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

coupled with the possibility of establishing satellite offices in European capitals. 2 The
chosen director was seventy-year old attorney George Rublee, a Roosevelt friend and
former classmate at Groton Academy. However, with little funding and authority its list
of accomplishments by the outbreak of war on September 1, 1939 was minimal. 3
[Appendix F demonstrates the limited finances available to the IGCR and the allocation
of expenses among member nations.] Its first meeting was scheduled for August 3.
The Americans preferred that this permanent committee be based in Paris but
official French opposition led to its location in the United Kingdom. The French Foreign
Ministry feared that the committee’s refugee operations, based in the capital, would result
in the proliferation of “every ethnic, religious, or political organization that concerns
itself with every minority and political opposition group.” Governmental attempts to
eradicate the “activities of irresponsible foreign bodies” within France would “thus be
annihilated.” Furthermore, involvement with the problem of German and Austrian
refugees would complicate French foreign affairs and policies. The Ministry asked if it
was in the interest of the Republic to assume the role of refuge for “all the misfits” and
people whom “Germany considers its natural enemy.” Such humanitarianism could
permanently create an air of “cultural and racial antagonism” between the two
neighbors. 4
2 Clarence K. Streit, “Refugee Meeting Adopts Resolution,” New York Times, July 15, 1938, 7; St.
Petersburg Times, July 9, 1938.
3 By August 1939, on the brink of the Polish-German war, the IGCR possessed a total bank balance of
$9,672. Sean Malloy and Doug Lorimer, eds., The Palestinian Struggle, Zionism and Anti-Semitism
(Chippendale, NSW, Australia: Resistance Books, 2002), 42.
4 Foreign Ministry Report, “Programme de la reunion du Comité Intergouvernemental d’Evian,” June
24, 1938, MAE SDN I M 1815, 211-218, Foreign Ministry, “Note pour le Ministre,” June 29, 1938, MAE
SDN I M 1815, 253-58 cited in Caron, Uneasy Asylum, 186.
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