Justice Louis Brandeis of the U. S. Supreme Court was proclaimed by Johann Smertenko, one of the American Revisionist leaders, to be the man who would most likely secure Revisionist support if he would be a candidate for the presidency of the World Zionist Organization at the coming World Congress. Prof. Smertenko made his statement at the Sunday afternoon session of the congress of the Zionist Revisionists of America, which took place at the Broadway Central Hotel on Saturday, Sunday, and Monday.
“Justice Brandeis has many times stated that he believes in a Jewish state. The insistance on the eventual attainment of a majority in Palestine and Trans-Jordania and the creation of a Jewish state is the essential item in Revisionist ideology,” said Prof Smertenko. “However the Revisionists will not commit themselves to any candidate for the presidency unless assured that the candidate stands for a program to which we can agree.”
Mordecai Danzis, president of the American Revisionists, in his address before the delegates advocated the absolute separation of the Revisionists from the Zionist organization. “The further we can get away from them the healthier for us!” he declared. He expressed the fear that, at the last emergency, the Centrist Zionists might decide to turn the Zionist organization over to the Revisionists. “The organization is a corps,” he said. “We don’t want it at our door. We are re-creating true Zionist ideology. The best way is to begin afresh.” There was opposition to his proposal.
The opening meeting of the convention, in Hias Hall, was attended by more than 300 people. There were forty official delegates, from ten cities, to the conference. On Sunday night a banquet in honor of Vladimir Jabotinsky was held. On Monday, meetings together with the Brith Trumpeldor were carried forward.
E. Ranin, one of the Revisionist organizers in America, said that within the last seven weeks the membership has grown from a mere handful to over a thousand. “Much of our enrollment is among American Jewish youth,” he said.
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
