Beyond Belief (14 page)

William Shirer recalled that reporters in Germany “could scarcely believe it” when they read statements by Americans claiming that the Germans were not discriminating and would not discriminate against Jews.
⁴²
Fifty years later, in an interview, he again expressed his utter amazement at how some Americans were able to ignore what Germany had become under the Nazis. The July riots, the Nuremberg Laws, the exclusion of Jewish athletes from training facilities, and the progressively harsher treatment being meted out to Jews throughout Germany did not shake the faith of the pro-Games faction that Hitler and the Nazis were abiding by their promises to behave as a civilized nation and observe the Olympic code of sportsmanship.

Although it took some papers until November to decide to do so, ultimately close to two-thirds of the papers that commented on the Games opposed going. The press favored a boycott of
the Games far more enthusiastically than it ever favored any form of economic boycott. This was understandable, for a trade boycott had the potential to cause economic repercussions in America, while a sports boycott demonstrated contempt for the Nazi system at little direct cost to America. Furthermore, while an economic boycott constituted a political statement, an Olympics boycott could be interpreted as a commitment to neutrality.

In the period following the issuance of the Nuremberg Laws, opposition to the Games increased markedly. By mid-October the fight began to gain momentum as the number of papers advocating a boycott increased. The
New York Times
cautioned that it was not necessary to “indulge in violent denunciations of what the Nazis are doing and proposing to do.” Just refusing to send players to the Games would be “the application of a moral sanction which could not be hidden from the German people and which they would not fail to understand.”
⁴³
Though in comparison with some other papers' editorials during this period the
New York Times
was reserved, the fact that the leading newspaper in the country advocated a boycott as a form of moral protest was significant.
⁴⁴
As the date for the AAU's final vote on whether to certify athletes for the Games grew near, press opposition became increasingly vocal and the list of prominent Americans and American organizations demanding a boycott grew apace.
⁴⁵

The tenor of the fight also became more vehement. Sherrill again predicted an outbreak of American antisemitism upon his return from Germany, and the AOC published a pamphlet in favor of the Games which posited that the opposition was “essentially Jewish and Communistic.” These claims elicited a number of editorial responses which argued that it was not Jews who were leading the fight against participation and that Jews were not Hitler's only victims. Brundage also introduced the Jewish issue, sometimes by innuendo. He called the fight one between “principles and dollars” and claimed that there was a million-dollar war chest so that the fight for a boycott could go on “whether or not there was any truth to the reports (from Germany).” On another occasion he claimed that newspapers—which by November were two to one against going—had been warned that if they did not oppose the Games, they would lose millions of dollars in advertising, and that the colleges which sent athletes would lose substantial donations. Brundage's stress on the existence of powerful monied forces anxious to halt the games was clearly
intended to raise the specter of “Jewish money” in the minds of the public. The threat of loss of advertising dollars was linked to the popular notion of Jewish department store owners who controlled the press with their monies. Sherrill later reiterated his premonitions about domestic antisemitism in a letter to the editor of the
American Hebrew
. In an admonitory tone he warned American Jews that there existed a “present danger of increased antisemitism . . . among thousands of young Americans . . . once [they] get the idea that Jews are scheming to get America to boycott the Berlin Games.”
⁴⁶

The opposition of prominent non-Jews and publications such as the Protestant
Christian Century
and the liberal Catholic journal
Commonweal
made it more difficult, but far from impossible, for Brundage and Sherrill to suggest that the Jews were behind it all.
Christian Century
and
Commonweal
took Sherrill to task for his warning to American Jews.

Reading accounts of torture and oppression, of hunger and degradation, which are the daily fate of hundreds of thousands living under the Hitler lash, Jews are bidden remember that silence alone can preserve them from a like fate here.
⁴⁷

The Committee on Fair Play in Sports, a proboycott group whose chairmen and members included secretary of the Federal Council of Churches Dr. Henry Smith Leiper, prominent theologian Dr. Harry Emerson Fosdick, former owner of
The Nation
Oswald Garrison Villard, the president of Mt. Holyoke College Mary Woolley, and Governor of Massachusetts James M. Curley, chastised Sherrill because he “gratuitously” tried to turn the debate over the Games into a “purely Jewish issue.”
⁴⁸
Until the participants set sail for Germany, Brundage and Sherrill continued to blame Jews—both directly and by innuendo—for placing obstacles in the team's path.

Sports writers were also debating the propriety of American attendance. The
Column Review
polled sports writers and found a strong division of opinion. A survey by the United Press was almost evenly divided. Of the thirty writers polled, thirteen supported participation, eleven opposed it, and six were undecided. (The close nature of the United Press results did not prevent the pro-Games
Los Angeles Times
from headlining its story “SPORTS SCRIBES FAVOR SENDING OLYMPIC TEAM.”)
⁴⁹
Among the sports writers who favored participation were Fred Digby of the
New Orleans Item Tribune
, Maurice O. Shevlin of the
St. Louis Globe Democrat
, and Richard Vidmer of the
New York Herald Tribune
, who made a special point of attacking Jeremiah T. Mahoney, former New York State Supreme Court justice and president of the AAU, who opposed the Games because of his conviction that Jewish athletes were not being given a fair chance. Harry Smith of the
San Francisco Chronicle
and Tom Laird of the
San Francisco News
gave guarded approval to participation if strong assurances of fair play could be obtained. Ralph McGill of the
Atlanta Constitution
, Shirley Povich of the
Washington Post
, and Bill Cunningham of the
Boston Post
all opposed participation, as did most of the New York dailies. Cunningham wondered whether the Germans planned to “declare a moratorium for six weeks and then go back to their beatings, sluggings and boycott?”
⁵⁰
Christian Century
, which had adopted an anti-Olympic editorial stance within a few weeks after the riots, considered the sports writers' opinions important enough to urge its readers to write to their local papers to protest United States participation and address their letters to the sports writers because they might pay more attention than editorial boards. The influence of
Christian Century
was reflected by the fact that the
New York Times
reprinted its statement in full and by the number of different editorials—both those for and against participation—which cited the Protestant journal's stance. Some felt compelled to take issue with it, while others cited it as support of their own position.
⁵¹

By the beginning of November the Anti-Nazi Federation had collected 30,000 protest signatures.
⁵²
Shortly after the announcement of the second phase of the Nuremberg decrees, 138 Protestant leaders called for an American withdrawal from the competition. They were joined by Ernst Jahncke, the American representative to the IOC. His decision to “do all I can to persuade my fellow Americans that they ought not take part in the Games if they are held in Nazi Germany” elicited a strong response from the press.
⁵³
It seemed to prompt many papers that had been ambivalent about American policy to take an anti-Olympic stance. The
Washington Post, Philadelphia Record, Brooklyn Citizen, Troy
(New York)
Times Record
, and other papers that were opposed to the Games, considered Jahncke's decision the “most important” antiparticipation action. Ever the proponent of participation, the
Los Angeles Times
deprecated Jahncke's opposition by casting it in a blatantly political light. Jews, columnist Warren B. Francis argued in a
Los Angeles Times
exclusive, were distressed by Roosevelt's failure to intervene in Germany and the Republicans were intent
on “profiting” from the situation. Therefore, “Jahncke, former
Republican
Assistant Secretary of the Navy,” was making “overtures” to American Jews.
⁵⁴

The popular journalist and commentator Heywood Broun registered his opposition to the Games on his radio show and asked listeners to express their opinion in a postcard poll. The response was overwhelming, surprising even Broun, who, in an article in
The Nation
, admitted that he had “never said anything on the air in any other discourse which caught and held a single ear” as this had. Despite the unscientific nature of his poll, it is significant that responses were more than 99 percent against going to the Games.
⁵⁵

By early December, immediately prior to the AAU meeting, an impressive list of civic, political, religious, and sports figures had joined many American newspapers in opposition to the Games. Proboycott petitions with 500,000 names and resolutions by organizations with 1.5 million members were presented to the AAU in the final days prior to its convention. After more than five hours of debate and speeches the boycott resolution lost by the tiny margin of two and a half votes. (The half vote was possible because of the AAU procedure for allocating votes.)
⁵⁶

But the opponents did not give up. Mahoney announced that he would continue to fight for a boycott. The
Philadelphia Record
called for a continuation of the fight, as did a number of other papers. The
Indianapolis Star
advocated a boycott if the persecution did not cease in the period remaining prior to the Games. One of the few national newspapers to openly praise the vote was the
Christian Science Monitor
, which believed that “competition on the playing field (would) . . . lessen unnatural animosities.” In contrast, the
Washington Post
regretted “loss of this great opportunity to let the Germans see what the outside world thinks of their present rulers.”
⁵⁷

Despite the fact that the fight was lost, some papers believed that significant gains had resulted. The
Wheeling
(West Virginia)
Register
observed that “no issue has been so widely discussed through the news columns and so persistently eschewed editorially as the United States' participation in the Olympic Games” and consequently Americans had been enlightened regarding conditions
in Germany.
⁵⁸
The
Philadelphia Record
expressed a similar sentiment. As a result of the Games there was now “awakening American awareness of the menace of Fascism.”
⁵⁹
Alan Gould, sports editor for Associated Press, predicted that the strong sentiment both within and outside the AAU would place insurmountable obstacles in the path of an American team.
⁶⁰
All these evaluations and predictions proved far too optimistic. The team sailed on schedule for Germany, where, instead of vanquishing the Reich's representatives, which some proponents of participation had claimed would constitute a fitting response to Hitler, they watched the athletes of the “new” Germany claim an unexpectedly large share of the honors.

The
Philadelphia Record
was probably right; many Americans were now more aware of German persecution. Discussion of the issue on both editorial and sports pages resulted in increased American exposure to German fascism. Never had there been such sustained nationwide debate about events in Nazi Germany. The boundaries between domestic and foreign policy issues had been blurred. But in all likelihood if Americans had a negative image of Germany as a result of the debate, it was obliterated by the glowing reports brought back by those Americans who attended the Games.

In addition to winning the top medals on the field of competition, the Germans won warm praise from many of those who came to witness the events. The American press corps, many of whom were in Germany just for the Games, lauded the Reich's accomplishments on and off the field. Much of what had been reported over the preceding years was ignored or forgotten. Newspaper and magazine readers were provided with lavish and extensive coverage of the Games. The sports competition was a massive exercise in propaganda and public relations, and many American reporters were uncritical about all that they saw. As Ambassador Dodd had predicted, Americans—particularly non-German-speaking ones who only knew Germany from the Games—departed convinced that the revolutionary upheavals, random beatings, and the murders of political opponents had been greatly exaggerated or were a thing of the past. Those bedazzled included not only the athletes and tourists, but personages such as newspaper publisher
Norman Chandler and numerous American businessmen. This period marked the beginning of Charles Lindbergh's love affair with the Reich. One reporter was convinced that as a result of the Games visitors would be