United States Foreign Policy Toward Jewish Refugees During 1933-1939
In reviewing the events which gave rise to the U.S.'s foreign policy
toward Jewish refugees, we must identify the relevant factors upon which such
decisions were made. Factors including the U.S. government's policy mechanisms,
it's bureaucracy and public opinion, coupled with the narrow domestic political
mindedness of President Roosevelt, lead us to ask; Why was the American
government apathetic to the point of culpability, and isolationist to the point
of irresponsibility, with respect to the systematic persecution and annihilation
of the Jewish people of Europe during the period between 1938-1945?
Throughout the years of 1933-1939, led by Neville Chamberlain and the
British, the United States was pursuing a policy of appeasement toward Hitler.
They had tolerated his military build-up and occupation of the Rhineland, both
violations of the Treaty of Versailles, as well as the annexing of Austria and
the take-over of the Sudetenland in Czechoslovakia. Hitler realized early on in
his expansionist campaign that Western leaders were too busy dealing with their
own domestic problems to pose any real opposition. In the United States,
Americans were wrestling with the ravages of the Great Depression. With the
lingering memory of the more than 300,000 U.S. troops either killed or injured
in World War I, isolationism was the dominant sentiment in most political
circles. Americans were not going to be "dragged" into another war by the
British. The Depression had bred increased xenophobia and anti-Semitism, and
with upward of 30% unemployment in some industrial areas1, many Americans wanted
to see immigration halted completely. It was in this context that the
democratic world, led by the United States, was faced with a refugee problem
that it was morally bound to deal with. The question then became; what would
they do?
Persecution of the Jews in Germany began officially on April
1st 1933. Hitler had come to power a few weeks earlier and he immediately began
the plan, as outlined in his book Mein Kampf, to eliminate "the eternal mushroom
of humanity - Jews".2 German Jews were stripped of their citizenship by the
Nuremberg Race Laws of 1935 and had their businesses and stockholdings seized in
1938. Civil servants, newspaper editors, soldiers and members of the judiciary
were dismissed from their positions, while lawyers and physicians were forbidden
to practice. Anti-Jewish violence peaked on 9 November 1938, known as the
"Night of the Broken Glass" or Kristallnacht, when over 1000 synagogues were
burned. Jewish schools, hospitals, books, cemeteries and homes were also
destroyed3.
The mistreatment of non-Aryans in Germany was common knowledge in the
U.S. in 1938. After the anschluss, the flow of
Adolf Hitler, head of the NSDAP, became Chancellor of Germany on the 30th January 1933. Following the 'legal revolution' of the following months and President Hindenburg's death on the 2nd August 1934, Hitler made himself Führer and Reichskanzler. The Nazi revolution was complete and Germany was subject to a dictatorship of the extreme political right.
Adolf Hitler came into power of Germany in 1934. Wanting power, land and revenge, Hitler gets troops ready to attack. Hitler was a troop in WWI for Germany. Once the Germans lost the war, Hitler took that personally, and wanted revenge. After coming into power with his army of Nazis, Hitler is quick to blame Jewish people for all the harsh debt and corruption in Germany. The Germans believe him, causing them to hate Jewish people. The holocaust happened throughout 1933-1945, it ended when Hitler killed himself.
The Change of Nazis' Treatment of the Jews From 1939-45 Hitler and the Nazi party managed to kill six million Jews throughout Europe by the end of 1945. This systematic process of killing between the years 1939 and 1945 is known as the holocaust. There were five key issues that led to the Wansee conference that took place in 1942 before the Nazi's decided upon the "final solution to the Jewish problem. These events included the outbreak of World War II, Hitler's personal agenda against the Jewish population, the rise and power of the SS and the failures of other solutions put forward to "get rid" of the Jewish problem.
By 1935 the Nazis made sure that Jews were no longer seen as a part of
that all Jews over 6 years had to wear a Star of David. Also Jews were
First of all, the Holocaust started in 1933, when Hitler became the leader of Germany. Although Hitler was originally an Austrian, he was a German soldier during World War I. As an soldier, Hitler had been injured many times, and while he was in the hospital, Germany surrounded. He was unhappy about Germany's lost and he had ideas that he think will change Germany. He then tried to take over the government by man power, but failed and had been arrested to jail. While he was in jail, he wrote a book cal...
Anti-Semitism has affected the world since Biblical times. There are many disastrous events in history, such as the Black Death, where the Jews have been put to blame by society. In March 1933, when Hitler came to power in Germany by manipulating the Enabling Act, he started to put into action the discriminatory laws as promised. The Nazi Party wanted Germany to become a supreme race of strong, healthy people, called Aryans, without contamination from ‘dirty’ minorities such as the Jews. Through the period from 1933 to 1939 Hitler passed laws which started off by discriminating the Jews, such as burning Jewish books and forbidding them to join the Army, and then gradually put into effect active persecution, so that in 1939 Jews were beginning to be sent into the now famous concentration camps.
According to my reading, Hitler came into power one day after Roosevelt’s inauguration, March 5, 1933. He had begun his dictatorship of Germany as he had planned. Adolf Hitler was a man of innovation and much hate. He had been a soldier in WWl and he blamed the Jews for Germany’s loss. The loss angered him deeply. He also believed that the Versailles Treaty caused the financial crisis in Germany. (Davidson, 2008)
First came the persecution of the Jews. Jews have been persecuted for many centuries, but Hitler started a new era of persecution. It started with organized attacks against the Jews. People would throw stuff at them and yell nasty comments towards them. Soon their stores and business were boycotted by any Aryan. The Germans would stand outside the Jew stores to prevent people from coming in. Shortly after the persecution...
In 1933, Hitler and the Nazi’s began to practice their racial ideology. They believed that the Germans
Adolf Hitler came to power on February 28, 1933 (Rossel). He rose to power using inflammatory speeches and inspiring hope for the defeated Germans. He constructed a system to empower the German people and allow them to thrive in the period after the Great Depression (Noakes). Using keen acumen and decisive moves, he was able to turn Germany into a war machine bent on the creation of an Aryan utopian society, at the cost of all inferior races, especially the Jews ("The Period between 1933 and 1939"). At this time Germany was a defeated country. They had recently had numerous humiliating defeats in WWI, and the Germans no longer had the pride they once had celebrated (Laurita). Augmented by the fact that the Great Depression had ravaged the country and left many in a state of penury and impoverished, the Germans were desperate. As well, Germany was currently a country without any source of stability without a generally supported constitution. When Hitler promised a utopian society filled with hope and where the Germans would be exalted as the superior race, the Germans listened and obeyed his every word (Noakes). Hitler fed on the desperation and hopelessness of these German people to make a society driven by fear; this state of pity allowed Hitler to convince the Germans that he could provide a better future.
Before 1933 nobody imagined what would happen when the Nazis came to power in Germany in January 1933. The Nazi regime had a leader named Hitler, and he
Germany and everybody else was starting to become angry with Hitler. Hitler was well aware of this. Every where he turned a felt like somebody was out to get him. He decided on one thing and that was to kill himself. He had a group of friends surrounding him when he killed himself. The date was April 30, 1933. Only ten days after his 44 birthday. Ha, some belated birthday.
It began with the rise of Hitler and the Nazi party. Hitler was in the run for president but lost to Paul Von Hindenburg. Hindenburg soon appointed Hitler as Chancellor in January 1933. President Hindenburg appointed Hitler chancellor after Hitler tried to run for president but was denied (Fitzgerald 28). Hitler was assigned to keep the Nazis under control, which mean he would have to work with political parties within the government, but that would only back fire on Hindenburg. After Hitler became the dictator in March, he quickly began enforcing power against the Jews. Hitler became dictator and quickly started enforcing power against the Jew (Fitzgerald 30). August 17, 1938 Laws passed that required Jew to distinguish themselves from the Germans (The U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum). Hitler was on the rise.
Hitler came to power in 1933 with the help of his Nazi party. Hitler's anti-Jew campaign began soon afterward, with the "Nuremberg Laws" introduced in 1935, which defined the meaning of being Jewish based on ancestry. These laws also forced segregation between Jews and the rest of the public. It was only a dim indication of what the future held for European Jews. Anti-Jewish aggression continued for years after the passing of the Nuremberg Laws. One of these was the "Aryanization" of Jewish property and business. Jews were progressively forced out of the economy of Germany, their assets turned over to the government and the German public.