Purely Commentary
All responsible citizens entertain one hope for our community: that our schools
will be open at the time they read these lines. The injunction in the Talmud: "A town
without schools is doomed to destruction" (Simeon b. Lakish, in Talmud Sabbath) should
have haunted us during the past three weeks. But even if the strike will have ended
by the time this is circulated among our readers—remember: to the teachers this is
not a strike but a lockout because they have offered to teach during negotiations!—
an honorable community must look at the record and must judge itself, those who have
been chosen as its spokesmen for educational and philanthropic needs, the causes of
the crisis, the background of negotiations and the lack of them.
It is necessary to go into all these details because our community has been
given a raw deal, and those who make up the community have shown either indifference
or complacency or weakness.
Let us concede that the teachers are scoundrels, a bunch of union toughs—all
for the sake of argument. Our duty to the Jewish teacher is to treat him with respect,
in order that the child he trains for a place of honor in the Jewish community should
end up with equal respect for the traditions he is asked to adhere to and to honor.
But even if the teacher is mean in the view of those who now seek to secure from
him submission to a contract that is intolerable to him, the fact is that the teacher
was the one who offered to submit to binding arbitration: the school administration
refuses to arbitrate.
Called in to act in an effort to prevent a strike—or a lockout—Tom Turner.
as president of Metropolitan Detroit AFL-CIO, told the attorney fur the United
Hebrew Schools: "I believe there were faults on both sides which have created con-
fusion."
But after an analysis of the issues the AFL-CIO leader also had this to say
to the UHS attorney: "In this sort of impasse the union's suggestion to arbitrate is
not unusual at all. I suggest you seriously consider it."
Thus, a non-Jew saw justice in negotiation and arbitration, but the head of the
school system saw fit to say "we are not negotiating, and we won't negotiate ... we are
simply talking . . ." Which justifies the renewal of the question: who owns our school
system?
While the impasse is being prolonged, some 40 teachers are without a liveli-
hood while administrators are free to condone a situation that approaches the scan-
dalous. There must be an awakening, else we will, indeed, be registered as a bankrupt
community.
A community is obligated to learn from experience and to be practical in its
functions. But our community, so great philanthropically, responsive to all human
needs, was blind for some years in facing up to issues involving our school system.
What we are experiencing now is a result of the complacency of the past. It was
foreseen. We expected the trouble to emerge when, on the editorial page of our
issue of April 7, 1972, under the multiple heading of "Proposal for Social Action
Commission: Preparedness Needed to Meet Crises," we predicted the present crisis
but we were confronted with silence typifying indifference.
Those in charge of communal affairs, especially the Hebrew schools' parent
organization, should have known then that a people without vision perishes. The
complacency that blinded our community 10 months ago should teach us a lesson
now not to reject a basic Jewish principle; to listen also to the advice of the non-
Jewish head of the AFL-CIO, and to concede that the teachers are justified in asking
for arbitration, and since they are willing to make it binding arbitration they are
submissive in the position they pursue.
Let us look at the record (with apologies to Al Smith) and let us take a look
at our editorial of April 7, 1972.
Was it lack of realism on the part of leadership or was it sheer smugness that
what we urged as a preventative of ensuing troubles was totally ignored? Let us review
what we proposed 10 months ago:
Reviewing several community needs and especially the astigmatism of educators
and lay leaders, especially in the matter of the proposal for the closing of two of
the UlIS branches, the editorial referred to stated in its conclusions:
We are a generous community that
usually provides the funds necessary
for the operation of our existing in-
stitutions. We respond nobly to Is-
rael's needs. We must be equally on
the alert to planning processes to
protect our vitally needed agencies
that are engaged in education, social
services, rehabilitation, schooling.
There is need for a well-function-
ing study commission to take into
consideration the approaching re-
sponsibilities for the transfer of the
Jewish Center to an area more dense-
ly inhabited by members of the Jew-
ish community. We shall be chal-
lenged properly to adjust the loca-
tion of our schools and fully to in-
tegrate the children in their proper
classes, in neighborhoods that should
assure continuity with a few diffi-
culties as possible.
Neighborhood changes have not
entirely ended our problematic con-
ditions.
The urgency of proper planning is
emphasized by the latest occurence
in our mdist—the differing view over
retention of a branch of our com-
munal school system that is suffering
drastic student enrollment changes,
due to the common ailment of neigh-
borhood changes. It was our convic-
tion that a community of 100 families
must be protected as long as possible,
and that for at least a year the Bor-
man branch of the United Hebrew
Schools should be kept operating for
the benefit of the 100 children. But
the decision that came after the ig-
niting of some passion was in itself
incomplete: such action must be ac-
2—Friday, Feb. 9. 1973
companied by future planning. It is
only through properly functioning
planning that a community can and
should decide under what conditions
a school should continue operating
when the reduction in the number of
students makes such operations pro-
hibitive. Borman branch should re-
main open for another year, but what
about the year after? Decisions that
are based on heated arguments dis-
rupt rather than construct, and only/
when fellow citizens can view exist-
ing conditions dispassionately will
there be hope for a wholesome com-
munity.
Not to be overlooked in communal,
planning is the democratic process
of free expression and access to be
granted to citizens to procedural
processes in the course of which ma-
jor decisions are reached affecting
the fate of existing agencies.
In view of new approaches to our
educational needs, because of the
approaching possibility of drastic
changes in the elementary as related
to higher grades in the established
system of Jewish schooling, and be-
rause the congregational schools may
become the dominant factors in pro.
viding for educational needs of the
children in Greater Detroit's Jewish
schools, these are obligations not to
be overlooked and should not be ig-
nored. Parents, and supporters, of
our school systems surely will not
be denied their share in planning our
educational programs.
We urge the formation of a study
commission, under auspices of the
Jewish Welfare Federation, to make
.. THE DETROIT JEWISH MEWS
Without Editing This Text—It Was Enough That Page One
Needed Complete Change—We Adhere to lnsistance That a
Community That Does Not Arbitrate May Be Listed as Criminal
the necessary studies of our special
needs as they confront our educa-
tional and recreational agencies and
the provisions for our aged, in order,
we repeat, not to be caught napping
in time of crisis.
Since crises are, in our view, re-
petitive, we must draw upon the
By Philip
3/0/110VitZ
skills of our ablest social scientists to
help resolve these problems. There
should be a sufficient number of such
qualified men and women who should
serve as a volunteer force to assure
preparedness for our community's
obligations. The time for such action
is NOW.
Now the crippled system of communal complacency has come home to roost.
A group of misled men and women have voted to close two branches of our schools.
The schools are not operating. The tragedy that struck us when a majority voted to
reduce studies from the five-day week to the present three-day week teaching systerris
that already point to a possible return to the minimalism of the Sunday school
assuming the specter of cultural despair.
Worse: the communal school system was struck—the teachers call it a lockout—
and the worst crime attributable to a kehilla, to a community—that its schools should
be closed, now brands us of the generation that has been pleading for priority for
Jewish education as a destructive generation.
These are harsh terms, but that's exactly how we should judge ourselves in
our blindness of treating the most serious needs in our life: the training of a knowledge-
able generation of young Jews.
Let's look at the facts some more:
We come to national gatherings, to budgeting conferences in our own com-
munities, and we hear the cry: support Jewish education, give the Diaspora's needs
priority, enlarge our schools, enroll more pupils in Jewish study classes, encourage
able young Jews to enter the Jewish teaching profession.
What have we done?
We are minimalizing, we are not true to the demands and to the assurances
we give that there will be priority for Jewish education, we permit men and women
to vote—we admit, in all seriousness—to vote for the closing of Jewish schools! We
permit a strike to shut our schools! We do not negotiate with the teachers!
It is claimed that enrollments are declining in the schools ordered to close
in September. Why do not the astigmatic read the advertisements in newspapers
throughout the country which plead for rabbis and teachers for youth to come to
small communities with Jewish population that have fewer than 50 families. But when
there are still enrollments of more than 70 or 80 we close the schools! And experts
serving on stud" committees come to us with attempts to prove that it is financially
feasible to do so. Were they chosen to be actuaries when experts in educational needs
are needed to pass judgment?
Non-Jews in the labor movement (AFL-CIO) were called in by the afflicted
teachers—and administration as well—to assist them in their efforts to reopen the
schools. Parents have awakened. Where were they on the morning after that April
1972 warning when it was foreseen that the trouble was brewing?
It is never too late to amend, to correct, to return to normalcy. Will the non-
Jews in AFL-CIO and the concerned parents force action as an atonement for what
n
had happened?
But we return to our original suggestion and we repeat the last paragraphs
from the portion of our editorial of April 7, 1972:
"We urge the formation of a study commission, under auspices of
the Jewish Welfare Federation, to make the necessary studies of our spe-
cial needs, as they confront our educational and recreational agencies and
the provisions for our aged, in order, we repeat, not to be caught napping
in time of crisis.
"Since crises are, in our view, repetitive, we must draw upon the
skills our our ablest social scientists to help resolve these problems. There
should be a sufficient number of such qualified men and women who
should serve as a volunteer force to assure preparedness for our community's
obligations. The time for such action is NOW!"
The Obligation of a Bet Din Tradition
A traditional rabbinical court—a Bet Din—functions in Boston where
it represents 65 congregations of the three branches in American Jewry. A
number of important decisions have been reached by this court, and its
importance was emphasized in an extensive story on the first page of the
second section of the Tuesday's New York Times. The half page space in
that section continued lengthily on another page. It was illustrated with
photographs of the rabbinic judges and it reproduced the accompanying
passage from Deuteronomy in which reference is made to the rabbinic court.
When the Detroit school system closed as a result of the impasse, the
Detroit Rabbinical Commission had selected three rabbis who had offered
their services to act as mediators. The AFL-CIO role provided a solution
which, for the period of the dispute, obviated the need for a Din Torah.
Torah.
(Rabbi Samuel I.
Korff of the Boston Bet
Din was quoted in the
New York Times story:
"If the rabbinic court
would be restored to its
proper position, it
would bring a voice of
conscience not only to
the Jewish community
but to the total soci-
etY.").
Detroit is no ex-
ception to the rule.
We, too, must be
dedicated to a basic
principle of yielding
to a Bet Din — es-
pecially when so
serious a matter as
the functioning of
our schools are in-
volved.
Do we arbitrate
or do we subscribe
to educational bank-
ruptcy?
DEUTERONOMY
CHAPTER XVI
z8. judges and officers shalt thou
make thee in all thy gates, which the
LORD thy God giveth thee, tribe by
tribe; and they shall judge the people
with righteous judgment. 19. Thou
shalt not wrest judgment; thou
shalt not respect persons; neither
shalt thou take a gift; for a gift cloth
blind the eyes of the wise, and per-
vert the words of the righteous.
20. justice, justice shalt thou follow,
that thou mayest live, and inherit the
land which the LORD thy God giveth
thee.
...a...4*mA m.o.,