The Jewish Trail of Tears The Evian Conference of ... - Haruth.com

Roosevelt initially believed and expressed during a press conference in Warm
Springs, Georgia, that the forthcoming refugee conference should include additional
groups facing persecution such as Spanish Loyalists, German Catholics and Lutherans
and Trotskyites. However, the editors of Newsweek claimed that the most logical
explanation for the President to extend the range of the conference was to avoid
accusations of giving preference to Jews. They argued Roosevelt was more interested in
“belaboring Hitler” than offering a workable solution to the refugee dilemma. The State
Department could have ordered the consulates to liberalize immigration requirements to
allow entry of German and Austrian Jews in numbers that could “not amount to much.” 97
Although the United States Government had called for an international conference to deal
with the refugee problem the policies of the State Department acted to impede the entry
of German and Austrian refugees. Visitors’ visas would be denied to foreigners who
were unable to enter under the quota system, who lacked an “unrelinquished domicile” in
and the means and ability to return to their country of origin. 98
A long standing anti-Jewish attitude or complacency towards anti-Semitism was
prevalent among officials of the State Department which impacted upon their willingness
to facilitate the entry of immigrants. For example, soon after the Nazi ascension to power
in 1933 the U.S. Consul in Munich, Charles M. Hathaway, Jr., compared the German
anti-Semitic program to the earlier actions of the infamous Spanish Inquisition under
Torquemada. The German Government, like the Catholic hierarchy in Spain, viewed the
97 Newsweek, April 4, 1938.
98 For a detailed analysis of U.S. immigration policies regarding Jews from Germany see Bat-Ami
Zucker, In Search of Refuge: Jews and US Consuls in Nazi Germany 1933-1941 (London: Vallentine
Mitchell, 2001).2000
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