[Congressional Record Volume 154, Number 93 (Friday, June 6, 2008)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5372-S5373]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                         SUBMITTED RESOLUTIONS

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   SENATE RESOLUTION 588--HONORING DR. FENG SHAN HO, A MAN OF GREAT 
COURAGE AND HUMANITY, WHO SAVED THE LIVES OF THOUSANDS OF AUSTRIAN JEWS 
                         BETWEEN 1938 AND 1940

  Mr. HATCH (for himself, Mrs. Feinstein, Mr. Barrasso, Mrs. Boxer, Mr. 
Bennett, Mr. Levin, Mr. Coleman, Mr. Lieberman, Mr. Kyl, Ms. Collins, 
Mr. Isakson, Mr. Specter, and Mr. Voinovich) submitted the following 
resolution; which was considered and agreed to:

                              S. Res. 588

       Whereas, at great personal risk and sacrifice, Dr. Feng 
     Shan Ho authorized the issuance of Chinese visas to Jewish 
     persons so they could emigrate from Austria and escape the 
     horrors of the Holocaust;
       Whereas it is necessary to honor Dr. Ho posthumously 
     because, in the ultimate demonstration of selfless 
     humanitarianism, Dr. Ho never sought recognition for his 
     courageous actions;
       Whereas 70 years ago, Adolf Hitler's troops crossed into 
     Austria and announced the Anschluss (the annexation of 
     Austria to Germany), thereby applying all anti-Semitic 
     decrees to Austrian Jews;
       Whereas the Nazis brutally persecuted more than 200,000 
     Austrian Jews, by forcibly

[[Page S5373]]

     segregating them, depriving them of their citizenship and 
     livelihoods, and interning them in concentration camps;
       Whereas the fierceness of the persecution in Austria became 
     the model for the future persecution of Jews in other Nazi-
     conquered territories;
       Whereas the Nazis initially assumed a policy of coerced 
     expulsion, with the goal of eventually removing all Jewish 
     persons from Europe;
       Whereas most other foreign consulates, although besieged by 
     desperate Jews, offered no help;
       Whereas a young Chinese diplomat in Vienna, Dr. Feng Shan 
     Ho, refused to stand by and witness the destruction of 
     innocent human beings, and authorized the issuance of visas 
     for all Jews who asked;
       Whereas word spread quickly and Jewish persons formed long 
     lines in front of the Chinese Consulate to obtain the 
     lifesaving visas;
       Whereas the Chinese ambassador in Berlin ordered Dr. Ho to 
     stop authorizing visas for Jews, but Dr. Ho nevertheless 
     continued, at risk to his career, to prepare the visas;
       Whereas in 1939, the Nazis confiscated the Chinese 
     Consulate building, on the grounds that it was a Jewish-owned 
     building;
       Whereas, when the Chinese government refused funds to 
     relocate the Consulate, Dr. Ho reopened the Consulate in 
     another building and personally paid all the expenses;
       Whereas in May 1940, Dr. Ho left Vienna, having authorized 
     visas for thousands of Austrian Jews;
       Whereas after 4 decades in diplomatic service to China, in 
     1973, Dr. Ho moved to the United States to join his children;
       Whereas Dr. Ho became a United States citizen and lived in 
     San Francisco until September 28, 1997, when he passed away 
     at the age of 96;
       Whereas the world only knows of Dr. Ho's courageous actions 
     because of a chance discovery among his diplomatic papers 
     after his death, and the full extent of Dr. Ho's heroism is 
     still being uncovered; and
       Whereas in 2000, the State of Israel posthumously made Dr. 
     Ho an honorary citizen of Israel and granted him one of 
     Israel's highest honors, the title of Righteous Among the 
     Nations, ``for his humanitarian courage in issuing Chinese 
     visas to Jews in Vienna in spite of orders from his superior 
     to the contrary'': Now, therefore, be it
       Resolved, That the Senate--
       (1) honors and salutes the great courage and humanity of 
     Dr. Feng Shan Ho for acting at great personal risk to issue 
     Chinese visas to Jews in Vienna between 1938 and 1940; and
       (2) recognizes his heroic deeds in saving the lives of 
     thousands of Jewish persons by allowing them to escape the 
     Holocaust.

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