867N.01/1088
Memorandum by the Chief of the Division of Near Eastern Affairs (Murray) to the Secretary of State
Mr. Secretary: I understand that a committee of the Pro-Palestine Federation of America, including Mr. William Green, President of the American Federation of Labor, and Dr. A. Ben Elias, Executive Secretary, proposes to call on you this morning.
The Pro-Palestine Federation, which you received on June 15th of last year, is made up of prominent laymen and members of the clergy of the Christian faith in this country, such as Charles Edward [Page 928] Russell, John Haynes Holmes, George Gordon Battle, Dr. S. Parkes Cadman, and William Green, to name only a few.
During the past year it has been active in appealing both to the White House and the State Department in favor of the intervention of this Government with the British Government against the partition of Palestine. More recently, it has advocated public action to induce Great Britain to lift the restrictions on Jewish immigration into Palestine. In general it favors the development of Palestine in the interest of the Jews and contends that the American-British Mandate Convention of 192447 places a responsibility upon this Government for insuring the fulfillment of the Balfour Declaration.
The committee, which you will presumably desire to receive by reason of the prominence of its members, will no doubt appeal to you to support officially with the British Government its program.
It was to be anticipated that pressure groups in this country would seize the occasion of the appointment of the International Committee on Political Refugees48 to urge the bringing before that body of the question of increased Jewish immigration into Palestine.
The committee of the Pro-Palestine Federation may well bring the subject forward this morning, in which case I would suggest that the committee be informed that the International Committee will of course give consideration to all practical phases of questions affecting political refugees so far as they may come within the scope of the International Committee’s activities, and that the Department is giving consideration at all times to all phases of the situation as it affects Palestine.
- Signed at London December 3, 1924, Foreign Relations, 1924, vol. ii, p. 212.↩
- See vol. i, pp. 740 ff.↩