Irene Mermelstein's Mom buried the family's wealth in a hole in the back yard. It was Hungary, 1944, and the Nazi troops were coming down the street. Mermelstein's parents and siblings subsequently died in Auschwitz, and the family treasure was never recovered. So Mrs. Mermelstein is suing the U.S.
Why the U.S.? Well, the answer seems to be that the Nazis hauled the loot from Hungarian Jews on a train, the Gold Train, which was intercepted by Americans in 1945. The U.S. claims to have returned identifiable property after the war, but Mermelstein's suit says the items in the train were deemed unidentifiable and spread among various agencies, or sold, or pilfered.
Well, that's certainly possible. I seem to recall someone bringing suit against Madeleine Albright for looting the wealth of the family whose home Albright's family occupied during or after World War II. There wasn't anything in the news about it, was there? And, of course, isn't looting and pillaging what war is all about? What about property seized or destroyed by the Union Army in the South? What about the gold taken from South America by the Spanish? Oh, and those Elgin Marbles!! Anybody for reparations?
What about all those German scientists, like Werner von Braun, that we acquired after the War? OK, they wanted to come here, but so what? As German citizens, were they free to go where they wanted? What if Germany had demanded their return? At the end of the war, there were over two million Soviet citizens in Germany, and Russia demanded them back. Most didn't want to go, but the U.S. sent them anyway, in the famous Operation Keelhaul. Was our government supposed to believe that people could just live where they wanted? This "land of the free" business doesn't extend THAT far!
Currently, there are some black leaders demanding reparations from the U.S. for slavery. If the demand is made often and loudly enough, it will, sooner or later, be taken seriously. So how about an idea which is not at all fantastic, and has not yet been proposed, although it should have been.
President Roosevelt seized the gold of Americans in 1933. He didn't do it lawfully: how could it have been lawful? Gold was money in those days; how could it be against the law for people to own and use money? Moreover, the reasons he gave for the seizure were blatantly absurd. How much of the people's gold was stolen? I've never read any estimate, but it must have been a considerable amount, doubtlessly many millions, especially in terms of today's undefined "dollars."
I want it back. I have every bit as much right to it as Mrs. Mermelstein does to her family's treasures, which almost certainly will never be discovered. Even so, she's entitled, by some sort of "law," to 10,000 in compensation. I'll settle for that from Uncle Sam, plus interest, of course. Whose claim is the greater, the more reasonable, the more powerful: mine, for property seized from my family by the government, in this country, or Mrs. Mermelstein's, for property seized by Nazis from her, a foreigner in a foreign land? Mark my words, Mrs. Mermelstein's claim will be given attention, mine will not. Of course, she's suing as one of thirteen claimants; I stand alone.
Possibly someone will realize, in this discussion of reparations, whether reasonable or ridiculous, that were there no governments, there would be no wars; and were there no wars, reparations, at least for Mrs. Mermelstein, would be unnecessary.
March 10, 2003
Dr. Hein [send him mail] is a semi-retired ophthalmologist in St. Louis, and the author of All Work & No Pay.
