“There is a definite limitation imposed” (Robin Ross to Claude Bissell, December 4, 1959). The Jewish Quota in the Faculty of Medicine, University of Toronto: Generational Memory Sustained by Documentation

Abstract

The paper considers a letter written by Robin Ross to Claude Bissell on December 4, 1959, in which Ross objects to discrimination against Jews in the admission process to the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Toronto from 1957 to 1959. The Ross letter is explored in the context of the ongoing debate about the possible existence of a quota system at the faculty; the issue of discrimination on the university campus in the 1950s; and the structure of Canadian Jewish scholarship since the Second World War. It bolsters the anecdotal opinion of previous scholars but still leaves several critical questions unanswered about the institution and administration of any quota system.