(3 of 4)
The Angel of the Lord bade Moses tell his people that when the Passover came they should sacrifice lambs and smear their doors with the blood, that the Angel of Death, passing by, might know where righteous men lived. Long after the death of Moses, Jews celebrated their Passover with the death of lambs; and in the ghettos of walled cities, there were bloody marks upon the doors. In the Middle Ages, when the Jews were hated most bitterly by Christians, the legend arose that the blood upon their doors was that of Christian children whom Jews deemed the most suitable sacrifice to their Jehovah.
True or not, to the legend can be traced many recorded persecutions and many pogroms, which have now been forgotten, in which Jews were driven out of their ghettos and killed.
Three weeks ago (TIME, Sept. 17), Jews celebrated Yom Kippur, their Day of Atonement. On the eve of Yom Kippur, in Massena. N. Y., Barbara Griffith, 4, disappeared. Her parents asked policemen to find her. At about this time, someone remembered the legend of the sacrifice. A State police trooper named H. M. McCann summoned Rabbi Berel Brennglass to headquarters where, in accordance with an arrangement previously made with Mayor W. Gilbert Hawes, he questioned the rabbi as follows:
"Is tomorrow a big holiday, a fast day? Can you give any information as to whether your people in the old country offer human sacrifices?" A crowd of several hundred people were waiting outside the police headquarters; they dispersed, gradually and angrily, when they heard that Barbara Griffith had been found walking in a forest, and that the rabbi had denied that Jews murdered children, or, nowadays, even animals, in any of their ritual.
This dispersion did not end the incident. Famed Rabbi Stephen Samuel Wise heard of it and complained to Major John A. Warner, Superintendent of New York State Police. Louis Marshall, president of the American Jewish Committee, called "the most distinguished Jew in America," sent to Mayor Hawes of Massena a long message in which he demanded an apology. Excerpts from the message.
"To me it seems inexpressibly horrible that this vile slander, which has been demonstrated over and over again to have no foundation in fact, should be resurrected in this State of ours by public officers, upon whom rests the duty of protecting every member of the community against acts of bigotry and fanaticism . . .
"What has occurred does not merely affect the Jews of Massena, whose very lives were placed in jeopardy, but the entire Jewish population of this country and of the world. ... I deem it my duty to demand of you an immediate and public written apology to the Jewish people for the terrible wrong which you have inflicted upon them.
"This apology must be couched in such terms as will meet with my approval, so that the world may know that the remorse which you have expressed is genuine. As further evidence, you should also resign from the office which you now hold."
This message brought an answer from the Mayor of Massena. Excerpts:
"I am confirmed in my conviction that I have committed a serious error of judgment. . . .