{"id":5013,"date":"2017-06-20T10:36:14","date_gmt":"2017-06-20T14:36:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/jewsingreen.org\/?p=5013"},"modified":"2017-06-20T10:38:13","modified_gmt":"2017-06-20T14:38:13","slug":"the-untold-story-of-the-jewish-effort-to-pass-the-g-i-bill","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jewsingreen.org\/2017\/06\/the-untold-story-of-the-jewish-effort-to-pass-the-g-i-bill\/","title":{"rendered":"The Untold Story of the Jewish Effort to Pass the G.I. Bill"},"content":{"rendered":"

On June 22nd<\/sup>, we celebrate the anniversary of the G.I. Bill, a historic act that was the first major piece of legislation dealing with the postwar era challenges to come.\u00a0 With veterans coming home to already fully staffed factories, the G.I. Bill, officially known as the Service Member Readjustment Act of 1944, helped stop another recession by providing education and housing opportunities to veterans – allowing them to create new jobs and businesses in America\u2019s new booming economy.\u00a0 However, the Jewish effort behind the G.I. Bill is little known to the public.<\/p>\n

In 1944, there were large groups of World War II veterans already living in the United States\u2013 discharged for either disability or family reasons.\u00a0 A column in The Jewish Veteran<\/em> explained, \u201cVets are being discharged more than 8,000 a week.\u00a0 More than a million have been honorably discharged since Pearl Harbor.\u201d\u00a0 Many of these veterans brought with them unique postwar challenges similar to those war-related disabilities we see in today\u2019s veterans.<\/p>\n

With over 50,000 Jewish World War II veterans discharged in 1944, the Jewish War Veterans of the United States (JWV) was one of the first veteran\u2019s organizations to anticipate the needs of the returning soldiers.\u00a0 Their national headquarters already had staff working on job placement, vocational training and treatment for disabled veterans.\u00a0 \u00a0It was no surprise when the American Legion announced their \u201cGI Bill of Rights\u201d, JWV was one of the first organizations to join on in support of the legislation.<\/p>\n

JWV was most effective in its campaigning and behind the scene work with Congressional members.\u00a0 Not only did JWV leadership meet with Congressional leaders, the organization also started a vigorous phone and letter-writing campaign after their National Commander Archie Greenberg called their membership to action \u2013 \u201cJWV favors S. 1767, the so-called GI Bill of Rights, for World War II Veterans sponsored by the American Legion and VFW.\u00a0 Contact your local congressman immediately and urge them to support this vital bill for veterans.\u00a0 Send National copies of all congressional letters.\u201d<\/p>\n

JWV is credited with starting the first letter writing campaign.\u00a0 \u201cAfter a while, all the other (veteran) organizations started picking it up,\u201d stated Past National JWV Commander Jerry Cohen.\u00a0 The campaign was so successful that the G.I. Bill passed in the next two months.\u00a0 The Director of the American Legion\u2019s National Rehabilitation Committee recognized the JWV in an article \u2013 stating, \u201cthe American Legion is indebted for many contributions in men and ideas \u2013 namely, the Jewish War Veterans of the United States!\u201d<\/p>\n

However, JWV\u2019s greatest contribution to the G.I. Bill was their aggressive campaigning for racial and religious protections to be put into the bill.\u00a0 JWV was particularly vested in promoting racial and religious diversity in the bill because there was a vast concern among American Jewry of a resurgence of anti-Semitism after the war.\u00a0 These concerns mainly stemmed from op-eds published in various newspapers that stated American Jews were responsible for the United States\u2019 involvement in World War II.\u00a0 Not only did JWV want to show that American Jews shared in the burden of the fighting, JWV also gave credit to<\/p>\n

\"\"

Archie Greenberg honoring WWII veteran and former boxer Barney Ross<\/p><\/div>\n

other minorities, particularly to those in the African American community.\u00a0 The G.I. Bill entitlements opened up jobs and educational opportunities that would otherwise not be available to these groups.<\/p>\n

All of this would not have been possible without the vision and direction of JWV National Commander Archie Greenberg.\u00a0 His leadership and direction helped safeguard protections for veterans in the future.\u00a0 As the debate continues around the G.I. Bill and veteran benefits, it is nice reminisce about where we started, but we also need look forward to all the work that needs to be done in the future.<\/p>\n

This year, JWV National Commander Carl Singer has made strengthening the G.I. Bill one of his priorities.\u00a0 He and fellow members of JWV met with Congressional representatives in February to talk about their views on the G.I. Bill.\u00a0 \u201cSome schools have been taking advantage of veterans with the G.I. Bill because someone else is paying the bill.\u00a0 We need to provide them (service members) with guidance on good schools to pick,\u201d said Singer.\u00a0 JWV also co-signed a letter alongside 37 veterans\u2019 organizations urging members of Congress to take action on modernizing the current G.I. Bill.<\/p>\n

\u201cJWV exists to our soldiers and veterans.\u00a0Whether it’s visiting a single veteran at a nursing facility\u00a0or going to Congress to speak on behalf of all veterans, we are there and we will be there.\u00a0 It is vital that we get our message out.\u00a0 Not for recognition, but for support from the many people\u00a0and organizations that endorse our mission,\u201d said Singer.\u00a0 If you would like to get more involved in the current G.I. Bill debate, please contact your local JWV chapter.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On June 22nd, we celebrate the anniversary of the G.I. Bill, a historic act that was the first major piece of legislation dealing with the postwar era challenges to come.\u00a0 With veterans coming home to already fully staffed factories, the G.I. Bill, officially known as the Service Member Readjustment Act of 1944, helped stop another recession by providing education and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2179,"featured_media":5016,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"wds_primary_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,43],"tags":[163,194,57],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2024-05-04 03:29:44","action":"Draft","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jewsingreen.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5013"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jewsingreen.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jewsingreen.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jewsingreen.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2179"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jewsingreen.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5013"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/jewsingreen.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5013\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jewsingreen.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5016"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jewsingreen.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5013"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jewsingreen.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5013"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jewsingreen.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5013"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}