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Edward Moskal
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BACKGROUND

Moskal, a former insurance broker and alum of Chicago's St. John Cantius School, was born to a Polish immigrant couple who were proprietors in the restaurant and catering businesses.

After a three-year stint in the U.S. Army, Moskal joined the PNA in 1942, jump-starting a 60-plus-year career that would lead him to a private meeting with Pope John Paul II , several humanitarian-related trips to Poland, a misguided campaign that almost derailed Poland's ability to join NATO and an appointment by United States President Bill Clinton to accompany Vice President Al Gore at the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising anniversary ceremonies in Warsaw.


POLISH NATIONAL ALLIANCE BEFORE THE ERA OF EDWARD MOSKAL

A helicopter with president Ronald Reagan landed on the lawn behind the Polish National Alliance's (PNA) "White House" in Chicago. The distinguished guest was greeted with bread and salt by the president of PNA and Polish American Congress (PAC) Alojzy Mazewski. The president joined the huge Polish American (Polonia) crowd. Everyone got up and greeted the President with warm applause. Ronald Reagan responded to questions; initial distance and uneasiness turned into genuine familial warmth. The president of the United States was a guest of Polonia. American mass media could not avoid that event. President Mazewski was the first and the only American of Polish decent to have been nominated as a member of the US UN delegation.

Two years earlier Mazewski was elected as president of PAC. After becoming president he announced it is time to "raise the image of nine million Polish Americans". Following this promise he worked relentlessly to promote Polish Americans for federal and state posts (he also looked for elected candidates). Leonard Walentynowicz from Buffalo became assistant secretary of State, Mitchell Kafarski from Detroit was a member of the Commission to rebuild Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington,
general Edward Rowny became the chief negotiator of USA with USSR in strategic arms limitations talks, Mitchell Kobelinski from Chicago became the director of the Import-Export Bank, and later the head of Small Business Administration.

Polish American congressmen helped Mazewski achieve his goal. From mid-fifties on, Chicago metropolitan area was represented by four congressmen of Polish background (today there is only one). One of the federal buildings in Chicago was named after john C. Kluczynski.
Congressman Dan Rostankowski for many years was the most influential individual (after the speaker) in the House of Representatives. Edward Derwinski was a member of the Foreign Relations Committee and was highly respected in Republican circles, and his personal friendship with the Bush family, began when the later president was a congressman, gained him entry to the White House, Department of State and many federal offices. When after twenty-four years in Congress the democratic-controlled state legislature listed him in the same district with his Republican friend, he did not campaign and lost his seat. This loss turned to his benefit because he was appointed ambassador for special missions by president Reagan, and when Bush Sr. became president Derwinski gained a cabinet post as secretary of Veterans Affairs. Congressman Pucinski, after losing his campaign for the Senate, became a Chicago alderman and was very influential in the city administration. Congressman Clement Zablocki, a democrat from Milwaukee, headed the foreign relations committee in the House. Thaddeus Machrowicz, a Michigan congressman was also influential in the House before being appointed to the bench.

Cordial contacts and meetings with leaders of Jewish organizations led to a toning down of anti-Polish rhetoric, especially of Polish jokes. The list of achievements of president of PAC and PNA Mazewski could stretch for far longer.
He continued in the footsteps of his predecessor, the lawyer Kalol Rozmarek.
The PAC had input in shaping US policy with regard to Poland, and Mazewski himself was often present and welcomed in the White House.


MOSKAL ERA BEGINS

That is how it was. For ten years prior to Edward Moskal's death not a single senator has met with him. He was not welcome at the White House and the Department of State. For his official support of George Bush's candidacy he received an invitation to the inauguration, and Colonel Lenard from the Washington Bureau arranged good seats for him. This mere courtesy was trumpeted in Dziennik Zwiazkowy with the headline: "President of PNA and PAC Guest at White House at the inauguration of president George W. Bush." In the body of the text after years of neglect happy news, 'President E. Moskal will go to Washington next Friday January 19 for discussions with members of Congress and the administration in Washington."

In the end President Moskal did not attend the inauguration after he found out Colonel Lenard could not arrange for him any meetings, not only with the president but with not a single senator or member of the administration in transition.

Under Moskal's predecessor's the Polish American Congress had much greater political influence in Washington, than Polonia perhaps deserved, because it did not contribute money to politicians. Under Moskal it became irrelevant with no political clout.


MOSKAL IMPLEMENTS CHANGES


PAC was established in May 1944 after a large Congress of Polonia in which nearly 2,300 delegates participated representing various Polish and Polish-American organizations. The main goal of the PAC, whose first president was Karol Rozmarek elected by the Congress, was to help Poland in its struggle for independence by lobbying US government. PAC was the Polish lobby, a tradition continued by Mazewski.

The treasurer of Polish National Alliance from 1967 Edward Moskal always opposed Mazewski. The main reason for the disagreement was PAC. Moskal believed that PAC and PNA should go their separate ways because the "marriage" cost PNA too much. Another important gripe were the elaborate wining and dinning by treasurer Moskal of the last Polish communist counsel general in Chicago Czerwinski, who was rumored to have been a secret police {Link without Title} agent. That is why many members of the PAC were annoyed with Mazewski for saying that Moskal, elected by All-Polonia Congress as treasurer had a mandate to dine with whom he pleases.

After Mazewski's death, Moskal did not take the "divorce" with PAC but took over the function of the president of this political arm of Polonia. A small circle of PAC leaders now deceased-- Bonaweture Migala and Kazimierz Lukomski, did not think Moskal was a good candidate for a leader of Polonia because of what they felt was his lack of education, political acumen, and vulgar language, expressed openly towards women. The main reason, however, was his suspicious communist contacts with the Chicago consulate.


THE NATO CAMPAIGN


In 1989/1990 the main task was accomplished. Poland gained its independence. In the new situation, it was worth reconsidering whether the Polish American Congress had a reason to exist. If it had a right, then what should be its new aims. There was little discussion because a new large task emerged, NATO enlargement to include Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic. President George Bush Sr., the father of the current president, supported enlargement.
The democrat who followed, Bill Clinton, following his campaign slogan "It's the economy, Stupid!" did not focus on foreign policy during his first term, and not wishing to enrage Russia that opposed enlargement, was ambivalent about the cause. At the meeting with the representatives of ethnic groups Moskal strongly called on the US to support NATO enlargement. That same position was taken by the representatives of the Czechs and the Hungarians. The elections were close and the votes of these ethnic groups could decide if Clinton would be elected to a second term. This was a persuasive argument, and Clinton expressed his support for NATO enlargement, which in itself did not make NATO enlargement a reality. The act had to be ratified in the Senate with 2/3 of the vote (67).

But even before, in addition to Edward Moskal supporting NATO enlargement, there emerged another Edward Moskal who ideologically worried PAC activists. One of those concerned was Kazimierz Lukomski, vice president and head of the Commission for Polish Affairs, for years the "soul" of all major initiatives involving Poland. Moskal began to push Lukomski aside and undertake decisions without consulting the Commission for Polish Affairs, even neglecting to notify it of his decisions.

In a letter to Jan Krawiec dated May 28, 1991, Lukomski rationalizing his decision to resign as Vice president of PAC and the Commission for Polish Affairs wrote: "Moskal treats the PAC just as he does the Polish National Alliance as his private fiefdom. I refuse to accept that and at the same time I do not have any means of opposing his misdeeds. Apart from few very narrow instances; I am shoved aside here in Chicago. Moskal is able to pull to his side everyone, along with our independents, who no longer care that he supports diplomats of the communist regime like Czerwinski, or sings songs of praise to General Wojciech Jaruzelski."


MOSKAL RAISES EYEBROWS


Years passed. In the political circles the debate whether the Senate should support NATO enlargement was discussed. At the beginning of 1996 Moskal wrote a letter to then Polish president Aleksander Kwasniewski, Moskal advocated a hard line against Jews, criticizing Poland's alleged vassalage with regard to Jews, he supported his argument by reffering to the act of the Sejm house of the Polish parliament whose goal was to return Jewish property swiftly. Similar acts became law in Romania, Hungary, and Austria, and were considered by the Czech republic. In order to be clear about the underlying motives for his letter Moskal added that "the murder by Israel of innocent women and children (sic!) who were sheltered in UN camps in Lebanon."

Single-handedly Moskal transformed the PAC from the Polish lobby in Washington to an anti-Jewish lobby in Warsaw. The Jewish reaction could not have come as a surprise. The oldest and most influential organization, the AJC, dubbed Moskal an anti-Semite and severed its ties with PAC.

Edward Moskal probably did not expect the consequences of the AJC declaration. He discovered quickly as he became the persona non grata in official Washington and his ability to affect US policy with regard to Poland became zero. PAC under Moskal's predecessors accomplished far more than one could hope for, because of its moral stance: it fought for freedom of a captive nation under the jolk of the Kremlin. Without campaign coffers, PAC was able to gain sympathizers because its cause was just, and in the American grain.

The distinguished German philosopher Karl Jaspers said that "before the war, before the Holocaust, ant-Semitism was a false political doctrine, after the Holocaust, it became a crime." In America, to be seen as an anti-Semite is a kiss of death.

A real fear at the time was that the anti-Jewish declarations by president Moskal as well as the anti-Semitic campaign of the two out of three dailies that appeared in Chicago in Polish and in other publications, would anger Jews enough to block Poland's NATO membership.


NATO ENLARGEMENT ALMOST DERAILED


American politician's were surprised by the diametrically opposed views of Myra Lenard in Washington with those expressed in the pronouncements of president Moskal. Many claimed that NATO enlargement was a fait accompli thanks to the political scientists, whom Moskal dismissed as "egg heads", who persuaded the politicians that it was in the interest of the United States. An important role was played by Professor Zbigniew Brzezinski, who in his books and articles explained the benefits for America from NATO enlargement. With the help of Brzezinski former director of Polish Radio Free Europe Jan Nowak-Jezioranski, with his own political ties, made contacts in the academic community. Even if the Polish American Congress came out against NATO enlargement, the US Senate would have voted for it -claimed Congressman Derwinski at the meeting of Illinois PAC.

Thanks to Myra Lenard who with much enthusiasm tried to sway senators to vote for the enlargement of NATO, thanks to the thousands of letters and telegrams from Polish Americans, and thanks to the constructive Polish Embassy effort, the undecided votes were swayed and shaped American public opinion, affecting the House that decides on financial issues. Russians were well aware that enlargement is fait accompli. The only hope they had to block it was in changing the position of the Jewish groups that strongly supported NATO enlargement. Hence, it was not understood the anti-Semitic campaign by Moskal came out just before such an important vote in the Senate involved Poland. It appeared that his anti-Semitism blinded him and dulled his abilities to think rationally.

There were moments when Jewish leaders thought of withdrawing their support.
Common sense and American national interest won out in the end. The long-term policy won out, not some president of an organization, since such presidents come and go. Eighty votes supported NATO enlargement, far more than 2/3 needed.


THE LOWPOINT


The scholars of communism claim that at the root of this criminal doctrine is a lie. Orwell, perhaps was first, to draw attention to the fact that totalitarian systems (communism, nazism) cannot exist without newspeak which is characterized by vague generalities and linguistic imprecision. Recently deceased reverend Joseph Tischner added other features of newspeak: taunts, suspicions, accusations and prejudgments. All these elements of newspeak were evident in the pronouncements of Edward Moskal and in the anti-Semitic propaganda found in significant portion of the Polish language press in America.

It is easy for people in the president Moskal in-group, who have been steeped to think in totalitarian ways, to move from communism to nationalism. These are not identical as ideologies but very close: it is even easier for the believers in the cult of the unerring know-it-alls of the party secretary to join the cult of the first secretary of Polonia, especially advisors who kowtow to his views. President Moskal had a difficult time shaping a sentence in Polish. It is nothing shameful since he was brought up in America. However, for his years as President he signed off on various pronouncements. He seemed to be a renaissance man, very knowledgeable in history, however false, and literature; he even spiced up his pronouncements with tidbits from the French.

He got the most mileage out of his attacks on Jews. He became the authority on the Auschwitz death camp. With doors closed to him in Washington, he decided to rule Poland. In a letter to Prime Minister Buzek written in a low insulting tone, he permitted himself to criticize the nomination of Wladyslaw Bartoszewski as member of the Auschwitz committee (Bartoszewski was in Auschwitz). The letter ended on a religious note: "It brings me comfort to think that, with God's help, you shall be prime minister only until the spring."

President Moskal stooped even lower in his attack on professor Leon Kieres, who was nominated by the Sejm (parliament) as head of the Institute of National Remembrance. Under the headline: "Another Trojan horse of Jewish organizations", the president of PNA and PAC, reflects: "Who employs Kieres. Aren't these the lackeys who feeling strange guilt yield to Jewish demands.." In the same statement he advises Jews: "It would be better if they treated Palestinians properly without killing their children. Terrible is the image of a young Palestinian protected by his own father against Israeli gunfire, moments later dead from the bullets of these 'heroes.'"

He hit rock bottom of a swamp with his vicious assault on "the courier from Warsaw " Jan Nowak Jezioranski who served Poland from the very beginning of WWII. He served her well, contributing more than any one to the fall of communism and received the highest Polish honor: the Order of the White Eagle. He also contributed, without any comparison, immeasurably more than Moskal to the NATO enlargement effort.

Moskal claimed to battle antipolonism. Yet he never countered any false claim made by a Jewish journalist or historian with an argument grounded in factual evidence. He parroted anti-Semitic cliches about Jews, promoting hatred towards a people that had been victimized for millennia.


POLISH NATIONAL ALLIANCE

Moskal was named national treasurer in 1967. He left the position when he was elected PNA's president in 1988. He was re-elected in 2003. He was also elected as President of the Polish American Congress, an umbrella organization of 1,200 Polish-American fraternal, veteran and cultural groups, in 1988 and served in that office until his death.

His term as President was marked by a few innovations and advancements on the part of the PNA. Among other things, he instituted a complete computerization of the Home Office in Chicago , making it a state-of-the-art operation. It was also a period in which other smaller Polish American fraternal groups merged with the PNA, which had become the largest ethnic fraternal organization in the United States. He completed the initiation of broadcasting by radio station WPNA (1490 AM) in the Chicago area. Determined to secure the financial independence and growth of the PNA, he expanded the interests to the organization to include banking institutions under the name of Alliance FSB with branches in Niles and Chicago, Illinois. Constantly interested in keeping current with modern trends, he led the PNA into the new world of Internet communications with the creation of a website and widespread e-mail correspondence.

Under his nearly two-decade leadership, the 250,000-member PNA implemented its own banking institution, radio station and technology-friendly infrastructure that helped make it the largest ethnic fraternal organization in the United States.

Poland's President Lech Wałęsa awarded him the second highest civilian honor of the Republic of Poland, the Commander’s Cross With Star . He was also made an honorary citizen of the city of Kraków , Poland. The title of Honorary Doctor was bestowed upon him by the University Of Poznań Medical School in 1997 .


CONTROVERSY

He took former Illinois Governor Jim Edgar by surprise at a Kazimierz Pułaski event in 1996 by demanding the ouster of then state Education Superintendent Joseph A. Spagnolo for failing to order Illinois schools to teach about Pulaski, a Revolutionary War hero born in Poland.

When the late syndicated columnist Ann Landers used a racially derogatory term to describe Pope John Paul II in the '' New Yorker '', Moskal quipped, "She should have shut up after she made the nice remark about the pope."


Charges of anti-Semitism

At times, Moskal's impassioned declarations of ethnic pride were made at the expense of the Jewish community, drawing charges of anti-Semitism.

The American Jewish Committee severed its longtime ties with the PAC in 1996 after Moskal wrote a letter to Polish President Aleksander Kwaśniewski , criticizing him and other Polish leaders for being too conciliatory toward Jews.

He made headlines a few years later when he speculated that Polish war hero Jan Nowak-Jeziorański was a Nazi collaborator.

In 2002, Moskal again angered Jewish groups when he made inflammatory remarks against United States Representative Rahm Emanuel in an effort to bolster support for Nancy Kaszak , Emanuel's opponent in the 5th Congressional District .

Moskal erroneously said Emanuel, a former Clinton aide, was a citizen of Israel and served in the country's army.

"As many in our community perhaps don't know, he is a citizen of another country and served in their armed forces for two years," Moskal said in the speech. "It is a reasonable guess that he . . . didn't throw spitballs at the Palestinian s, but the country from which Poles came struggled for democracy was the country certain elements to which he gave his allegiance defiles the Polish homeland and continues to hurl insults at the Polish people. Sadly, there are those among us who will accept 30 pieces of silver to betray Polonia."

Moskal, who had several Jewish friends, never apologized for the statements and refused to be labeled as an anti-Semite.


DEATH

Edward Moskal died on March 22 , 2005 in Chicago after a long illness. He was survived by his wife Wanda, daughter Pamela (Dennis) Komorowski, granddaughters Joyce (Joseph) Selby, Mary (Dariusz) Wieczorkiewicz and Lisa, and four great-grandchildren, Joseph, Jason and Jamie Selby and Ryan Wieczorkiewicz.