Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost, to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!
The irony is unmistakable. For 130 years, Lady Liberty has stood tall in New York harbor, looking east to welcome immigrants to the land of opportunity and freedom.
But has the time arrived to replace the words of Jewish-American poet Emma Lazarus inscribed on the statue with "Syrians aren't welcome - even Syrian orphans" - the inspirational words of Chris Christie, Governor of the state that stubbornly insists Lady Liberty is a resident of New Jersey?
Or, "Syrians are welcome...as long as they're Christian'" the opinion of Jeb Bush, brother of the President who's administration was largely responsible for implementing the very vetting system that has "kept us safe" and "protected the homeland" from refugee terrorists? Ironically, it's largely the same vetting system that is now being questioned by current candidates as unreliable.
Or perhaps “Syrians – welcome to 38% of the United States of America” which represents the percentage of states with Governors who don’t view leadership and statesmanship as simply sucking on your finger and holding it up to gauge the opinion of the most bellicose segment of their constituency
The United States looks poised to repeat a shameful betrayal to its stated ideals that occurred a little more than 75 years ago. Adolf Hitler had taken control of Germany and his fascist ideology was rapidly spreading through Europe. Despite overwhelming evidence of atrocities committed against various ethnic and religious groups (predominately Jewish) in Germany, Czechoslovakia and Austria, President Franklin Roosevelt resisted efforts to facilitate refugee immigration to the US. Shamefully, it was a view shared by a resounding majority of US citizens. In fact, a 1938 poll indicates that more than 67% of Americans felt that "with conditions as they are, we should try to keep them out."
Even after the terror of Kristallnacht, when asked "It has been proposed to bring to this country 10,000 refugee children from Germany - most of them Jewish - to be taken care of in American homes. Should the Government permit these children to come?" 61% of Americans responded no.
It is easy and comforting to engage in revisionist history as it dampers any lingering national guilt and disguises our current national prejudices. The most common argument against comparing these two US movements against refugee resettlement is that they are "not comparable...the Jews weren't trying to kill us like the Muslim Syrians are." While easy to justify, these opinions conveniently gloss over US feelings toward German Jews widely held at that time.
In fact, hateful anti-Semitism was wide-spread in the United States. This religious and ethnic intolerance was largely responsible was the environment of mistrust and fear of European Jews most responsible for our county's refusal to welcome them as refugees. Citizens of the United States did fear and mistrust them.
There was also a widely held belief that Jewish refugees posed a very serious security threat to the US. In fact, the US State Department failed to fill even the small allotment of German refugee slots from 1933 to 1945 due to the belief that "there were many radicals and subversives among Jewish refugees" (Freidman, Max (2003) Nazis and Good Neighbors: The United States Campaign against the Germans of Latin America in World War II Cambridge University Press.) It was unfair and unjust to deny refugee status to German Jews based on mistrust of Germans in general. It is equally unjust to condemn Syrian Muslims for the recent atrocities of a few French and Belgian nationals.
Those believing it is best to "send them back" and create a safe zone in Syria would be well served to remember the story of the St. Louis. On May 13th, this ship set sail for Cuba with 900 German-Jewish refugees aboard - all hoping for a safe haven in Havana while they waited for refugee status in the United States. After being denied entry by both Cuba and the United States, the ship returned to Europe where, similar to today, Great Britain, France, Belgium, and the Netherlands provided them a home.
It is unlikely the horrors of the holocaust would have been avoided even had the United States lived up to its stated humanitarian principles. But it is certain that thousands, perhaps hundred of thousands, of European Jews would have been spared the greatest genocide of the 20th century if we had lived by the principles set forth by our Founding Fathers.
If we give in to fear and prejudice once again, how will future generations judge us? And, if once again we abandon our position as leaders in a free and just world to protect "our way of life," is it really a way of life worth protecting?
And does closing our borders to those most in need make the US a more secure and safe nation or does it further threaten future generations of Americans? I believe our actions today threaten the very existence of our nation…but those are thoughts for my next post.
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