So, the electric company had to replace three transformers on the pole outside our church this morning. I was sitting in the dark, reading a 1943 edition of our Diocesan magazine, “Church Life,” like you do. And I ran across this letter written to a movie reviewer at the Cleveland Plain Dealer.
June 1943
Church Women
Protest Cleveland
Plain Dealer
Writer’s Views on
Japanese
Children’s Christmas Gifts
Dear Mr.
Marsh:
On behalf of,
the Executive Board of the Woman’s Auxiliary of the Episcopal Church in the
Diocese of Ohio, I am writing to protest a reference in your recent “Moon Is
Down” review in which you spoke contemptuously of people who send toys to
Japanese children, as you heard “was done in one place.”
The one place
this was done, Mr. Marsh, was the whole United States of America. And while we
are a free nation it is the sort of thing that will always be done.
We have no
wish to enter into any controversy with you on the subject of hate, though we
believe plenty of proof could be brought to the argument for the other
side. As, for instance, the British have
stopped the teaching of hate to commandos. We consider it spiritual immaturity
to confuse hate of a loathsome disease with hate of those who have it. We
recognize the need to exterminate the rabidly
infected Nazi-Fascist, Black-Dragon ridden militarists, but we do not consider it
necessary to hate each individual of the nationalities most affected.
We are not
pacifists nor isolationists, Mr. Marsh, nor soft sentimentalists. Many of us hated this Thing long before you,
apparently, were aware of its menace to us-—in your own words you were a most
ardent peace lover “before Germany marched into Poland and . . . . the Japs
blasted Pearl Harbor.” Do you think
these were the cause of the war?
Many of us
have hated this Thing since it started the downfall of Germany around 1928;
through the invasions of Manchuria and Ethiopia, the rehearsal in Spain and war
in China; through Munich and murder of Czechoslovakia, our hatred increased
until we would go ourselves to fight the ugliness on any battlefront, if such
action would help. We hate this cancerous disease wherever it is found--and it
can be found even in Cleveland.
It is found,
Mr. Marsh, in blind prejudice against children who happen to be born to a race
with whose homeland we are at war.
1f you are
well informed, you will know that most of the Japanese who were sent to
relocation centers are loyal to the United States. Very many were born here and
are citizens who surrendered their constitutional rights to protect their
country from possible subversive activity by the enemy alien minority they knew
existed among them. They gave up homes and means of livelihood and freedom
itself to help beat Japan. Many are in the U. S. Army. The F. B. I. has now had
time to double check on them and you can if you take the trouble, learn more
about them from the War Relocation Authority office here in Cleveland.
The
Relocation Centers are not beds of roses, Mr. Marsh. You wouldn’t like having
to take your family and live in these barren quarters behind barbed wire and under
guard. For the high percentage of professional people especially, life has
become a pretty bleak affair. Christmas was coming, and there was nothing to
brighten the season for thousands of restless children who had faith in Santa Claus and
American Christmases.
The Women’s
Department of the Home Missions Council recognized the desperate need of
keeping this faith alive, and appealed to women of all Protestant churches all
over the United States. Catholic and
Jewish women may have done the same sort of thing. The response was what
Hollywood might term colossal. We had feared that the prejudice you reflected
might prevent the success of the project. But toys and money poured in, and
that Christmas in camp was proof to people in a cage that America is still a
healthy-hearted nation. It was a little thing, but it came from countless
people who had the vision of the real spirit of Christmas.
Anyway, Mr.
Marsh, you may call this soft and pantywaist if you will. It is cheap and easy
to lump all these people together and condemn them. The Christian way is harder
and takes more courage--but it is the only way to free the future from the
appalling effects of a moral sickness whose byproducts are hate and war and
eternal tragedy.
We are proud
of having had a small part in one action to rebuild hope and faith and love.
With best
wishes, believe me
Sincerely
yours,
JOSEPHINE V.
COWIN,
National
Executive Board
Woman’s
Auxiliary, Protestant Episcopal
Church in U.
S. A.
