The history of Brotherhood Week
The annual celebration started in the 1930s and was chaired by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt
For decades, Americans across the nation set aside seven days in February to commemorate what the National Conference of Christians and Jews — now the National Conference for Community and Justice (NCCJ) — called “Brotherhood Week.”
The goal of this nationwide program was to promote interfaith understanding, compassion and cooperation; to de-escalate racial tensions and promote tolerance; and to do so by creating opportunities for dialogue between various groups. Events and rallies were held, educational programs were offered and more, until what started as a single day turned into a decades-long observance that stretched into the early aughts.
The National Conference of Christians and Jews, an American social justice organization, was founded in 1927 with the hopes of addressing the various interfaith divisions throughout the nation. It was borne of the tensions that erupted during Alfred E. Smith's presidential campaign. Smith, being the first Catholic nominee to the presidency by one of the major parties, was battered by strong waves of anti-Catholic sentiment and propaganda, which led a group of "several distinguished Americans" to found the NCCJ. Among the list of founding members is Charles Evans Hughes, the 11th chief justice of the United States.
One of the NCCJ’s earlier campaign ideas was the sponsorship of "National Brotherhood Day," a day set aside in February that would be rooted in strengthening the brotherhood of America — one in which every person, no matter their faith or color, was considered family. "Brotherhood Day" became "Brotherhood Week" in 1934 and gained the attention of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, who offered his support and encouragement to the campaign. In 1936, he was named honorary chairman of the program.
By 1941, the NCCJ had established permanent local roundtables in more than 200 cities, where communities were encouraged to gather and hold interfaith dialogues. A Religious News Service reporter attended one of these roundtables in 1947, when more than 250 guests gathered at a Newark, New Jersey, police station to converse with NCCJ representatives. Hosted by the Newark Police and Fire Departments' Youth Movement, the meeting featured four speakers who stood at the front of the youth-filled room and answered questions. Behind their heads a banner was hung, an advertisement for "Brotherhood Week" that reads: "'I am SO an American!' YOU BET, Sonny. .. No Matter What Your Race or Religion!"
FDR regularly put out presidential-level announcements about the week-long commemoration, reminding Americans to mark their calendars and be sure to participate. His proclamation regarding the 1943 celebration reads: "We are fighting for the right of men to live together as members of one family rather than as masters and slaves. We are fighting that the spirit of brotherhood which we prize in this country may be practiced here and by free men everywhere. It is our promise to extend such brotherhood earth-wide, which gives hope to all the world. The war makes the appeal of Brotherhood Week stronger than ever." The program reached its height of popularity and participation during the 1940s, with the outbreak of the Second World War encouraging feelings of American nationalism and unity.
The following year’s “Brotherhood Week” programming included more than 50 radio spots, military and USO participation, and an "extensive educational program of nationwide scope in cooperation with the American Council on Education," the press release from the NCCJ states. The release, published on Feb. 18, was titled "National Conference of Christians and Jews Announces Measures Against Racial Bias" and offered an overview of the 1944 celebration, which would begin on Feb. 26. The educational program consisted of three major projects: a national conference on the subject of "Education and Religion in the American Democracy," the development and publication of a series of teacher handbooks, and a "comprehensive study of textbooks used by schools of the nation."
In 1947, former Secretary of War Robert P. Patterson was named chairman of the celebratory week, which was scheduled for Feb. 22-28 that year. The New York Times published a snapshot of Patterson discussing "Brotherhood Week" plans with the co-chairmen of the NCCJ, Thomas E. Braniff and Roger W. Straus. Upon accepting the post, Patterson offered this comment: "We will not reach [world peace] unless we have a strong, united nation here at home. And a strong united nation is an unattainable ideal unless we keep brotherhood as the guiding rule of our daily lives. Intolerance is bound to produce a divided people; a weak nation. You may be sure that we will never achieve lasting peace on these terms.”
"Brotherhood Week" was backed by presidents and public figures alike. Marian Anderson's likeness was attached to promotional posters for a series of 1951 TV spots about "Brotherhood in America" in which she and two others conversed on the topic "Women in Leadership." Anderson, a world renowned vocalist, was joined by M. Chase Smith, a U.S. senator, as well as Anna M. Rosenberg, the then-Assistant Secretary of Defense.
Singer and actor Frank Sinatra starred in a short film called "The House I Live In", which won a Golden Globe award in 1946. Sinatra, in between recording songs, steps outside for a smoke break when he witnesses a group of boys chasing after a single child. He interferes, steps between them, and asks them, "What's he got, smallpox or somethin'?" The boys reply, "We don't like his religion!" Sinatra continues to question them, in an attempt to get to the bottom of their discontent. He says to them, "Look, fellas. Religion makes no difference ... God created everybody ... Do you know what this wonderful country is made of? It's made up of a hundred different kinds of people, and a hundred different ways of talking, and a hundred different ways of going to church. But they're all American ways."
By 1955, the work of the NCCJ had grown tremendously since its organization 27 years before. In the dedication program booklet for their new headquarters in New York, the National Conference shared some statistics from 1954, when they arranged 75,000 programs for: 12,700 schools, 890 colleges, 8,500 churches and synagogues, 2,500 women's clubs, 1,650 service clubs, 1,500 youth groups and 525 national community organizations.
It was because of this growth — "the Conference's splendid record of achievement" — that they were able to construct a new office building, which would be dedicated in November 1955. Four years earlier, the Ford Motor Company Fund had donated $1 million to the NCCJ for the construction of its headquarters. The ceremony proceedings would take place over four days, beginning on Nov. 8 and concluding on Nov. 11. Dr. Ralph J. Bunche, the Assistant Secretary General of the United Nations, had been elected to serve as chairman of the dedicatory exercises, which President Dwight D. Eisenhower attended. Months later, the president was elected honorary chairman of the 1956 celebration of "Brotherhood Week."
Visitors to the Building for Brotherhood, once it was open to the public post-November, would come face-to-face with a large mural by New York artist Dean Fausett. Fausett was photographed as he put the finishing touches on his artwork for the 1955 press release from the Religious News Service regarding the new headquarters at 43 West 57th Street.
The page-length caption tells us that the mural depicts a crowd of figures that remain "intentionally anonymous," as "they stand for the many racial and ethnic groups which make up the family of man. Two of the figures are actual people — Albert Schweitzer and Albert Einstein. Fausett said it seemed 'perfectly proper' to him to paint actual portraits of 'the man of God' and 'the man of science' ... Reaching from the shadows are other figures, hands and faces sometimes indefinable, pleading for release form the persecution and enslavement which makes them un-free."
“Brotherhood Week” reached its peak season during the 1940s and 1950s, with the outbreak of the Second World War encouraging a burst of American nationalism and unity. When the war ended, the Cold War began, another opportunity for Americans to see themselves, as a whole, as a people of faith and fairness. Though the "Brotherhood Week" campaign lost its momentum in the era of the civil rights movement, the NCCJ kept moving forward. They continued to hold conferences; World Brotherhood continued to converse with presidents. In 1998, NCCJ underwent a name change — but not an acronym change — going from the National Conference of Christians and Jews to the National Conference for Community and Justice. Regional chapters of the NCCJ are scattered throughout the nation, and many are still active.
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