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Committees in the U.S. and the U.K. The American Jewish Physicians Committee,
just established in New York, intended to utilize Einstein’s prestige to raise funds
specifically for the medical faculty of the planned university. Given these conflict-
ing designs, widely divergent plans surfaced in regard to Einstein’s mission,
witnessed by the shifting schedule of talks and meetings that emerges from the
correspondence.
After two weeks of “promising” negotiations between Weizmann and the Bran-
deis faction of the ZOA in the U.S., the talks broke down and a deep rift ensued.
On 17 April, Weizmann broke off all further meetings and “proclaimed the estab-
lishment of Keren Hayesod in the United
States.”[26]
The breakdown did not have
an immediate impact on Einstein’s efforts. In mid-April, Brandeis supporter Judah
L. Magnes proposed to organize a gathering of intellectuals interested in the
Hebrew University, which Einstein agreed to attend only if it were to “contribute
to the success of my Mission, to secure support for the Jerusalem University”
(Doc. 123), a limitation with which Magnes disagreed (Doc. 124). Einstein
attempted to make his decisive push to establish a framework for mobilizing the
Jewish non-Zionists on behalf of the university project. He did so by sending a
circular letter on 9 May, inviting a number of prominent Jewish personalities to a
discussion on the establishment of the Hebrew University on 19 May at the Hotel
Commodore (see Doc. 131). The letter, sent to “about 50 non-Zionists,” expressed
the hope that the meeting would lead to the formation of a University Aid Commit-
tee and elect its principal
officers.[27]
Many prominent figures declined the invita-
tion, some of them declaring their opposition to the entire project. The hardest
rejection was presumably that of Paul M. Warburg (Doc. 133), who earlier had
acted as a conduit for the negotiations regarding Einstein’s lecture tour and who,
allegedly, had insisted on Einstein’s participation in the Zionist mission (see
Docs. 43 and
73).[28]
After having attended a reception at the residence of Harvard University’s pres-
ident on 18 May, Einstein participated in a dinner at the New Century Club in Bos-
ton, where $25,000 were raised for the Hebrew University
Library.[29]
Although
Einstein had been invited to lecture on international conciliation at the Harvard
Liberal Club, which had been established by Harvard alumni but was not affiliated
with the university, there is no indication that the lecture actually took place. Felix
Frankfurter, the prominent leader of the ZOA and professor of law at Harvard,
wrote Einstein a letter that was both angry and apologetic: he believed that Einstein
had been told that Frankfurter was to blame for the fact that Einstein had not been
invited to speak at Harvard (Doc. 134). By then, a controversy over a possible visit
by Einstein to Harvard had been brewing for six weeks, since Weizmann received