PURELY COMMENTARY

PHILIP SLOMOVITZ

The Statue of Liberty Centennial: A Personal Reminiscing Echo

Echoes of the excitingly emotional ob-
servances of the centennial of the Statue
of Liberty will surely continue to reverb-
erate in the months ahead.
Formally, it was a long week-end cel-
?bration. In the nation's experience it will
surely be an entire year's acclaim to Lib-
erty and to the American genius that per-
petuates it.
That is why every recollection of the
trek via Ellis Island became a portion of
the resporise of newcomers to this Land of
Freedom to the glories shared in the proc-
ess of continuing the ideals inspired by the
acquired unalienable rights.
That is why the enthusiasm of the
immigrants who have become a factor in
this nation have been drawn upon for
Sharing with the millions who became the
audience for these salutes in the media.
Therefore, why not a personal note to
3hafe in these enthusiastic acclaims on
this page?
This_ isan appropriate time to recall
;he expression of pride in his
Americanism by this columnist when he
celebrated an occasion that became means
for the pride and gratitude when I cele-
brated Fifty Years as an American, on
Nov. 29, 1960.
It is an assertion that gained Con-
gressional recognition as well as in these
columns. Even no`w, 26 yeais later, pride
flourishes. _
That's when I decla'red_ in my
gratitude to my adopted country:

Fifty years as an - American
meant 50 years of freedom — free-
dom to speak the mind . and to ex-
press.views without hindrance; 50
years- of service to causes that fit
into the American way of life and
therefore help in the uplifting of
the less fortunate; 50 years that
were not without their battles and
debates — but they were disputes
and arguments of such a nature as
to echo what the-strjver for justice
acquired as part of his immersion
into Americanism.
The last 50 years revolu-
tionized the world. They were
politically stirring. The half cen-
tury began with challenges un-
paralleled in - history. They
changed' the fabric of America's
acts and thoughts. They trans-
forMed our land into a new mold.
- Two world wars claimed the
lives of millions of our fellow
Americans. Smaller conflicts and
some calamities also were costly
in human lives.
While the world was being
remolded, the Jewish people
underwent even graver changes.
Our kinsmen were threatened
with extinction. We lost a third of
JeWry in the course of the victimi-
zation of mankind by the most de-

A Taal Thank You

The privilege of this page
enables us to thank family and
friends, rabbis and the community's
many agencies, for the kindnesses
shown Anna during her serious ill-
ness and now in her recuperation. I
share with Anna the deep apprecia-
tion for the warm messages of
friendship and for the generous
gifts in her honor to many worthy
causes.

ANNA AND PHILIP SLOMOVITZ

2 Friday, July 25, 1986

vilish minds that ever inflicted
themselves upon us.
As Americans, we were part of
a generation that revolted against
bestialities. As Jews, we had the
obligation of coming to the aid of
the afflicted. As American Jews,
we were destined by history to be
the rescuers of the oppressed.
But while we were rescuing,
we, too, were the targets of bigots.
We were charged with the task of
saving lives, and, at the same time,
of repudiating bigots. In this coun-
try were were free to speak our
minds against intolerance, to
battle the anti-Semites, to demand
justice wherever and whenever it
was due.

In that battle, we soon learned
the greatness of America. We were
not alone in the fight. We soon
learned that there is such a
genuine principle as fair play in
this great land of our adoption. We
are grateful for that idea. It has
helped to sustain us in our
Americanism, and it has given us
pride in our loyalties to this great
land and its deep-rooted princi-
ples.
There was much more to our
pride. When, you fight the anti-
Semite, you seek to eliminate the
negative aspects of American life.
It is when one searches for the
positive, when one aims to do the
creative things in life, that one is
faced with the true test of Ameri-
can greatness. Your commentator
has found the genius of America in
the freedom to act in behalf of his
fellow Jews through the Zionist
ideal.
America spells freedom, but it
does not qualify it by saying that it
is to be freedom only for Ameri-
cans. It is an established and sac-
red American principle that one
who has his freedoms must not
deprive others of their freedoms.
More than that: he who has his
freedoms must aid others to ac-
quire similar just rights.
During the five decades of his
Ameridanism, before acquiring
citizenship and during the many
years of his enfranchisement, your
commentator labored for the
Zionist idea. No one hindered him:
the best Americans assisted in the
great aspirations. Presidents,
Cabinet members, Supreme Court
justices, governors of states, and
members of both Houses of Con-
gress often - gave him their
blessings. It was the greatness of
America that its leaders always
gave us comfort in our work. The
handful of Jews who were
frightened, who, in their panic,
could not assist in the greatest
humanitarian effort in history, did
not matter. They were unworthy.,
of concern. They do not count
now, although they still seek to
obstruct justice. But there are so
few of them that they are insig-
nificant.

But even the few could have
been helpful in rescuing many
more people than we have suc-
ceeded in saving since our great
Zionist idea became a reality.
Nevertheless, we are grateful —
for the millions of our kinsmen
who recognized the immensity of
the task and assisted in it; for the
many millions of Christian Ameri-

THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS

cans who, by their actions and by
their encouragement, upheld the
American principles of justice and
the right to life, liberty and pursuit
of happiness of all mankind, and
give us cause for gratitude and
thanksgiving on this sacred day.
There is another cause for re-
joicing. During his fifty years as
an American, this writer had the
right to adhere to the faith of our
fathers — at preparatory high
school, at college, while working
on newspapers, in the course of
travels — wherever the Stars and
Stripes fluttered for us as a sym-
bol of our citizenship.
The pride of your commen-
tator's Americanism has accom-
panied him abroad, where he was
able to hold his head high as an
American Jew, and in Israel,
where he enjoyed the fruits of his
labors and witnessed the fulfill-
ment of the dream of an American
Jew for whom Zionism was akin to
Americanism — because the aspi-
rations of both are kindred in
spirit — and where he saw the
realization of the ideal that all men
have a right to pursue happiness
and enjoy freedom.

This Commentator's Credo,
A news commentator's, an

editor's, duty is to strive for the truth
and to establish it.
This has been and is my aim as a
working newspaperman.
I do not carry grudges.
I abhor anything akin to ter-
rorism, Nazism, or any form of
bigotry.
In the process, I recognize the
right to differ.
I do not "hate" Arabs. I deplore
their enmity and the failure to grant
Israel the right to live.
In the libertarian aim, Zionism
remains a major principle in my life.
In its advocacy, I sought under-
standing from fellow Jews, coopera-
tion from non-Jews, many of whom
have given me personal comfort in
the assistance I enrolled for the
movement.
To ascertain truth, in justice to
the Jewish people and to Israel, I am
obliged never to be silent when there
is the merest semblance of injustice
anywhere . . . and, to speak out with-
out malice.

Such was My Credo as an American
written on the 50th anniversary of my ar-
rival in this country. Such is My Credo
today. Blessed the land that gave me
proud citizenship.

A Duty To Keep -
U.S. Doors Closed
To Kurt Waldheim

Should it happen that the indifferent
to truth will militate in favor of the new
Austrian president's quest for a wekome
to this country, it will be the most crimi-
nal endorsement of silence in treating
Nazi accomplices.
With all the tongue-in-cheek at-
tempts to exonerate him, even every de-
fensive statement was marked by conces-
sions that he lied.
Therefore adherence to justice and
truth demands that the Austrian
President Kurt Waldheim be kept out of

this country and that he be held in con-
tempt wherever he may seek diplomatic
immunity.
In a joint statement in the New York
Times, former Associate Justice of the
U.S. Supreme Court Arthur Goldberg and
a former U.S. chief delegate to the United
Nations and Brooklyn District Attorney
Elizabeth Holtzman presented an ac-
cumulation of diplomatic precedents out-
lawing accused criminals from visiting
this land. Their article, entitled, Wal-
dheim Can Be Kept Out of the U.S., con-
cluded with the declaration:
"Our country should not and, must
not be host to any person, whatever his or
her office, who has participated in or as-
sisted in Nazi atrocities."
A beginning has already been made
in the anticipated steps to bar Waldheim
from this land when the U.S. Ambassador
to Austria Ronald S. Lauder stayed away
frorb the accused Nazi's inauguration as
president.

Evidence indicting Waldheim,
meanwhile, is accumulating. While the
Austrian press and the country's officials
are disturbed by the American ambas-
sador's absence from the inauguration, it
has the overwhelming endorsement of the
American press and people. The Los
Angeles Times, in its acclaim of Lauder's
action, introduced additional facts giving
support to the mounting accusations
against Waldheim. In an editorial, pub-
lished on the eve of the inauguration,
entitled Snub for Waldheim, the following
additional accusatory details are
suggested:

Whether Lauder's absence re-
presents a private protest against
Waldheim's Nazi affiliations or a
high-level policy deciiion isn't
clear, and doesn't matter. The
message of disapproval that it de-
livers speaks for itself.
The inauguration will take
place just days after Luxem-
bourg's Foreign Minister Jacques
Poos shed further light on Wal-
dheim's long-obscured past. Ac-
cording to Poos, the doctoral
thesis that Waldheim wrote in
1943, when he was 25, called for
the elimination of Switzerland,
Belgium, Luxembourg and the
Netherlands as independent states
and their incorporation into a
"Greater German Reich." At the
time only Switzerland among
these countries had not been
occupied by Germany. Does this
advocacy of empire mean that
Waldheim was a committed Nazi?
If nothing else, it adds to the im-
pression of a committed oppor-
tunist who saw a future domi-
nated by Nazism and wanted to be
part of it.
Good U.S.-Austrian relations
are not likely to change when
Waldheim assumes the largely
ceremonial role of president. But
neither will the increasingly
well-documented record on Wal-
dheim's Nazi-related past change.
Austrians made their choice when
they votedlast month. Now Am-
bassador Lauder has made his,
and it is the right one.

The evidence is mounting. The accused
Nazi is persona non grata. The charges
against him keep gaining substantiation.
U.S. officialdom should always keep this
in mind and not only shut the door for
Waldheim but keep the accusatory link-
ing him with Nazi criminality on the in-
erasable record.