THE JEWS: FR. COUGHLIN DEFENDS HIMSELF

From Our Own Correspondent
NEW YORK.
Shortly after the Rev. Charles E. Coughlin, Detroit's famous radio priest, had defended himself against charges of anti-Semitism on radio station WHIP, Dr. John A. Lapp, well-known Catholic economist, sharply criticised Fr. Coughlin from the same radio station.
Devoting the whole first half of his hour-long radio address to a discussion of charges levelled at him by the American Jewish Council, Fr. Coughlin strongly denied that he was anti-Semitic, and disclaimed any animus toward the Jews as a group.
What he was attacking, Fr. Coughlin explained; was the atheism and lack of scruples of certain Jews, and Gentiles as well, who were identified with international Communism and inter.national finance.
Counter-Charge Fr. Coughlin made the counter.. charge that the American Jewish Council had launched against him
a campaign of slander and defamation, the most energetic onslaught ever launched against any individual.
Dr. Lapp, speaking from the studio which had just broadcast Er. Coughla's weekly address, declared that " Father Coughlin is not entitled to speak as a priest representing the Catholic Church., either directly or by implication, or to receive any immunities as a clergyman. It is well that this is so," Dr. Lapp went on," for a Christian Church which would be responsible for the recent speeches of Fr. Coughlin would be unworthy of its Founder."
Dr. Lapp is a former member of the National Bituminous Coal Labour Board, an arbitrator in labour disputes, and a member of the faculty of Marquette University, a Catholic institution in Milwaukee.
" Shameless Distortion "
" Fr. Coughlin has been on the air for eight or nine years," Dr. Lapp continued. " His stock in trade has been from the beginning the stimulation of fears and prejudices. One must suspect the source of anything he quotes. He has been found guilty of shameless distortion of material.
" Fr. Coughlin is a hero in Nazi Germany, just as he was a hero to the German-American Bund members when they cheered his name wildly in Madison Square Garden. Hitler has doubtless heard of his valiant defender, the Detroit priest.
" A man who uses in America as his own an anti-Semitic speech of Herr Goebbele deserves the loss of the moral respect of all right-minded citizens." '