862.4016/1210
The Chargé in Germany (Gordon) to the Acting Secretary of State
[Received July 21.]
Sir: In continuation of section 6 of despatch No. 2447 of June 3, 1933,16 I have the honor to report that although the outward manifestations of official anti-Semitism are becoming less frequent, the enforcement of discriminatory measures against Jews shows no signs of abating. Consistently and relentlessly the Jews are being eliminated from practically all walks of life. This procedure is most effectively facilitated by the present organizing of the Reich as a corporative State, for Jews are not permitted to join the various “estates” now being formed.
Since the advent of the Nazi regime about five months ago, anti-Semitic activity in Germany may be divided into three distinct stages. The first stage was the period of atrocities which immediately followed the Nazi victory at the polls on March 5. These atrocities were encouraged by inflammatory speeches of Nazi leaders. It was during this [Page 355] period that Minister Goering made his rabid speech at Essen (see section 3 of despatch No. 2247 of March 13, 193317). The second stage was the period of official legislation and other measures against Jews, which began with the general anti-Jewish boycott on April 1 and in which such legislation as the numerus clausus for Jews in the professions, educational institutions, and in almost all walks of life was enacted. In the present, third period, the Nazis are concentrating on the enforcement and administrative amplification of anti-Jewish laws already enacted. The various regulations issued by the authorities in connection therewith show that the Nazis intend to carry the Aryan principle to the utmost limit. The severity of these regulations is intensified by the anti-Semitic activities of various Nazi organizations which feel that the pace of the revolution is not rapid enough.
Though the physical atrocities against Jews appear to have ceased on a systematic scale, sporadic cases are still not infrequent. The Embassy was informed from reliable sources that as late as three weeks ago a small group of prominent Jews who gathered in a private dwelling in Berlin to discuss ways and means of relief for their needy coreligionists were dragged out by uniformed Nazis and taken to a secret Nazi haunt, where several of them were beaten up. This incident was later reported in the London Times. Only a few days ago, the Advisory Bureau for Physicians was raided by the police because the local Nazi Medical Organization charged that its members were Marxists and that it disseminated atrocity propaganda in foreign countries. Eighty Jewish physicians were arrested. It appears that the work of this bureau, which was formed as a result of the discriminatory measures against Jews in the professions, consists solely in advising Jewish physicians as to the possibilities of earning a livelihood in other countries, and that the charge of disseminating atrocity propaganda arose from the fact that the bureau corresponds with Jewish organizations in foreign countries.
The official boycott against Jewish business in April was followed by private boycott measures by various Nazi organizations. The National-Socialist Economic League has announced that framed signs with the legend “German Business”, surmounted by the Nazi swastika, were now available for display by non-Jewish firms, in exchange for an annual payment, the proceeds to be used for creating employment for jobless members of Nazi Storm Detachments. In various small cities, under pressure of Nazi organizations, newspapers refuse to accept advertisements from Jewish firms. In Nuremberg, the official advertising agency refused to accept an advertisement for the local telephone directory “in view of the Jewish character” of the firm in question.
[Page 356]Nazi organizations of doctors and lawyers especially are conducting a bitter and relentless boycott against their Jewish colleagues. On the basis of the new civil service law, Jewish doctors have been excluded from all social insurance organizations in Germany. Not satisfied with this, the leading German medical association has now concluded an agreement with private sick benefit insurance companies whereby the latter agree not to pay bills submitted by Aryans for treatment by Jewish doctors.
The Berlin Chamber of Lawyers passed a resolution prohibiting members of the bar from having any professional relations, especially partnership arrangements, with Jewish lawyers who had been disbarred. Any such arrangement entered into since September, 1930, must be dissolved. This means that disbarred Jewish lawyers who sought to evade the “Aryan clause” by forming a partnership with a lawyer entitled to practice in court must give up all hope of earning a livelihood in their profession.
Even private teachers come under the “Aryan clause.” Persons who conduct private preparatory schools, language schools, art schools, dramatic and cinema schools, and athletic gymnasiums, and persons who teach in such schools, must furnish evidence of Aryan origin by August 1, otherwise their license will be revoked.
Racial hygiene has been elevated to primary importance in the curriculum of schools and universities. Particular emphasis is being placed on the evils of miscegenation. According to the latest official interpretation of the new civil service law, a person married to a non-Aryan may not be appointed to the civil service; civil servants who marry a non-Aryan must be dismissed. Certain recent remarks by the Reich Minister of the Interior indicate that a law prohibiting intermarriage between Jews and Christians in Germany will soon be forthcoming.
Dr. Pfundtner, Secretary of State in the Reich Ministry of the Interior, announced only a few days ago that a new citizenship law on the racial principle is being contemplated. It seems clear that the purpose and effect of such a law would be to reduce the German Jews to the position of ignominy to which they were subjected during the Middle Ages. Nazi leaders have repeatedly boasted in the past that one of the first acts of a Nazi regime would be to set up ghettos in Germany.
It will thus be seen that the outward and official manifestations of anti-Semitism in present-day Germany fail to reveal the real brutality and truculence of the Nazis towards the Jews, and that they are determined to make life for Jews in Germany well-nigh insufferable. As yet there are no signs that the Nazis intend to let up on these discriminatory measures.
Respectfully yours,