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The Slattery Report, officially titled The Problem of Alaskan Development, was produced by the United States Department of the Interior under President Franklin D. Roosevelt's secretary Harold L. Ickes in 1939–40. It was named after Undersecretary of the Interior Harry A. Slattery. The report, which dealt with Alaska Territory development through immigration, included a proposal to move European refugees, especially Jews from Nazi Germany and Austria, to four locations in Alaska, including Baranof Island and the Matanuska-Susitna Valley. Skagway, Petersburg and Seward were the only towns to endorse the proposal.
In his proposal, Ickes pointed out that 200 families from Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin had settled in Alaska's Matanuska-Susitna Valley. The plan was introduced as a bill by Senator William King (Utah) and Representative Franck R. Havenner (California), both Democrats. The Alaska proposal won the support of theologian Paul Tillich, the Federal Council of Churches, and the American Friends Service Committee.
Some non-Jewish Americans also moved against the proposal, relying on a backlash of antisemitism to suggest that the proposal would allow Jews to enter America as "Trojan horses" and carry Marxist ideology with them.
The plan was dealt a severe blow when President Franklin D. Roosevelt told Ickes that he insisted on limiting the number of refugees to 10,000 a year for five years, and with a further restriction that Jews not make up more than 10% of the refugees. Roosevelt never mentioned the Alaska proposal in public, and without his support the plan died.
See also
Categories: 1939 In Alaska, 1939 In International Relations, 1939 In The United States, 1939 Documents, International Response To The Holocaust, Jewish-american History, Jewish Emigration From Nazi Germany, Jews And Judaism In Alaska, Presidency Of Franklin D. Roosevelt, Jewish Settlement Schemes, Territory Of Alaska, Settlement Schemes In The United States
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