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c.JOSEPH- ,—

Hon. Sol Bloom,
Ilouse of Representatives,
Washington, D. C.
Dear Sir:—My attention has been called to an article appearing
in the New York Times of Feb. 7, in which you are quoted as mak-
ing certain statements before the Young Men's Club of Temple
Adath Yeshurun of Syracuse, N. Y., in regard to Mr. Ford and his
relation to the Jews.
You are reported to have said: "He commits the care of his
health to Dr. Charles D. Aaron, a Jew; his architect is Albert Kahn
a Jew; his legal adviser is a Jew, Harry Hellman; his spiritual ad-
viser is Rabbi Leo M. Franklin, Dependent upon a Jew as his chief
lieutenant in the upbuilding of his vast plants, dependent on a Jew
to steer him through the channels of the law, dependent upon a Jew
for counsel as to the life hereafter—whence Ford's anti-Jewish bias?"
May I say to you, my dear Mr. Bloom, that these statements
are no more accurate than are Mr. Ford's statements in regard to
the Jews. Except for the fact that Mr. Kahn continues a large part
of Mr. Ford's architectural work, there isn't to the best of my belief
a scintilla of truth in all the balance of your statement. I think you
yourself would have realized the absolute absurdity of saying that
I was Mr. Ford's spiritual adviser. . . . The fact that years ago,
before he had begun his anti-Semitic propaganda, I had been on
friendly terms with Mr. Ford, whom I publicly repudiated when he
began his insidious campaign, and that the fact that Mr. Heitman
years ago had been a member of a firm—all other members being
Christians—that had some connection with Mr. Ford's legal affairs
was certainly not sufficient basis for you to make the statements
that you have made.

There was more to the letter, but I ant going to spare the congress-
man's feelings.

There is no writer for whom I have a greater regard than Dr. Mendel-
sohn of Chicago, who contributes a page of "Topics of the Week" in the
Chicago Sentinel—he usually has an understanding and sane view on sub-
jects of interest to the Jewish world. But I am afraid that for once I must
disagree with his conclusions regarding the reasons why Jews take up
Christian Science. He refers to the statement made by a Washington
rabbi, Dr. Schwefel, that 100,000 Jews in New York City alone have become
Scientists. Dr. :Mendelsohn is not prepared to accept Dr. Schwefel's figures
as accurate. Probably he is right, but that there is a great number cannot
be gainsaid. Dr. Mendelsohn then goes on to say:

Usually the candidate for this cult from our people is a Jewess who
is unhappily married or a spinster who imagines that she will satisfy
her hunger for love by talking about it. When Jewish husbands be-
come Christian Scientists they do so only for the sake of their wives.
Then there are Jews and Jewesses who join the Christian Science
Church because they are social climbers and they believe their affilia-
tion will bring them into Gentile society. Moreover, the Jewish
Christian Scientist is very seldom sincere in his professions. He
will talk audibly about disease being an "error of mortal mind" and
at the same time use expensive physicians and medicine.

I can't agree with these statements. From my own observation I have
come to the conclusion that most Jews who are Christian Scientists have
become so because of ill-health mentally or bodily. In fact I have talked
• with many and they believe that they have found the panacea for well
being in the Christian Science Church. Right or wrong, that is their honest
conviction.
Jews may join the Episcopal Church for social prestige. but the Chris-
lion Science Church holds out for them the promise of freedom from those
physical ills that most of us are heir to. And we Jews seem to be such
easy prey to nervous ailments that we offer a great field for recruits for
the Christian Science movement.

I notice that Houdini's brother is carrying on his work. Bardeen may
become as famous as Houdini, though it will depend upon how seriously he
takes his profession. When Houdini died he left his secrets with his wife
and his brother and, if my report is correct, when they die the secrets of
the great Houdini mysteries die with them. Our spiritualist friend "Mar-
gery" can now continue her work undisturbed by the dread presence of the
great exposer. Whenever Houdini walked Into a conference of spiritualists
it created exactly the same effect as if a cat were to slip into a room filled
with mice.
•
Many parents worry what is to become of their boys. I wonder if
ey have the same admiration as I have for Sheftel Needleman, who came
o this country from Russia 23 years ago and just before he landed at
iffts Island he went blind. He was then 15 years old. It wasn't easy for
the blind boy to get through the mass of tape at Ellis Island, for they felt
he might become a public charge. But finally, with the help of a bond put
up by his father, he was permitted to enter. Instead of weeping over his
misfortune, he became an inmate of an industrial home for the blind in
k Brooklyn, and there he learned English, a new tongue to him. Later on,
he sold newspapers, and in 1912 he married. With money he had saved
front peddling and selling newspapers he started his business. the Royal
Tip Printing Company. Ten years passed. He made money. His son and
daughter went to school on the East Side and told hini of all the strange
sights they witnessed. It happened that while Needleman was an inmate
of the home for the blind he could not eat the food there because he was
/orthodox, and so he ;eft on that account. So then he made up his mind
tl-at if he ever succeeded in life he would found an Orthodox Jewish home
for the blind. Now that ambition has been realized. He with his own
funds and the help of n few' friends bought a five-story building in New
York and on April 1 the American Jewish Association for the Blind will
open its doors.

s

seineweeMel

(unnecessary. Why does England con-
tinue to maintain the. death penalty
for major crime's? Fur the same rya-
son that it maintains other ancient
nuisances such us kings and queens
;and princes. Englund is a ruinously
.conservative country. If England were
not so consummately conservative this
would net be the United States of
A me rice.
As the State of Michigan emerged
out of frontier conditions and Immune
a civilized state, its people gradually
modified the fierce Incas which had
, served them when they lived in the
wilds and adopted more humane tradi-
tions. Thus the capital punishment
law was modified and interpreted out
of existence. The people of Michigan
had reason to fuel that in abolishing
this law of the wild they placed their
state in the forefront of human prog-
ress. Actually, however, another state
had anticipated them. As long as
2,000 years ago the little state of Pal-
estine had abolished capital punish-
ment.
Bible and the Death Penalty.

tr, ,

The other day I was somewhat mystified when I read in the daily press
that Mr. Ford received his spiritual nourishment from a Jewish source.
Congressman Sol Bloom was the author of the statement. Now I have a
very friendly feeling, for Congressman Bloom, but I am inclined to the
belief that he goes off "half-cocked." with the result that he scatters a lot
of useless bird shot and frequently hits some other target than the one 11r
aims at So I was not in the least hit surprised when I received in my mail
the other day the following letter from Rabbi Franklin, the original of
which went to Congressman "Sol.". The letter speaks for itself and speaks
very emphatically:

It is quite an ignorant view which
sees in the Bible an advocate of the
death penalty. The Bible must be read
in accordance with the interpretation
given it by those who administered it
as a practical code of law, just as the
Constitution of the United Status can
be read intelligently only in the light
of the interpretation given it by
the Supreme Court. In one of the
several distinct codes which are re-
corded in the Bible, a code which the
best scholarship traces hack to an age
when Israel was still a semi-barbaric
people, we read "A life fora life, an
eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth."
( Exodus XX I.23.) It is this Biblical
law which those gentle editors and
ministers are fond of quoting when
they seek divine sanction fur legal
murder. At the time when the law
was written, about 1,000 years before
this ern, it undoubtedly meant exactly
what it sead. If A struck out Ws
eye, then the law permitted li to strike
out A's eye in revenge. But as Pales-
tine emerged from frontier life as its
people broadened their ideas of God
and deepened their sense- of the value
of human life, the hearshness of this
law was realized, and the judges of the
newer day, or the rabbis, reinterpreted
it. The law, the rabbis of 1(10 B. C.
argued, cannot mean an actual eye for
an eye, fur the law in taking the cul-
prit's eye risks killing hint altogether
and taking a whole life for an eye.
Therefore, the rabbis decided, the law
is to be administered as meaning the
value of an eye for an eye. The cul-
prit who struck out his neighbor's eye
had to pay in money a fair evaluation
of his neighbor's eye. And as for the
clause a "life for a life," the rabbis
placed so many legal safegurds around
the suspect, that while the provisions
for capital punishment remained on
the book, they were practically never
carried out. We read in the rabbinic
commentary on the Bible, the Talmud:
"A Sanhedrin that is, a court of
judges) which executes one man in
seven years deserves to he' called a
court of murderers. Rabbi Eleazar
ben Azariah said: "Even the court
which executes one man in 70 years is
a court of murderers." Rabbi Tarphon
and Rabbi Akiba said: "(lad we sat
on the Sanhedrin in the days of Jewish
independence no man would ever have
been executed." (Maccoth I-10.) Only
those who have a superficial knowl-
edge of the Bible can use its authority
in support of killing. As the Bible was
interpreted by those who used it as a
living code of law, it actually abol-
ished capital punishment. It is this
definite statement of the attitude of
the rabbis which Dr. Emil G. Hirsch
quoted in his famous essay on the
'Crucifixion of Jesus" to prove that
the story of the trial of Jesus as re-
corded in the Gospels could not have
been written by an eye-witness, or by a
well-informed writer. it was manu-
factured purely out of the imagination
of writers who knew nothing about the
procedure and the principles of the
Jewish court or the Sanhedrin. Such
a hasty trial, held at midnight, with so
little examination of the witnesses, so
little opportunity for the defendant to
clear himself, and such, eagerness on
t he part of the judges to impose the
death sentence was impossible in the
system of the Sanhedrin.
The Scapegoat.

Away from the sentimental motives
of revenge and punishment and toward
the practical purpose of public safety
—that has been the trend in the civil-
ized treatment of the problem of crime.
And public safety, it has b••en found.
encouragement
to
men
like
An interesting story that should give some
is not furthered by public murder. I
Senator David Reed of Pennsylvania, who is obsessed with the fear of the
have read carefully the utterances of
menace of the immigrant from Russia. There are ninny other 100 per those who would like to see Michigan
centers who, if they could make out of their own sons what this handicapped, go back to the execution of criminals.
poor, friendless Jewish boy in a strange country made of himself, coul d I concede the honesty eif these men and
point with pride to their achievement. (Inc of the troubles in this country admire them for it. They do not pre-
, i' that too many worthy gentlemen are afflicted wilt a Babbitt complex. tend that capital punishment has
--a—ia■.—
stopped crime in any large city in
A lecturer like Lewis Browne, author of "This Believing World." should America. They frankly concede that
,
. bring joy to the typical "forum" audience. I can imagine with what glee it hasn't. And yet in some manner
. the crowd at Cooper Union in New York on Sunday night, or over at the i they insist that somehow this law
Hebre• Educat tonal Forum in Brooklyn, welcome a rough and tumble would be effective. There is only one
"question hour" with Browne. It must be a stimulating experience for the way to explain this mysterious atti-
- speaker as well as for the audience. But for the conservative folk of this tude, and that is through psycho-anal.
-great and glorious land, alas and slack! For them Browne is not When psis. Such men are actuated by deep-
he becomes warmed up to his subject, beads of perspiration become visible seated motives which they are not vele
on the forehead of the average pillar of a church or synagogue.. The con- •cious of and which they will not ii
ventional-minded folk move restlessly and uneasily in their pews. For knowledge. But hidden as these
•-
friend Lewis is surely some iconoclast! The intelligentsia revel in his I tives are from the eyes of these self-
sophisticated satirical thrusts. Imagine Mencken talking to the Baptist Con.' righteous men who cry for bled,
fcrence at Dayton, Tenn.! Well, Browne produces just about the same are very obvious. They are extremely
Tort when he talks to the average congregation. But he knows how to old and familiar motives and they
- lk! Undoubtedly one of the finest platform speakers of the hour. If you have performed such veteran service
'long to a liberal group and are broadminded enough to hear some of in the tragedy of human life that like,
your cherished notions knocked into a cocked hat without getting indignant, bacterial germs, they have ken iso-
then you can't spend a more interesting evening than listening to Lewis lated and given names.
VIrowne. But if you are a Fundamentalist—slay at home and save your
One of these motives is known as
Ilt.elings!
the "scapegoat" motive. A second is
•--...- •
...
the "red herring" motive. A third is
A gentleman of the Old Stock by the name of Cyrus Willard has a word the "kick" motive. The "scapegoat"
to say about the Jew in the current issue of the B'nai B'rith News. One motive is so powerful in human con-
duct that it is prominent in every re-
thing in particular arrested my attention:
ligion and is the dominating element
in one of the great religions of man-
It in my observation that the Jew generally does not know him-
kind. When the savage, who was our
self. This ignorance, I believe, is the cause for the absence of self-
ancestor,
stumbled upon the corpse of
respect—the inferiority complex—which the Gentile often notices in
a relative who had evidently met his
the Jew. Lacking knowledge of himself, how can the Jew expect
death in the course of a raid from a
son-Jews to know him? Without self-esteem how can he expect
neighboring tribe. then his body shook
oslaPfs to respect him?
with emotion. "Somebody," he said,
In other words, Mr. Willard, the Gentile is urging the Jew to do what "will pay for this." It really did not
the rabbis are urging him to do. He wants the Jew to get to know his matter who was to pay. Our savage
own history, his contributions to the world, what part he has played in the ancestor did not necessarily look for
development of this country (which has been taken over by the Ku Klux the man who actually committed the
Klan and the Nordics). He feels that if once they become impressed with murder. His emotions were satisfied
their own standing in relation to their fellows, that they will stand erect. if he killed the murderer's brother. or
his wife, or his sons, or any member
I think there's much in this.
of his family or tribe, or the whole
family or the whole tribe. The idea
the British government woke up to the was that blood shall he shed for blood.
There had to be blood revenge. It did
fact that its judiciary Was corrupt net even matter whether the killing
and its police indifferent. A new had been deliberate or accidental. Once
policy was now adopted. The penalty the savage was filled with emotinn, he
(Continued from Preceding Pagel
for pickporketing was reduced from had to take it nut on 'somebody. This
death by hanging to one month in primitive impulse to vent your out-
11 HP
a simple method of putting the prison, but an efficient police system • raged feeling upon aomebody, no mat-
petty thieves to rout It imposed the and an honest judiciary were installed. ter who, is known as the scapegoat
death penalty upon the crime of pick- Immediately pickpsx-keting was re- motive.
los keting. To the surprise of the gov- duced to near zero. There you have.1
On the Day of Atonement in the an-
ernment, the quick-fingered fraternity the psychology of the crime problem. cient Temple of Jerusalem, the high
grew and flourished as though nothing Where there is an inadequate police I priest used to lay his hand upon the
had happened. Public executions of organization and an incompetent judi- • head of a gnat and would deliver a
the convicted pickpockets were tried cial system, capital punishment is fu- prayer something to this effect:
but they tell that the pickpocket, made tile. Where you have an adequate po- "Lord, there have been many crimes
their best hauls among the crowds that lice organization and • competent ju- emimitted against Thee. Somebody
gathered to watch the executions. Then dicial system, capital punishment is has to pay for those crimes. Spare

Capital Punishment

MEYATRon;//wisft Rgniar,

Thy children, 0 God, and let Thine
anger out on this goat." The goat was
then taken to the top of a rocky hill
and thrust down to its death into the
ravine. God had wrought II is blood
revenge on the goat, and the children
of Israel were therefore safe from His
wrath. To this day this ceremony is
by Orthodox Jrw's. Un the
eve of Punt Kippur they place their
hands Up011 a chicken rooster and
they pray that God may take Ili:
anger out on the bird and spare them.
It is railed the ceremony of Kopores.
Do nut unde•-rate this "scapegoat"
motive. Childish as it may sound it
fines very deep and it accounts fur
many of your acts and attitudes. It
is the dominating idea in the daughter
religion of Judaism, Christianity.
What is the atonement doctrine of
Christianity in its original form? Sim-
ply that a time had e01110 when the
people of the earth had committed so
many sins that God's anger was hut.
Crimes had been committed and some-
body had to pay. In carrying out II is
blood revenge God was about to de-
stroy all mankind. Then out of His
love for mankind, God decided to let
one man pay the penalty for all the
rest and so lie sent His pure and inno-
cent son into the world and caused his
blood to be shed so that all the rest
of mankind might be saved. .11)sus was
the "scapegoat" fur the sins of man,
%Viten a human motive is so profound
that it has been adopted as a religious
creed by the most advanced nations of
the world, then it is no wonder that
people. frequently act upon it without
knawing. it. I believe that what the
newspapers and the business men who
are demanding capital punishment
really want is a "scapegoat." They
have seen murder." bodies shake
with emotion. They must take it out
on somebody. Somebody has to pay.
If the capital punishment law should
Ile passed I predict that the first man
who is arrested for murder after the
passage of that law is going to his
death. All the newspapers will de-
mand his death. All the luncheon
clubs will demand his death. The pros-
ecuting attorney will know that if he
can send that man to death he will Ile
the next governor of the state. If he
fails, he is doomed to political obliv-
ion. But he will not fail. That poor
fellow will die. The "scapegoat" will
have been thrust down the rocky de-
clivity. Everybody's emotions will
have been satisfied. After that it will
be as easy for a murderer to escape
capital punishment in Michigan as it
is in Chicago and New York, for the
excitement which demands the "scape-
goat," once it has spent itself, is not
revived again for a long time. The
he tom-tom for capital punishment fur
same newspapers who are now beating
murderers will later on try to revive'
he excitement by demanding the death
penalty for rubbery armed.

to track down criminals, they say that
a criminal would throw a few red
herring on the trail. The odor of the
herring was so pervasive and pungent
that it neutralized every other !Went
HMI drew the bloodhounds completely
off the track. The "real herring" mo-
tive in IZoVernIIIVIlt IlleallS to distract
the attention of the public from its
real grievaines by raising n great
pother about Peale irrelevant issue.
The czars of Russia used i0 make it a
habit to start a war with a foreign
nation every time the inujiks seemed
to grow restive under the yoke of
serfdom. Patriotism in the fall` id an
alien file was used as the "ref I her-
ring" to divert the minds (if the serfs
away from the wrongs they were suf-
fering at the hands of their own rul-
ers. The leading newspapers of Itlich-
igan, the leading business men,
the political leaders of Michigan feel
that sooner or later they will be held
responsible for the conditions which
promote crime. They have always had I
the power, Were they but willing to
exert it, to create those wholesome po-
litical, civic, and economic conditions
which would prevent crime and keel
it under control. They have failed,
and it is to hide their failure that they
are throwing this "real herring" on the
trail. They are trying to get the peo-
ple excited about killing a few crim-
inals and thus take their minds away
from the social conditions which breed
criminals 100 times as fast as they
can be killed.
Getting • Kick.
Finally, there is the "kick" motive.
On the dial of the genealogical dock
We Are only about five minutes away
from the walking ape who was our an-
cestor, front our father, the scavenger,
who thrilled at the sight of blood. And
the impulse of the savage beast seeth-
ing within us are not held altogether
in leash. 11'e have much more emo-
tional energy than we can make use of
in our daily life. It is the neve] of ex-
pending this surplus energy that
drives many nations into wars. It is
this primitive force which whips
crowds into frenzies at football games
and at baseball games. This release
of emotion is called a "kick." Civilizes-
tam is in one aspect a process of the
suppression of primitive energies.
Sometimes when civilized life grows
dull and routine., when war is over, the
football season past, and there is no
place to go, those primitive energies
demand release HMI then some men go
out on an emotional jog. That's what
is happening today in the State of
Michigan. That's the way those as-
tute psychologists, Clarence Darrow
and our own Dr. Arnold Jacoby have
psycho-analyzed us. When we raise
this hue and cry for "death for the
criminals" we are not promoting public
safety but getting a personal "kick"—
that same emotional release that our
savage ancestors got at the sight of
The "red herring" motive. In the blood. I wish the advocates of capital
days when bloodhounds were employed punishment would look fur a kick else

where, Let them go to a prizefight.
I am convinced that if the football
season were now on they would lad In'
so clamorous nor getting so much at-
\‘'hat American needs to
SIIVe it from such recurrent bloody en-
thusiasm is some thrilling popular
sport If) occupy the long interval be-
tween football and baseball.

gan that the deliberate killing of a

huntan tieing is a normal and even
laudable act. And after this great re-
fusal to do the easy thing, I hope they
ran rise also to the Great Assent to
do the difficult thing—to deal with
the clime situation dispassionately in
a practical business-like way—to in-
vestigate the specific factors which
foster crime and to apply the concrete
.The Eery and the Difficult Way.
I hope that the people. of the State remedies which shall at first control
and
ultimately prevent it.
of Michigan will not renounce their
heritage of a highly advanced civiliza-
tion and go back to the ways of the
MAY SETTLE ARAB FEUDS
wilderness. I hope the legislature of
the State of Michigan can rise to a
Great Refusal—the refusal to follow
JERUSALEM.—(J, T. A.I—Jeri-
the easiest way—the Way Of passion. cho, the Biblical town of palms and
I hope they will refuse to use the war, may be inscribed in the history
criminal as a scapegoat upon whom to of the Arab tribes as a city of peace
vent their impulse of revenge, Or as a as a result of a peace conference
"reel herring" to distract attention which opened its sessions there. The
from their own shortcomino, or as ae conference, which consists of two rep-
Melilla of getting an emotional "kick." resentatives of Ibn Saud, victorious
I hope also that they will refuse to pity leafier of the M'ahabis and conqueror
the murderer the compliment of fol- ut Mecca; two representatives of the
lowing his example. I hope they will Transjordanian government and one
refuse to make the cold blooded taking of the Palestine government, war
of human life an honorable occupation called to consider the feuds and fron-
in this state. I }lile that they will tier disputes between the tribes of
refuse to teach the children of Michi- Nejd, Iledjas and Transjordania.

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