Nahum Goldmann

Nahum Goldmann: "I Told Them to Throw Themselves into the Water"

In his memories, Nahum Goldmann, first president of the World Jewish Congress, tells its difficult negotiations with the American Government to save some refugees.

"A number of Jews in France who had somehow succeeded in getting Mexican visas sailed for Mexico on the S.S. Quenza. When they arrived in Tampico, if I remember rightly the Mexican government declared that its consul had not been authorized to issue them visas and refused to admit them, ordering the ship to return. Of course, if they had landed in France these people would immediately have been deported by the Nazi authorities. I received desperate telegrams from the Central Jewish Committee in Mexico and from the individuals in question, asking me to do everything possible to have them admitted to the United States when the ship stopped to refuel at Norfolk, Virginia. At the request of Stephen Wise, Mrs. Franklin Roosevelt, deeply sympathetic and eager to help, spoke to the President, who informed us he was prepared to instruct the immigration authorities in Norfolk to admit these refugees without visas, provided we could persuade Secretary of State Cordell Hull, who was very conservative in such matters, not to oppose the move.

Dr. Wise and I went to see Secretary Hull to ask him to agree to the admission of these unfortunate souls. At first he took a strictly negative attitude, explaining that under American law no one may immigrate without a visa. When I pressed him relentlessly, he exclaimed: "Do you see that American flag behind my desk? I have sworn by it to uphold the Constitution and the laws of the United States. You are asking me to break my oath." I told Mr. Hull that I read in the newspaper about some anti-Nazi German seamen who had jumped ship rather than return to Germany. The Coast Guard had had to send out a cutter to pick them up and take them to Ellis Island, where all immigrants whose papers were not in order were held.

"If you like," I said, "I'll send the Quenza refugees a telegram, and I guarantee they'll jump overboard at Norfolk. Then the Coast Guard will have to send boats to pick them up. Some of them may catch pneumonia. In the end you'll have to do the same with them as you've done with the German seamen. I personally have nothing against the idea of these unfortunate people sitting out rhe war in safety on Ellis Island. But why do you want me to go about it in this devious, complicated, expensive, and insalubrious way?" Hull gave me an angry look and said: "You are very cynical, Mr. Goldmann.

"I wonder who is more cynical," I replied, "the Secretary who wants to condemn hundreds of Jewish refugees to certain death, or he who tries everything to save them."

My argument seemed to impress him, because finally he said, in a grumbling tone: "Tell the President that if he issues the orders on his own authority I won't make any difliculties." The order was issued; the refugees were allowed to land at Norfolk, sent briefly to Ellis Island, and later legally admitted as immigrants.

Nahum Goldmann

excerpt from Memories, the autobiography of Nahum Goldmann, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, London, 1970, p 202.