Why did FDR refuse Jewish immigrants from Europe after WWII?

Question

he is such an icon of the left..yet he was anti-immigration

good point..he did refuse them though

The St. Louis sailed out of Hamburg into the Atlantic Ocean in May 1939 carrying one non-Jewish and 936 (mainly German) Jewish refugees seeking asylum from Nazi persecution just before World War II.[1][2]

The ship arrived in Cuba seeking asylum. The boat was kept waiting offshore while the Cuban government disagreed on how much they could charge the passengers to come ashore. A small boat armada formed to keep people from jumping off and swimming ashore, and searchlights guarded it at night. The ship was then refused asylum, prompting a near mutiny. Two people attempted suicide and dozens more threatened to do the same. However, 29 of the refugees were able to disembark at Havana.[3]

On 4 June 1939, the St. Louis was also refused permission to unload on orders of President Roosevelt as the ship waited in the Caribbean Sea between Florida and Cuba. Initially, Roosevelt showed limited willingness to take in some of those on board, but vehement opposition came from Roosevelt's Secre

Answer 1

Ok, so an error was made, lighten up (we all know what he meant)!

Few countries wanted more Jews. Some, such as Switzerland, took as many as they could handle but the USA, Great Britain, France, Poland, and many, many others either flat out refused, changed their laws to prevent them from coming, or reclassified them as economic refugees (effectively barring them). The Jews had done quite well in Germany and were over represented in professions such as real estate, banking, business, professors, etc so it wasn't that they would be a burden on the country accepting them (at least until just before WWII when the Nazis started compensating their wealth before allowing them to leave saying it was stolen from the German people).

The only answer was that, while not killing Jews, other countries felt contempt for them and simply did not want any more. Whether this was based on race or religion or both is the subject of conjecture. The Jewish homeland idea was really a way of getting rid of them similar to Lincoln's plan of exporting all the freed slaves to Africa.

Answer 2

Um, FDR died before WWII even ended lol. President Truman took over, dropped the nuke on Japan, and Truman was in charge when WWII ended.
FDR refused Jewish immigrants BEFORE the war to avoid entangling the US in an inevitable war for as long as he could. He didn't want to become involved in foreign affairs because of pressure back home from people who didn't want to send our soldiers to die in Europe. Besides, at the time, FDR and the US really didn't know the full extent of the Holocaust. The US was in a state of isolationism at the time.

Answer 3

Hitler offered to send 6 million Jews to the United State but Roosevelt said that it would devastate our economy- we took only as many as the immigration service said would be safe to take- Other countries did the same thing-the leaders of the day felt that they had a responsibility to the citizens to guard them from economic collapse. It is quite different today.

Answer 4

You failed jr. high school US history , didn't you ?

Prior to 1941, the US did not let in a lot of Jews from Europe, and since FDR was President...it's his bad. But after WW 2, there was a mass exodus of Holocaust survivors to British controlled "Palestine", and most of the Jews preferred to go there than here. Israel was founded from this influx, so there was no need for a lot of Jewish immigration to the US.

Now, go back to school and LEARN your US history !

Answer 5

i am going to inform you a touch that i have realized about human beings in my time in this staggering planet of ours. human beings despise you if you're a failure and they imagine they'd ought to pay somewhat their puzzling earned tax funds which could be sensible you out. on the different hand, they despise you even extra if you're too efficient. It makes them look inferior. And to make amends for that they are going to take care of you as not so good as make themselves look extra suitable. no individual on earth changed into extra bodily and mentally inferior than Hitler and his rag tag team of insane miscreants and thugs he surrounded himself with. And yet they believed they were the further suitable ones. Jews on universal have a tendency to do o.k. everywhere they go and that is one reason they're hated. On universal, they're an sensible and proficient race that would not sit down round whining about the previous like many different races. even regardless of the reality that, arguably they'd have extra reason than many others. they actually have a competing faith, and the purpose of maximum religions is to damage all others. i'm ashamed that below the insane best minister we had in the course of WWII, even Canada "the pleasant" refused possibility-free haven to Jews whose inevitable destiny changed into the inability of life camps, yet now we glance to grant sanctuary to means terrorists. which could be replacing, I confident desire so.

Answer 6

FDR never saw the end of WWII. But while he was alive he did restrict the number of Jewish that could immigrate here. In fact most European countries were turning the Jews back. They couldn't take any more.

Answer 7

You mean during WW2 when they were seeking refuge.The answer is that he was an insider,and the zionists wanted it that way to establish a Jewish Homeland in Palestine per the Balfour Declaration after the war.Many historical documents prove that position.

Answer 8

This is a hilarious attempt to rewrite history to make a point, because you made one big mistake that shows your hand: FDR was DEAD before WWII ended.

Nice try.

In regards to your additions, you said it right at the bottom: FDR initially was going to let some of them in. This is not a simple case of anti-immigration. There is more to this story. For one thing, there was a war going on and we were, supposedly, neutral at this point. Taking on refugees could easily have been viewed as a violation of our neutrality.

Answer 9

Considering that FDR died before the end of WWII, that would be an interesting feat.

Answer 10

He was a racist against Jews.... thats why!!