August 5, 1935;
Seattle Star
, August 7, 1935;
Lawrence
(Massachusetts)
Eagle
, August 1, 1935.

26
.
Atlanta Constitution
, August 25, 1935.

27
.
Milwaukee Herald
, September 10, 1935;
Christian Century
, August 7, 1935, p. 1007, August 14, 1935, p. 1028.

28
.
New York Times
July 12, 1936. Memo, Dodd to Hull, January 30, 1936, DS 862.4016/1610; Messersmith to Hull, November 15, 1934, DS 862.4063/01. G. 57; Messersmith to Phillips, November 30, 1935, DS 862.00/3573; Messersmith to Geist, November 12, 1935, Frankfurter Papers, box 25, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C., as cited in Shafir, p. 587.

29
.
Minneapolis Star
, August 8, 1935;
St. Joseph
(Missouri)
Gazette
, August 1, 1935. Bang was quoted in a “roundup” of sports writers' opinions in the
Knoxville Journal
, November 8, 1935.

30
.
Lansing
(Michigan)
Journal
, August 7, 1935;
Wheeling
(West Virginia)
News Register
, September 10, 1935.

31
.
Charleston
(South Carolina)
Post
, August 6, 1935; Morse, pp. 359-360; Henry L. Feingold,
The Politics of Rescue
(New York: Waldon Press, 1970), p. 257.

32
. Mandell, pp. 68, 77-78.

33
. Dodd to Hull, January 30, 1936, DS 862.4016/1610. See also
FRUS
, 1936, vol. II, p. 197.

34
.
Charleston
(South Carolina)
Post
, August 6, 1935.

35
.
Rochester Democrat and Chronicle
, October 23, 1935;
Albany Press
, November 1, 1935;
Charleston Post
, August 5, 1935; Memo, Dodd to Hull, October 31, 1935, DS 862.4016/1573.

36
.
Los Angeles Times
, August 7, 1935.

37
.
Los Angeles Times
, September 13, 1935.

38
.
Mobile
(Alabama)
Register
, November 9, 1935.

39
.
Literary Digest
, August 31, 1935.

40
.
New York World Telegram
, February 17, February 19, 1936; Mandell, pp. 87-88;
Washington Post
, August 3, 1936, p. 7, August 5, 1936, p. 7.

41
.
Los Angeles Times
, September 9, 1935.

42
. William L. Shirer,
20th Century Journey: A Memoir of a Life and the Times
, vol. II,
The Nightmare Years, 1930-1940
(Boston: Little, Brown, 1984), p. 233; author's interview with William Shirer, December 19, 1984.