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

initially to ten minutes but later cut down to five minutes. Consequently, the advocates
“all left the room disheartened and disillusioned.” 3
Catholic spokesmen claimed that five hundred thousand of their non-Aryan
Christian brethren resided within the confines of Greater Germany and that ten thousand
refugees were “dependent on the charity” of their co-religionists. Catholic committees in
the United States, headed by Archbishop Joseph Rummel of New Orleans, and similar
groups from Great Britain, France, Belgium, Holland and Switzerland introduced a joint
memorandum calling upon the Evian delegations to persuade Germany to end its policy
of forced emigration or at a minimum to allow retention of sufficient monies to provide
re-training, transportation and resettlement. “[A] clear reassertion of the fundamental
rights” of mankind was essential for it was the denial and denigration of such rights that
fostered the “tragic problem” of involuntary refugees. 4
The British League of Nations Union introduced a statement acknowledging its
prior attempts to unify projects of rescue under the auspices of the Geneva based body. It
did agree, however, that an organization independent of the League would be required to
negotiate with the German Government and to persuade the United States and Brazil to
assume greater responsibility in reaching a solution; i.e., accept a greater percentage of
stateless refugees. The British League called upon the Germans to establish a fund,
whether by “barter, exchange or other methods” to broker the costs of resettlement. A
3 Rudel-Adler, The Evian Conference, 255.
4 Charles K. Streit, “Catholics Appeal to Refugee Parley,” New York Times, July 9, 1938, 1. Monsignor
Michael Ready, the General Secretary of the National Catholic Welfare Conference (NCWC), attended the
Evian Conference as the surrogate of Archbishop Rummel.
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