871.4016/232
The Minister in Rumania (Gunther) to the Secretary of State
[Received August 12.]
Sir: I have the honor to report that the new Minister of Propaganda, Mr. Nichiror Crainic, received the directors of Bucharest newspapers on June 8th last, at which time he read to them a prepared statement which included the following passages:
“In the new regime inaugurated by His Majesty the King the right of daily addressing the Rumanian nation belongs to Rumanians of pure blood. Nationality is a fatality of the blood, and a stranger tends only to express his own self when he utilizes our language. A long and grievous experience has taught us that the press written by Jews never succeeds in integrating itself into the ideals of Rumanianism, but under the mask of the borrowed language only expressed the natural ideas of the respective race, unfortunately dissolvent for our nation. The defunct regime of democracy was dominated by a Jewish press and we are today experiencing its last consequences with profound disillusionment. The regime of integral or totalitarian nationalism of the Party of the Nation and of the Government which I represent can be served only by a national press, the other co-habiting peoples continuing to have newspapers in their languages, harmonized with the superior principles and interests of the State, a thing which, to their [Page 766] credit, the Christian minorities of the country have done for a long time.
“Consequently, the Government makes it known that Rumanian newspapers can not be directed by Jews, and Jews are not in their place on newspapers directed by Rumanians. …4
“We know perfectly well that after the great Rumanian misfortune which the old democratic policy won for us, the psychology of the time imposes the bellowing of grief and the red-hot iron of accusation. But, nevertheless, external circumstances, known to everyone, forbid the settlement of internal accounts in the superior interests of the State.”
The foregoing is noteworthy mainly for its plain speaking. The result has been the elimination of the Jews from the Rumanian press. The French-language newspaper Le Moment, whose Jewish founder-editor has resigned, has been suspended for an indefinite period for reasons of public order and two other democratically inclined newspapers, Semnalul and Jurnalul (Jewish controlled) have been suppressed. Of interest in this same connection is the publication in the Monitorul Oficial of July 10th of the Law for the Organization of the College of Doctors, which provides that in order legally to practice medicine one must be a member of the College and membership is restricted to Rumanian citizens enjoying full civil rights. Since Jews do not enjoy full civil rights, not being eligible to membership in the Party of the Nation, it is obvious that the intention is to exclude them also from the practice of medicine.
The Government appears to be making every effort on the one hand to appease the Jews by restraining molestation of all kinds, while on the other hand proceeding with such discriminatory regulations as those just mentioned. Some are suspected of clandestinely encouraging attacks on the Jews because of their conviction that (a) this is the solution of the entire Rumanian problem and (b) it will curry favor with Germany. Rumanians in general seem to wish to wreak their wrath either actively or passively on the Jews for the events which have taken place in Bessarabia, particularly the many instances which are gradually becoming known in which the Jews, either aided or encouraged by communists and other members of the local populations, rose against the departing Rumanian officials at the time of the Russian entry.
Continual reports of persecutions and killings of Jews in the provinces, particularly in Moldavian villages and towns along the new frontier, are drifting into Bucharest daily, but it is difficult to ascertain just what proportion of them may be true.
As of possible interest in this general connection I am enclosing herewith a copy of a covertly circulated statement4a issued by the self-styled “Central Committee of the organization for the protection of [Page 767] the victims of imperialistic terrorism in Rumania” which describes the “joy and enthusiasm” reigning in Bessarabia and Bucovina today.
Respectfully yours,
Secretary of Legation