In 1940, Arthur Sulzberger received his first warning that Europe's Jews faced horrors far worse than anything yet imagined. A young rabbi who had arrived from Berlin just 3 days earlier came to Sulzberger's office in August bearing alarming news. Germany planned to send more than 4 million European Jews to the island of Madagascar, Max Nussbaum told the publisher. After meeting with Nussbaum a second time on September 11, Sulzberger called Henry Morgenthau. He urged Morgenthau to meet with the rabbi as soon as possible. “He's a most attractive looking fellow and taught himself English which he speaks remarkably well,” Sulzberger said in a telephone conversation that Morgenthau recorded, “and I thought his story was sufficiently dramatic and some of the things that he had to say of what the Gestapo had told him as to the ultimate plans for the Jews there, if you were to hear it and if you're as much impressed, to pass him on to higher ups.” Sulzberger even told Morgenthau that he would pay for Nussbaum and his wife, Ruth, to travel to Washington, DC. Morgenthau agreed to see him at 9 the next morning.

The Nussbaums met with Morgenthau, who promised to relate what he heard to members of the Cabinet and the president. The treasury secretary discouraged the Nussbaums from publicizing the Madagascar news. Morgenthau said such news would “upset [American Jews] profoundly, at a time when one ought to strengthen their position and their morale.”