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

ut approximately 39,400 Jews entered Argentina during the war years primarily illegally
via Paraguay and Bolivia. 107
Helio Lobo, the delegate from Brazil, indicated that Brazil had long held an
“open door” immigration policy seeking the labor that would develop the country’s
natural resources. During the period 1820-1930 more than four and a half million
immigrants had been admitted primarily from Europe accounting for ten percent of the
total population but current economic conditions mandated immigration restrictions to
protect domestic employment. The ability of non-Latin refugees to assimilate into the
dominant culture and potential alterations in the racial composition of the nation were
additional concerns. The Immigration Law of 1934 established a two percent yearly
quota based on each nationality that had settled in Brazil over the previous fifty years and
amounted to 42,000 per year; most of whom resided in the countryside working in the
agricultural sector. Germans comprised the fourth largest migrant group prior to World
War I. The German and Austrian quotas respectively accounted for 3,099 and 1,655
immigrants annually.
The Immigration Law of 1938 continued the two percent benchmark but allocated
unused quotas to other nationalities whose yearly allotment had been exhausted. A
similar recommendation would be made by the British to the U.S. but the State
Department would decline. In addition, eighty percent of each quota had to be reserved
for “agricultural immigrants or technical experts in agriculture.” Brazil was, according to
Lobo, ready to “respond to the noble appeal of the American Government” and would
cooperate to the “limits of her immigration policy…for the sake of the lofty ideal which
107 “Argentina in World War II Timeline” available from
http://history.sandiego.edu/GEN/st/~tpace/Timeline.html; Internet; accessed December 26, 2009.
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