Einstein in defence of academic(s) freedom

1933, October 3, Address at the Royal Albert Hall

Listen to a fragment:

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• Date: October 3, 1933
• Location: Royal Albert Hall, London
• Organiser: The British Academic Assistance Council (BAAC)
• Audience: 9.000 tickets sold

Occasion (first racial laws proclaimed in Germany, 1933)

A fundraising event, organised by the ‘Refugee Assistance Fund’ comprising:
– The Academic Assistance Council (AAC, see below)
– The International Student Service
– The Society of Friends (Germany Committee) = the Quakers
– The Refugee Professionals Committee.
It’s also a general protest manifestation against Hitler and his politics (first racial laws, and persecution). Main focus is to support (jewish/academic) refugees from Nazi-Germany, i.e., helping them to leave the country and find a new job abroad. After Hitler’s rise to power in (his coup d’état inside a democracy) january 1933, Jewish academics were expelled from German universities.¹ Also in March, Einstein – who had already faced anti-Semitic attacks before – was preparing his return from America (visiting professor at California Institute for Technology in Pasadena) to Germany. He was until then employed in Berlin (Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Physics).

Einstein, on his way back to Germany in 1933, arrives in Antwerp

While Einstein and his wife (Elsa) were sailing the ocean (Red Star Line, Steam Ship (SS) Belgenland) they got informed that their summer house in Caputh (Germany, near Potsdam) was raided and that several colleagues were threatened. They arrived in Antwerp on 28 March 1933. Still on the boat (using stationery with logo of the Red Star Line, see below), Einstein wrote a letter to the Prussian Academy of Sciences to renounce his membership (he was the director), and another letter asking the German Embassy in Brussels how to renounce his German citizenship. By the way, in Belgium he was well received by his (academic) friends (in particular Prof. De Groodt from Ghent University). Also on stationery from the Red Star Line Elsa wrote to Alberts sister, Maja Einstein, an emotonal letter in which her fear and concerns are clearly expressed.

In april 1933 a boycott of Jewish products and shops was installed, and the situation in Germany rapidly deteriorated. ‘Aryan scientists’ (yes, they existed) proclaimed that the new theories in physics (relativity and quantum) were non-german, ‘entartete Wissenschaft’ (degenerate science’ , analogous to ‘entartete Kunst’) and that ‘the Jews’ were te blame for them. After his arrival in Antwerp, Einstein was a guest of the family De Groodt, and stayed in their ‘castle’ in Mortsel (Cantecroy). From april he stayed at the Belgian coast, in a villa in De Haan (Le Coq sur mer). In June he left Belgium for England. His speech in London (October the 3rd) was scheduled a week before he left for the USA, orienting himself (and his wife Elsa) towards a new future outside Germany: Princeton. In a way also a fare-well address.

Contents of Einstein’s speech in London

Einstein first thanked Britain for welcoming him (as a European, and a Jew), and then emphasized that the refugees were not just victims, but also valuable intellectual assets who could contribute to science and society in the free world. He warns for the political forces that threaten political, individual and intellectual freedom. Such freedom, he states, is conducive to the progress of knowledge (in all fields), which in its turn is the basis of improvements in private and societal well-being. In the second part he interprets the recent events as a ‘wake-up’ call for the civilised world, and expresses his hope that the free Nations will combine forces, because: “Today, the questions which concern us are : how can we save mankind and its spiritual acquisitions of which we are the heirs? How can one save Europe from a new disaster?”

Fragment from Einstein’s speech about the importance of freedom
(click here to read the full text – bold the lines in the videoclip)

I am glad that you have given me the opportunity of expressing to you here my deep sense of gratitude as a man, as a good European, and as a Jew. Through your well-organised work of relief you have done a great service not only to innocent scholars who have been persecuted, but also to humanity and science. You have shown that you and the British people have remained faithful to the traditions of tolerance and justice which for centuries you have upheld with pride. It is in times of economic distress such as we experience everywhere today, one sees very clearly the strength of the moral forces that live in a people. Let us hope that a historian delivering judgment in some future period when Europe is politically and economically united, will be able to say that in our days the liberty and honour of this Continent was saved by its Western nations, which stood fast in hard times against the temptations of hatred and oppression; and that Western Europe defended successfully the liberty of the individual, which has brought us the advance of knowledge and invention – liberty without which life to a self-respecting man is not worth living.
It cannot be my task to-day to act as judge of the conduct of a nation which for many years has considered me as her own ; perhaps it is an idle task to judge in times when action counts. To-day, the questions which concern us are : how can we save mankind and its spiritual acquisitions of which we are the heirs? How can one save Europe from a new disaster?
It cannot be doubted that the world crisis and the suffering and privations of the people resulting from the crisis are in some measure responsible for the dangerous upheavals of which we are the witness. In such periods discontent breeds hatred, and hatred leads to acts of violence and revolution, and often even to war. Thus distress and evil produce new distress and new evil. Again the leading statesmen are burdened with tremendous responsibilities just the same as twenty years ago. May they succeed through timely agreement to establish a condition of unity and clarity of international obligations in Europe so that for every State a war-like adventure must appear as utterly hopeless. But the work of statesmen can succeed only if they are backed ·by the serious and determined will of the people.
We are concerned not merely with the technical problem of securing and maintaining peace, but also with the important task of education and enlightenment. If we want to resist the powers which threaten to suppress intellectual and individual freedom we must keep clearly before us what is at stake, and what we owe to that freedom which our ancestors have won for us after hard struggles.
Without such freedom there would have been no Shakespeare, no Goethe, no Newton, no Faraday, no Pasteur and no Lister. There would be no comfortable houses for the mass of the people, no railway, no wireless, no protection against epidemics, no cheap books, no culture and no enjoyment of art for all. There would be no machines to relieve the people from the arduous labour needed for the production of the essential necessities of life. Most people would lead a dull life of slavery just as under the ancient despotisms of Asia. It is only men who are free, who create the inventions and intellectual works which to us moderns make life worth while.
[…]
Shall we worry over the fact that we are living in a time of danger and want ? I think not. Man like every other animal is by nature indolent. If nothing spurs him on, then he will hardly think, and will behave from habit like an automaton. I am no longer young and can, therefore, say, that as a child and as a young man I experienced that phase — when a young man thinks only about the trivialities of personal existence, and talks like his fellows and behaves like them. Only with difficulty can one see what is really behind such a conventional mask. For owing to habit and speech his real personality is, as it were, wrapped in cotton wool.
How different it is to-day ! In the lightning flashes of our tempestuous times one sees human beings and things in their nakedness. Every action and every human being reveal clearly their aims, powers and weaknesses, and also their passions. Routine becomes of no avail under the swift change of conditions; conventions fall away like dry husks.
Men in their distress begin to think about the failure of economic practice and about the necessity of political combinations which are supernational. Only through perils and upheavals can Nations be brought to further developments. May the  present  upheavals lead to a better world.
Above and beyond this valuation of our time we have this further duty, the care for what is eternal and highest amongst our possessions, that which gives to life its import and which we wish to hand on to our children purer and richer than we received it from our forebears. Towards these purposes you have affectionately contributed with your blessed services.

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• Einstein – letter to Mileva. 19 July 1933
• Einstein in defence of academic(s) freedom
• Einstein renounces his german citizenship
• Einstein resigns (Prussian academy of sciences)
• Elsa Einstein: Letter to Maja (Albert’s sister) 28 March 1933
• Science and Civilisation (Albert Einstein, 1933)

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The Academic Assistance Council (AAC)

The British Academic Assistance Council was founded early 1933 to help Jewish academics and scientists forced out of their positions in Germany. It was an initiative of William Beveridge (director of the London School of Economics), who was travelling Europe, when Hitler’s decrees to ‘purify’ the universities were issued. While in Vienna he personally saw the consequences (both threatening individual lives and science in general) and decided that ‘academics’ should act for their colleagues (and thus for science).

He convinced physicist and Nobel-prize winner, Ernest Rutherford, to become the first president. The organisation quickly gained track and was able to provide financial aid, job placements, and resettlement assistance for many jewish academics, and researchers from Germany. When the war was over it had helped over 1,500 Jewish scientists, mathematicians, and intellectuals to relocate and continue their work.

Notable Scientists Rescued by the BAAC

Physics & Mathematics

1. Max Born (1882–1970) – Quantum Mechanics Pioneer
   • Dismissed from Göttingen University in 1933.
   • Took refuge in Cambridge and later Edinburgh.
   • Won the Nobel Prize in Physics (1954) for quantum mechanics.
2. Hans Bethe (1906–2005) – Nuclear Physicist
   • Expelled from Germany in 1933, briefly worked in Britain.
   • Moved to the U.S. and helped develop nuclear weapons (Manhattan Project).
   • Won the Nobel Prize in Physics (1967) for explaining how stars produce energy.
3. Rudolf Peierls (1907–1995) – Key Figure in Britain’s Nuclear Program
   • BAAC helped him secure a post at Cambridge.
   • Later worked at Birmingham University, where he and Otto Frisch wrote the Frisch-Peierls memorandum, which laid out the first real plan for an atomic bomb.
4. Otto Frisch (1904–1979) – Nuclear Physicist & Atomic Bomb Pioneer
   • Expelled from Austria, aided by BAAC.
   • Worked with Peierls on Britain’s atomic bomb research.
   • Later joined the Manhattan Project.
5. Leo Szilard (1898–1964) – Physicist & Nuclear Weapons Pioneer
   • Fled Nazi Germany in 1933, found refuge in Britain before moving to the U.S.
   • Co-wrote the Einstein-Szilard letter, which led to the Manhattan Project.

Medicine & Biology

6. Ernst Chain (1906–1979) – Co-Discoverer of Penicillin
   • Fled Germany in 1933, BAAC helped him settle at Cambridge.
   • Later worked at Oxford, helping develop penicillin into a usable antibiotic.
   • Won the Nobel Prize in Medicine (1945).
7. Sir Ludwig Guttmann (1899–1980) – Founder of the Paralympics
   • A Jewish neurologist forced to flee Germany.
   • BAAC helped him secure a medical position in Britain.
   • Developed pioneering spinal injury treatments and founded the Paralympic Games.

Humanities & Social Sciences

8. Nikolaus Pevsner (1902–1983) – Architectural Historian
   • Expelled from Germany, BAAC helped him relocate to Britain.
   • Became a leading authority on British architecture, writing the famous “Buildings of England” series.
9. Walter Ledermann (1911–2009) – Mathematician
   • Fled Germany in 1933, supported by BAAC.
   • Became an important figure in algebra and probability theory.

1. On 23 March 1933 a “Reichsgesetz” was published, allowing the government to issue laws without consent of the German Parliament. This was followed two weeks later by the passage of the “Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service”. Members of certain groups of tenured civil servants were to be dismissed. At a stroke this meant that Jews, other non-Aryans, and political opponents could not serve as teachers, professors, judges, or other government positions. Shortly afterward, a similar law was passed concerning lawyers, doctors, tax consultants, musicians, and notaries. In a wave of “pre-emptive obedience”, many Jewish employees were also dismissed from their positions in private companies and the art business