Sample letter to Congress and media You are welcome to use the letter as a sample and copy/modify it for your use.

 January 2007 

To: Congressmen, members of the media: 

We, the sons, daughters and grandchildren of Holocaust Survivors and leaders of grass roots Survivor-family organizations in the United States, stand with the Survivors in their just demand for immediate access to the Bad Arolsen archives. With the Bad Arolsen archive of previously suppressed documentation from the Nazi period about to be made public, we ask you to halt the rush to judgment and “closure” and require a full and transparent accounting of what the survivors are morally and legally entitled to without impediments.

We have witnessed the failed enterprise known as “Holocaust asset restitution.” We have seen how it has proceeded during the years of litigation and negotiations over thefts and human exploitation by European manufacturers, banks, insurance companies, railroads and governments. We are appalled by the fact that as a result of unsettled claims, approximately one fourth of Holocaust Survivors in the United States are forced to live below the poverty level. This is egregious in that funds that should be going to ease their final days are going, instead, to a host of institutions.

Congress and the media have ignored the fact that most survivors have not been allowed access to the necessary information required to prove their claims. That information – which includes concentration camp registrations, transportation lists, death books and displaced persons files* – is expected to help Holocaust survivors verify restitution claims so that more compensation reaches needy survivors.  

Because this long-repressed information has not yet been released, it is important that survivors and their families can, through their chosen representatives, with the assistance of the courts if necessary, have the opportunity to get full, immediate, transparent, and unfettered access to the material stored in the Bad Arolsen archives before any compensation claim settlements are finalized for the victims of the Holocaust.

We call upon all institutions of good faith, in government and the media, to support our parents and grandparents, the Survivors of the Holocaust, in their final hour of need. We stand with them in their call for justice and immediate access to materials from Bad Arolsen.

Signed

View list of prospective recipients
To learn more about the archive at Bad Arolsen: www.cbsnews.com/sections/i_video/main500251.shtml?id=2274705n