THE EMMA LAZARUS FEDERATION’S 20TH ANNIVERSARY

B y M O R R IS V. SCHAPPES

You are to be congratulated by all of us in the progressive Jewish move- ment for having weathered in unity the tensions that have threatened us with disruption. You have resisted and withstood moods of distrust that have disoriented many individuals, organizations and institutions in our country and abroad. You have shed illusions without becoming disillu- sioned. You have matured without growing weary of the ongoing struggle for peace, for progress, for social justice for all peoples, including the Jewish people, for an end to exploita- tion of man by man, of woman by man.

Your record these 20 years has been unique in the annals of contemporary American Jewish women’s organiza- tions—and I hope you will use this anniversary to spread this in detail on the public record, with Congress- woman Bella Abzug or Shirley Chisholm, or another, wanting to put the account into the Congressional Record.

The other day I checked the file of our magazine to see how the Emmas had first appeared in our pages, and came up with these significant and symbolic entries. It seems that as soon as we established the column, “In- side the Jewish Community,” the work

An Address

TT IS an honor for me again to havebeen chosen to address you on

such a memorable and gala occasion as your 20th anniversary, a celebra- tion that you are enriching by a long- deserved tribute to your devoted and distinguished executive director, Rose Raynes.

Such anniversaries are of course properly an occasion for self-con- gratulation and self-evaluation, such as your National Council has engaged in during its deliberations this week- end. Such anniversaries are also properly the occasion for you to re- ceive the applause and congratula- tions of others who have stood with you in your notable work in the American progressive Jewish move- ment. Although I am empowered to speak only for myself, I believe I ex- press the sentiments and convictions of the entire progressive Jewish lead- ership when I say to the Emma Lazarus Federation of Jewish Wo- men’s Clubs: Mazel tov on your an- niversary; yasher koach on your achievements; may your minds be sharpened and your hearts and arms strengthened as you go forward to continue, expand and improve your splendid work, under the leadership of your National Council and your director, Rose Raynes!

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Security Council Resolution of Nov. 22, 1967, calling for Israeli with- drawal to secure and recognized boundaries to be determined by nego- tiations between Israel and the Arab states. On these activities, and on the many other sound, progressive posi- tions that you have taken, you are indeed to be congratulated by all pro- gressive America.

But there is still another feature of your work that distinguishes you in all the company of American Jewish women’s organizations, your out- standing work in promoting progres- sive Jewish education and culture. Your generous support of secular, progressive Jewish children’s schools marks your commitment to Jewish survival. But you have made other contributions to Jewish revival: you have made green and kept alive not only the reputations but the influence of Emma Lazarus and Ernestine L. Rose by publishing or sponsoring the publication of books by and about them. Both were secular Jews long be- fore there was a secular Jewish move- ment in our country. Both have some- thing to say to us to this day. May I follow the practice of your unfor- gotten leader, June Gordon (1901־ 1967), and dig into these books of yours for the vitalizing riches and refreshment they offer?

I turn to Emma Lazarus’ “Epistle to the Hebrews” and find there her comments in 1882 on such current is- sues as cosmopolitanism, international- ism, the “chosen people” concept and national identity. She points to the historic advance made by “the theory of Humanity as a grand whole towards whose common weal every in- dividual must strive.” Then she re- marks: “To combine the conservation of one’s own individuality with due respect for the rights of every other individuality is the ideal condition of society, but it is a foolish perver­

of the Emmas began to be reported in it. Thus in his very first column in Nov., 1955, Sam Pevzner recorded the protest sent by the Emma Lazarus f ederation to Pres. Dwight D. Eisen- hower when a white jury in Missis- sippi acquitted the murderers of Emmett Till. Then the very next month, Pevzner reported the publica- tion by the Federation of a pamphlet, We Were There, containing an ac- count of the World Jewish Conference Against German Rearmament, at- tended by your president, Leah Nel- son. The significance and symbolism of these two actions lie in this fact: that no other American Jewish wo- men’s organization was acting on these issues, was combatting white racism as the central evil of our country and fighting fascism in all its manifestations abroad and at home, including its McCarthyite and Me- Carranite outpourings and its anti- Semitic outcroppings then and now.

I need not rehearse with you suchoutstanding aspects of your work as your petition campaign to get the U.S. Senate to ratify the United Nations convention against genocide, which netted 60,000 signatures; or your establishment and continuing support of the Emma Lazarus Day Nursery in Tel Aviv as only one aspect of your solidarity, 110 matter what your criti- cism may be, with the embattled people and State of Israel; or your work for women’s rights long before the current welcome surge of Women’s Lib, with your emphasis on equal pay for equal work and day care centers for working mothers; or your un- flagging activity to compel our own White House administrations to with- draw immediately and totally from Vietnam, from all of Indochina; or your continuing support of a just solu- tion to the Arab-Israel confrontation in the Middle East, based on the U.N.

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Well, it took a Civil War to abol- ish slavery—and the Emmas helped make the celebration of the centennial in 1961 a memorable event. But part of slavery persists today. The black man or woman or family still cannot say, “I will live here, or I will move yonder,” or “I will work here,” or “I will join this union.” The struggle against white racist discrimination is therefore still a part of the struggle in which Ernestine Rose played such an important role, a role continued by your Federation down to this moment in such activities as the signing by Rose Raynes and Lola Fine, as mem- bers of the recently founded Jewish Committee for a Fair Trial for Angela Davis, of “An Appeal to the Jewish People” that it has published as an advertisement in Congress Bi-Weekly, Sept. 17, 1971, in the Chicago Jewish weekly, The Sentinel, Oct. 14, 1971 and in Commentary in December. From Ernestine Rose to Rose Raynes, the line of descent is clear!

And that brings me, obviously, toyour tribute to Rose Raynes, for me an especially precious part of this oc- casion. For you gave me an excuse, without prying, to ask her some per- sonal questions at a luncheon-inter- view 10 days ago. Why did I, who have been in very close association with her through her invaluable work on the Management Committee of our magazine for some years, have to in- terview her? Because in her work, for you as well as for us, she is both selfless and modest, and if I wanted, for this occasion, to find out about her activity before she helped found the Federation 20 years ago, I would simply have to get her to talk about herself. I did.

I found out, gratifyingly, that like me she was born in the Ukraine; she came to the USA with her parents and younger sister in 1913. Her edu­

sion of this truth to deduce there- from the obligation to renounce all individuality; and this remark is no less applicable to nations than to per- sons. Not by disclaiming our Tull heritage,’ but by lifting up our own race [people] to the standard of mor- ality and instruction shall we at the same time promote the advancement and elevation of the Gentiles. Teach- ing by example, not by proselytism, has ever been the method of Israel. But he can fulfill his high vocation only on condition of maintaining him- self at that level of moral and in- tellectual eminence where he be- comes a beacon-light to others. . . .” (Schappes, Emma Lazarus, Selections from her Prose and Poetry, 3d ed., Emma Lazarus Federation of Jewish Women’s Clubs, 150 5th Ave., N. Y. 10011, pages 80-81.)

For another pregnant and relevant statement I turn also to Ernestine Rose, this time to her great speech on the anniversary of West Indian Emancipation, delivered on Aug. 4, 1853. As an abolitionist countering the slaveowners’ propaganda that they treat their slaves benevolently, Mrs. Rose answered: “ . . . what does slavery mean? To work hard, to fare ill, to suffer hardship, that is not slavery; for many of us white men and women have to work hard, have to fare ill, have to suffer hardship, and yet we are not slaves. Slavery is, not to belong to yourself—to be robbed of yourself. . . . The slave has no power to say, T will go here, or I will go yonder.’ The slave cannot say, ‘My wife, my husband, or my child.’ He does not belong to him- self, and of course cannot claim any- thing whatever as his own. . . .” (From text, edited by Schappes, Journal of Negro History, July, 1949; cited in Yuri Suhl, Ernestine L. Rose and the Battle for Human Rights, sponsored by ELFWC, N.Y., 1959, p. 140.)

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A NEW FILM GUIDEThe Film Review, a monthly bul-

letin featuring reviews of current films in terms of their Jewish in- terest, has just made its bow. Pub- lished by the Jewish Community Relations Advisory Council, it will be distributed as a guide to parents, rabbis, Jewish educators, youth group leaders and community rela- tions workers. The first issue (Dec.) has reviews of Fiddler on the Roof, Romance of a Horse Thief and Sun- day, Bloody Sunday.

casions will evoke the living profile of Rose Raynes that we all need.

In closing, however, I should like to point to the admirably close co- operation that we have had and will, I am sure, continue to have, between the Emma Lazarus Federation and our magazine. It is neither accidental nor incidental that June Gordon in her time and Rose Raynes now serve us invaluably on our Management Committee, and that we proudly count among our Life Subscribers not only Rose Raynes but also your presi- dent, Leah Nelson, and your vice- presidents, Mollie Goldstein and Marian Lerner.

Now the Hadassah has its Hadassah Magazine; Pioneer Women has its magazine; the National Council of Jewish Women has its own organ. The Emma Lazarus Federation does not— and therefore we on Jewish Cur- rents have felt it our responsibility to reflect the work of your organiza- tion as extensively as possible. Serv- ing as we do the entire progressive Jewish movement, we have a special spot— a tender spot— for the Emmas, whose embodiment we see continually on our Management Committee in the person and devotion of Rose Raynes. Like you, we have thus grown to re- spect, admire and love her.

cation was obtained both in the pub- lie schools of Brownsville and in the Brownsville Socialist Sunday School. At 17 she became a high school drop- out because she had to go to work to help support the family. By this time she had already joined the Young People’s Socialist League, where, after keeping quiet for three months, she volunteered to chair a meeting; her leadership qualities were instantly recognized and she was elected cor- responding secretary. While thus working to make life better, she was making a living in the garment in- dustry, first in Local 62 (underwear) and then in Local 43 (millinery).

The economic crisis brought her to the foreground in 1931 as the full- time executive secretary of the United Council of Working Class Women, forerunner of the national organiza- tion of Progressive Women’s Councils. In 1939, she was called to head the Women’s Department of the N. Y. City Committee of the International Workers Order, and held that office until 1943, then returning to private employment as an office worker.

When the Emma Lazarus Federa- tion was born Jan. 6, 1951, Rose Raynes was one of its founding mem- bers and a member of its First Na- tional Executive Committee. On re- tiring from her commercial job in 1965, she was elected president of the Brooklyn Council of Emma Lazarus Clubs. On the death of June Gordon Jan. 7, 1967, Rose Raynes waselected national executive director, a difficult post she has filled with dis- tinction— and, if I may say so, with the full cooperation and understand- ing of her husband, Alex Raynes.

As I listened to myself read this sketch, I realized that this was at best a formal, colorless Who’s Who in American Progressive Jewish Leader- ship kind of outline, but time hardly permits more. I am sure other oc-

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