In the week following Kristallnacht , in November 1938 , the British government offered to give the major part of its quota of 65,000 British citizens eligible for emigration to the United States to Jews fleeing Hitler . Under-Secretary Welles opposed this idea , as he later recounted : I reminded the Ambassador that the President stated there was no intention on the part of his government to increase the quota for German nationals . I added that it was my strong impression that the responsible leaders among American Jews would be the first to urge that no change in the present quota for German Jews be made ... The influential Sam Rosenman , one of the " responsible " Jewish leaders sent Roosevelt a memorandum telling him that an " increase of quotas is wholly inadvisable . It will merely produce a ' Jewish problem ' in the countries increasing the quota . " Welles headed the American delegation to the 21-nation Pan American conference that met in Panama in September 1939 . He said the conference had been planned in earlier hemispheric meetings in Buenos Aires and Lima and he emphasized the need for consultation on economic issues to " cushion the shock of the dislocation of inter-American commerce arising from the war " in Europe
Kristallnacht
Kristallnacht
Sumner Welles