Slattery Report

A report entitled "The Problem of Alaskan Development,” produced by the United States Department of the Interior under Secretary Harold L. Ickes in 1939-40, is more usually called the Slattery Report, after Harry A. Slattery, who was undersecretary of the Interior. The report, which dealt with Alaskan development through immigration, included a proposal to move European refugees, especially Jews from Nazi Germany and Austria, to four locations in Alaska, including Baranof Island, the Matsu Valley and Sitka. Skagway, Petersburg and Seward were the only towns to endorse the proposal.

In November 1938, two weeks after "Kristallnacht", Ickes proposed the use of Alaska as a "haven for Jewish refugees from Germany and other areas in Europe where the Jews are subjected to oppressive restrictions." Resettlement in Alaska would allow the refugees to bypass normal immigration quotas, because Alaska was a territory and not a state. That summer Ickes had toured Alaska and met with local officials to discuss improving the local economy and bolstering security in a territory viewed as vulnerable to Japanese attack. Ickes thought European Jews might be the solution.cite web |url=http://www.jstandard.com/articles/3470/1/A-Thanksgiving-plan-to-save-Europe's-Jews |title=A Thanksgiving plan to save Europe’s Jews |accessdate=2007-11-25 |author=Raphael Medoff |date=November 16, 2007 |work=Jewish Standard ] cite web |url=http://www.adn.com/adn/sanctuary/stories/T99051691.html |title=Sanctuary: Alaska, the Nazis, and the Jews |accessdate=2007-11-25 |author=Tom Kizzia |date=May 19, 1999 |work=Anchorage Daily News ]

In his proposal, Ickes pointed out that 200 families from the dustbowl had settled in Alaska's Matanuska Valley. The plan was introduced as a bill by Senator William King (Utah) and Democratic Representative Franck Havenner (California), both Democrats. The Alaska proposal won the support of theologian Paul Tillich, the Federal Council of Churches, and the American Friends Service Committee.

But the plan won little support from American Jews, with the exception of the Labor Zionists of America. Most Jews agreed with Rabbi Stephen Wise, president of the American Jewish Congress, that adoption of the Alaska proposal would deliver "a wrong and hurtful impression ... that Jews are taking over some part of the country for settlement." The plan was dealt a severe blow when Roosevelt told Ickes that he insisted on limiting the number of refugees to 10,000 a year for five years, and with a further restriction that Jews not make up more than 10% of the refugees. Roosevelt never mentioned the Alaska proposal in public, and without his support the plan died.

"The Yiddish Policemen's Union" is an 2007 alternate-history novel by Michael Chabon about a Jewish Yiddish-speaking territory in Sitka [" [http://www.adn.com/news/alaska/story/8828757p-8729539c.html Novel involving Alaska Jewish colony is rooted in history] ," Tom Kizzia, "Anchorage Daily News". ] .

ee also

*International response to the Holocaust
*Territorialism, a Jewish political movement calling for creation of a sufficiently large and compact Jewish territory (or territories), not necessarily in the Land of Israel and not necessarily fully autonomous.
*Proposals for a Jewish state
**Fugu Plan, a Japanese plan to bring Jewish refugees to Manchukuo.
**Madagascar Plan, a Nazi proposal to deport European Jews to Madagascar.
**Jewish Autonomous Oblast, a Soviet territory intended as a Yiddish-speaking Jewish homeland in Siberia.
**Kimberley Plan, an Australian proposal to bring Jewish refugees to Kimberley.

References