881.4016/11
The Secretary of the American Jewish Committee ( Morris D. Waldman ) to the Secretary of State
[Received April 2.]
Dear Sir: On behalf of my fellow-officers and the Executive Committee of the American Jewish Committee, I beg leave to call your attention to the following subject, which we regard as one of concern to the government of the United States.
According to a decree of the present government of France, published in the Journal Officiel of October 18, all persons “descended from three grandparents of the Jewish race, or descended from two grandparents of the same race and married to a Jewish consort” are denied access to and exercise of public functions and commissions which cover practically all branches of the public service, civil and military, as well as participation in all publishing, motion picture, and radio broadcasting enterprises. Article IX of this decree states: “The present law applies to Algeria, the colonies, protectorates and mandated territories.”
One of the territories to which this law applies is the Protectorate of Morocco, which, according to the census of 1936, had a Jewish population of 161,312 persons in a total population of 6,298,528. You will recall that, on the occasion of the Algeciras Conference in 1906, at which the Government of the United States was represented by Mr. Henry White, he was instructed by Elihu Root, then Secretary of State, to urge upon the Conference “the consideration of guarantees of religious and racial tolerance in Morocco.” Foreign Relations of [Page 593] the United States for 1905, p. 680.) In the official protocol of the Conference, of April 2, 1906, Mr. White is quoted as saying: “The American Delegation urges the Conference to be willing to propose the vote, that H. Shereefian Majesty continue in the good work inaugurated by his father and maintained by His Majesty himself in reference to his Jewish subjects, and that he see to it that his government does not neglect any occasion to make known to its functionaries that the Sultan maintains that the Jews of his Empire and all his subjects, without distinction of faith, should be treated with justice and equality.” Representatives of all the Powers participating in the Conference supported the proposal of Mr. White and the resolution offered by him was unanimously adopted by the delegates of the Powers. (Nouveau Recueil Général de Traités, II Series, Vol. 34, Pt. 1, pp. 229–230.)
It is respectfully submitted that, regardless of the present status of the General Act of the International Conference at Algeciras,60 the Government of the United States, in proposing the resolution which was adopted unanimously by the Conference, assumed a moral responsibility for the equal treatment of all subjects of the Protectorate of French Morocco. This equal treatment is obviously violated by the extension to Morocco of the anti-Jewish discriminatory decree already referred to.
My colleagues and I express the hope that, should a favorable opportunity present itself, the Government of the United States will make appropriate representations to the French Government on the basis of the resolution adopted at the Algeciras Conference upon the initiative of the Government of the United States.
Respectfully yours,
- Signed April 7, 1906, Foreign Relations, 1906, pt. 2, p. 1495.↩