TREASURE
DOORYARD
Mrs. Irving M. Engel Mrs. Engel is dudrman of the board of the United Service for New Americans, Inc., principal national welfare agency serving the foreign bom in the United States.
One of the brightest moments in the Jewish annals of the year 4706 occurred at 9 o'clock on the sunny morning of the 19th of Sivan (May 20), on a pier on New York's North River waterfront. A trim army transport, still wearing its wartime grey, pulled into the dock, decks and lower rigging crowded with passengers eagerly scanning the Manhattan skyline.
There toad been many gala arrivals in New York Harbor since the end of the war of ships bringing back American soldiers. This was different. Those waiting on the pier could see the rails of the vessel lined with strangely mixed assortment of people, grey-bearded men, old women leaning on crutdhes, mothers clutching babies, boys and yoimg men dressed in salvalged American and British uniforms.
A strange quiet fell over ship and pier as the transport slid toward her berth. Instead of the usual cheerful hubbub of greetings between the deck and pier, tizere was only the occasional hooting of the tugboats. Then, from the ship's foredeck, there came a feeble attempt at singing. At first only a few voices took up the refrain, faintly and uncertainly. Then someone on the bridge picked up the tune. In a moment the. entire ship was resounding with the strains of "America the Beautiful."
From the deck came a strange and stirring answer. It was com-poimded of the cry of a mother whose lost child is restored to her; of husband and vinfe, lover and beloved, brother and sister reimit-ed as if from, the grave. Packed behind a barrier on the pier were two. thousand men and women, each of whom had a loved one on the ship. They gave voice to their emotion in one long sound that was both a shout and a sign. e:q>ressive of joy and pain, tragedy and Tuispeakable happiness.
This was the arrival of the steamship "Marine Flasher," bringing the first group of survivors of Nazi persecution as immigrants to the United States imder President Truman's directive for the rescue of displaced persons and refugees. The event was a concrete demonstration of the meaning of the great American, tradition of .asylum for llhe oppressed.
There were many more such shiparlvals later. Dispossessed and homeless paople reached our shores from Europe and other parts of the world at the rate of 2.000 a month, and they are stilll coming. Each occasion brought scenes similar to the iirst docking of the "Marine Flasher."
Despite the vital personal stake of thousands of Americans, and particularly American Jews, ui' this immigration, it is doubtful that many of them have given much thought to the organized effort involved in bringing eadi rescued man, woman or diild to our country. Still less have many been concerned about the things that must be done for these people as a group after they have reached OUT sihores, and least of all about the broader agnificance of this immigration with rdation to the Jewish situation throughout the world.
Yet these events held in then* seeds of hope for the remnants of Jewry stranded by the receding tides of Nazism and war. They have an important bearing on the fate of Jewry in Eiurope, the aspirations of thousands to reach Palestine, and the possibiUty of thousands more finding haven In other lands.
The Truman directive did not constitute any sudden shift in American policy. It was a logical extension of previous developments. Refugees had come here ever since 1933. For years a large part of the public had known gen-eraly, and the Government had been very keenly and vividly a-ware, that these people had made a remarkably rapid and satisfactory adjustment to American lilc, and were making contributions to their new country far out of proportion to their comparatively small nimibers.
The Government also knew that a' fundamental reason why the newcomers bad succeeded so well in becoming good Americans was that they had the benefit of an
• THE SMILING FACE of a reclaimed refugee boy, admitted into the United States by President Truman's directive, is testimony to the relief job being done by United Service for New Americans.
organized program of assistance for this purpose, supported by private contributions, largely from American Jews, and enlisting the cooperation of local community groups in every part of the country.
There can be no doubt that this fact played a leading part in keep-mg the gates of the United States open to refugees all through the war. While most of those who would have sought haven here were prevented from doing so by the circumstances of the conflict, several thousand managed to reach this country in eadi of tlie war years. The tradition of asylitm was maintained uninterruptedly. This tradition found special ex-presion in the establishment of the Emergency Shelter at Oswego, N. Y., to which some. 900 displaceo persons wei* brought after their liberation by our trooiK in Itlay.
"When the war in Europe ended, and our army took up occupation duties in Germany and Austria it found under its tare not merdy a few thousand liberated refugees, as in May, but himdreds of thousands who could not be repatriated or re-established in their former home or anywhere on the Continent. A large proportion were the Jewish survivors.
The fate of these people was and is one of tihe greatest tragedies, and also one of the most diflBcuJt international problCTOs, of the post-war period The hope of many for prompt emigration to Palestine has been deferred, tangled in political manoeuveiing and British imperial
policy. Other countries whidh migh might, with benefiit to themselves, offer haven to large numbers, have moved with infinite slowness. The Jews ihad survived the Nazi terror, but there was nowhere they could go nothing they could do about returning to normaj. existence ox picking up the threads of their disrupted lives. They suffered a sort of 'cold pogram" and meanwhile the situation was made worse by the violent pogroms in Poland wthich sent thousands more in flight to the American zones.
The Truman directive was an effort to cut through this tangle. It made no change in American poUcy; it simply: provided machinery for implementing that policy. Consular offices were establishe<l in Germany, empowered to issue visas, and all departments of the Govenunents were ordered to cooperate in speeding immigration of refugees and displaced persons imder the quotas. In this way, the President pointed out, America would set a hxmianitarian example for other nations. The weight oi that example is now being felt, and its fuU effects have not yet by any means been exhausted.
A most significant passage in the durective was the President's reference to the responsibilities of privatly supported welfare agencies. Such agencies, he .pointed out, had performed a major task in the adjustment of .refugees coming to the United States in the past, and in preventing any of charges. They wovd be the keystone of the entire program.
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NEW YEAR EDmON
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