Theodore Newman Kaufman (February 22, 1910 – April 1, 1986), sometimes given incorrectly as Theodore Nathan Kaufmann, was an

American Jewish American Jews or Jewish Americans are Americans, American citizens who are Jewish, whether by Judaism, religion, ethnicity, culture, or nationality. Today the Jewish community in the United States consists primarily of Ashkenazi Jews, who desce ...

businessman and writer known for his

genocidal Genocide is the intentional destruction of a people—usually defined as an ethnic, national, racial, or religious group—in whole or in part. Raphael Lemkin coined the term in 1944, combining the Greek word (, "race, people") with the Latin ...

views on

Germans , native_name_lang = de , region1 = , pop1 = 72,650,269 , region2 = , pop2 = 534,000 , region3 = , pop3 = 157,000 3,322,405 , region4 = , pop4 = ...

. In 1939, he published pamphlets as "chairman of the American Federation of Peace" that argued that Americans should be sterilized so that their children will no longer have to fight in foreign wars. In 1941, he wrote and published '' Germany Must Perish!'' which called for the sterilization of the

German people , native_name_lang = de , region1 = , pop1 = 72,650,269 , region2 = , pop2 = 534,000 , region3 = , pop3 = 157,000 3,322,405 , region4 = , pop4 = ...

and the distribution of the German lands. The text was used extensively in

Nazi propaganda The propaganda used by the German Nazi Party in the years leading up to and during Adolf Hitler's dictatorship of Germany from 1933 to 1945 was a crucial instrument for acquiring and maintaining power, and for the implementation of Nazi polici ...

, often as a justification for the persecution of Jews and was specifically cited as a reason to round up the Jews of

Hanover Hanover (; german: Hannover ; nds, Hannober) is the capital and largest city of the German state of Lower Saxony. Its 535,932 (2021) inhabitants make it the 13th-largest city in Germany as well as the fourth-largest city in Northern Germany ...

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

Early life

He was born in

Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...

, on February 22, 1910, to Anton Kaufman and Fannie Newman. His parents had married on March 14, 1909. His father had been a reporter for the '' Berliner Morgen-Zeitung'' in

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and List of cities in Germany by population, largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's List of cities in the European Union by population within ci ...

before emigrating to the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

in 1905. Theodore's three brothers were Herbert, Julian, and Leonard. He attended South Side High School in

Budapest Budapest (, ; ) is the capital and most populous city of Hungary. It is the ninth-largest city in the European Union by population within city limits and the second-largest city on the Danube river; the city has an estimated population ...

. Balint had developed a process to increase the aging of wine. The Kaufmans had purchased this formula from Balint, but later came to believe that the formula was "worthless". Theodore Kaufman's mother died in 1939. Kaufman traveled to the

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and wrote: "you look at the horizon all day long and feel that you are staring at eternity." In

Biskra Biskra ( ar, بسكرة ; ; Latin Vescera) is the capital city of Biskra Province, Algeria. In 2007, its population was recorded as 307,987. Biskra is located in northeastern Algeria, about 248 miles (400 km) from Algiers, 71 miles (115&n ...

he met

Clare Sheridan Clare Consuelo Sheridan (née Frewen; 9 September 1885 – 31 May 1970), was an English sculptor, journalist and writer known primarily for creating busts for famous sitters and writing diaries recounting her worldly travels. She was a cousin ...

. Kaufman became the owner of a small

advertising agency An advertising agency, often referred to as a creative agency or an ad agency, is a business dedicated to creating, planning, and handling advertising and sometimes other forms of promotion and marketing for its clients. An ad agency is generally ...

and ticket agency in South Orange, New Jersey. He published the ''New Jersey Legal Record''. Kaufman founded the Argyle Press of

Newark, New Jersey Newark ( , ) is the most populous city in the U.S. state of New Jersey and the seat of Essex County and the second largest city within the New York metropolitan area. Kaufman produced several publications. One pamphlet, titled "Passive Purchase" advocated the establishment of a two-week period during which Americans would curtail their spending in order to demonstrate public opposition to American intervention in European conflicts. In a section of the pamphlet on the American Federation of Peace's beliefs, Kaufman advocated for "the strongest possible military defense of the United States" and stated that "by keeping absolutely aloof from foreign wars and entanglements the American People face a truly great future." That same year, the group also issued publications with more contentious messages, one of which read:

A possible plea to Congress. ... Have Us All Sterilized! ... If You Plan On Sending Us To A Foreign War ... Spare Us Any Possibility Of Ever Bringing Children Into This World — Into This Country Of Ours!

Two years later he shifted his focus to the forced mass-sterilization of all German men under 65 and the sterilization of most German women under 45. This would eliminate "inbred Germanism," he proposed, thus solving a great deal of humanity's problems. He also promoted the distribution of Germany's lands among the neighboring countries. His effort was spearheaded by the self-publication of the book '' Germany Must Perish!'' : "Since Germans are the perennial disturbers of the world's peace ... they must be dealt with like any homicidal criminals. But it is unnecessary to put the whole German nation to the sword. It is more humane to sterilize them. The army groups, as organized units, would be the easiest and quickest to deal with. ... The population of Germany, excluding conquered and annexed territories, is about 70,000,000, almost equally divided between male and female. To achieve the purpose of German extinction it would be necessary to only sterilize some 48,000,000 -- a figure which excludes, because of their limited power to procreate, males over 60 years of age, and females over 45. ... Taking 20,000 surgeons as an arbitrary number and on the assumption that each will perform a minimum of 25 operations daily, it would take no more than one month, at the maximum, to complete their sterilization. ... The balance of the male civilian population of Germany could be treated within three months. Inasmuch as sterilization of women needs somewhat more time, it may be computed that the entire female population of Germany could be sterilized within a period of three years or less. Complete sterilization of both sexes, and not only one, is to be considered necessary in view of the present German doctrine that so much as one drop of true German blood constitutes a German. Of course, after complete sterilization, there will cease to be a birth rate in Germany. At the normal death rate of 2 per cent per annum, German life will diminish at the rate of 1,500,000 yearly. Accordingly in the span of two generations that which cost millions of lives and centuries of useless effort, namely, the elimination of Germanism and its carriers, will have been an accomplished fact. By virtue of its loss of self-perpetuation German Will will have atrophied and German power reduced to negligible importance." Although Kaufman's book had a minimal impact in the United States, it gained attention in

Nazi Germany Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...

, where propagandists used it as evidence of an international Jewish plan to destroy the German people. On July 24, 1941, the Nazi Party's newspaper, ''

Völkischer Beobachter The ''Völkischer Beobachter'' (; "'' Völkisch'' Observer") was the newspaper of the Nazi Party (NSDAP) from 25 December 1920. It first appeared weekly, then daily from 8 February 1923. For twenty-four years it formed part of the official pub ...

'', published a front-page article on the book titled: "The Product of Criminal Jewish Sadism: Roosevelt Demands the Sterilization of the German People." The newspaper alleged that Kaufman was a close ally of

Samuel Irving Rosenman Samuel Irving Rosenman (February 13, 1896 – June 24, 1973) was an American lawyer, judge, Democratic Party activist and presidential speechwriter. He coined the term "New Deal", and helped articulate liberal policies during the heyday of the ...

, an advisor to Franklin Delano Roosevelt and that: "Given the close relationship of the writer to the White House, this monstrous war program can be seen as a synthesis of genuine Talmudic hatred and Roosevelt's views on foreign policy." At the time, the German leadership was engaged in a propaganda campaign designed to rally popular support for the

German invasion of the Soviet Union Operation Barbarossa (german: link=no, Unternehmen Barbarossa; ) was the invasion of the Soviet Union by Nazi Germany and many of its Axis allies, starting on Sunday, 22 June 1941, during the Second World War. The operation, code-named afte ...

Antisemitism Antisemitism (also spelled anti-semitism or anti-Semitism) is hostility to, prejudice towards, or discrimination against Jews. A person who holds such positions is called an antisemite. Antisemitism is considered to be a form of racism. Antis ...

in general, and Kaufman's ideas in particular, became a focus of this campaign. Nazi Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels read the book in early August and immediately grasped its value, writing in his diary: "This Jew did a real service for the enemy

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side. Had he written this book for us, he could not have made it any better." Under Goebbels' direction, ''Germany Must Perish!'' continued to receive significant media attention in Germany. Portions of the book were read on national radio, and Goebbels ordered the printing of five million copies of a pamphlet that summarized Kaufman's ideas. Der Jude Kaufman übertrumpft!

Nazi propaganda often used Kaufman's pamphlet as a justification for the persecution of Jews. When the Nazis required German Jews to wear a

yellow badge Yellow badges (or yellow patches), also referred to as Jewish badges (german: Judenstern, lit=Jew's star), are badges that Jews were ordered to wear at various times during the Middle Ages by some caliphates, at various times during the Medieva ...

on their clothing on September 1, 1941, they published a flyer explaining to the

German people , native_name_lang = de , region1 = , pop1 = 72,650,269 , region2 = , pop2 = 534,000 , region3 = , pop3 = 157,000 3,322,405 , region4 = , pop4 = ...

that those individuals wearing the star were conspiring to implement Kaufman's plan for the destruction of Germany. When the Jews of

were forced from their homes on September 8, 1941, German authorities cited Kaufman's book as one of the reasons. Kaufman responded by saying:

This is just a flimsy pretext for another of the innate cruelties of the German people ... I don't think it was my book that prompted this barbarity. They employed every possible German cruelty against the Jews long before my book was published.

The Nazi propaganda ministry continued to publish pamphlets, posters and flyers on Kaufman's ideas through the end of the war, and also urged newspapers and public speakers to remind Germans of Kaufman's book. Kaufman's last major appearance in Nazi propaganda occurred in late 1944, when a five-page section on him was included in the widely published booklet ''Never!'', which described a number of alleged plots to destroy Germany. Randall Bytwerk, an historian of communications at Calvin College, concluded that " German at the time could not have missed encountering" propaganda about Kaufman. His final publication through Argyle Press was the March 1942 brochure titled "No More German Wars! Being an outline for their permanent cessation". It contained no more writing on the sterilization of Germans or discussion of German land distribution, but made very moderate proposals for democratic re-education of the German population. He enlisted in the US Army in

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on April 24, 1942. During this time he was also placed at

Camp Ritchie Fort Ritchie at Cascade, Maryland was a military installation southwest of Blue Ridge Summit, Pennsylvania and southeast of Waynesboro in the area of South Mountain. Following the 1995 Base Realignment and Closure Commission, it closed in 19 ...

because of his linguistic abilities, thus making him one of many

Ritchie Boys The Ritchie Boys were a special collection of soldiers, with sizable numbers of German-Austrian recruits, of Military Intelligence Service officers and enlisted men of World War II who were trained at Camp Ritchie in Washington County, Maryland. ...

. His three brothers also served. Kaufman married the former Jean Siris in a civil ceremony on November 23, 1942, in Harris County, Texas.

Post-war years and death

After World War II, Kaufman disappeared entirely from public life. One scholar, Berel Lang, a visiting professor of philosophy and letters at

Wesleyan University Wesleyan University ( ) is a private liberal arts university in Middletown, Connecticut. Founded in 1831 as a men's college under the auspices of the Methodist Episcopal Church and with the support of prominent residents of Middletown, the col ...

, failed to locate Kaufman in the records of the city of Newark and in other sources. Kaufman and his wife appear in the Montclair, New Jersey Directory in 1947. He is listed as being in the painted textile business at 50 Church Street, Montclair. He died in April 1986 in East Orange, New Jersey.

Social Security Death Index The Social Security Death Index (SSDI) was a database of death records created from the United States Social Security Administration's Death Master File until 2014. Since 2014, public access to the updated Death Master File has been via the Limit ...

Writings

* "Life Liberty Pursuit of Happiness - Where? In The Graves of European Battle Fields?" American Federation of Peace, Newark, NJ, (circa 1938-1942) *
A Will and Way to Peace: Passive Purchase
' Theodore N. Kaufman, American Federation of Peace, Newark, NJ, 1939, 10-page pamphlet * '' Germany Must Perish!'', Argyle Press, Newark, NJ, 1941, 104-page brochure *
No More German Wars! Being An Outline For Their Permanent Cessation
' Argyle Press, Newark, NJ, 1942, 16-page brochur
alternate link

References

External links

* Includes translations and images of several German propaganda publications that reference Kaufman. {{DEFAULTSORT:Kaufman, Theodore N. 1911 births 1986 deaths American people of German-Jewish descent Anti-German sentiment in the United States American pamphleteers American male non-fiction writers 20th-century American non-fiction writers Malcolm X Shabazz High School alumni Writers from Newark, New Jersey Ritchie Boys

Early life

Post-war years and death

Writings

See also

References

External links