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No. 42. | Vienna, 17 October 1902 — 16 Tishri 5663. | 6th Year

American Conditions.

By J. de Haas.

American life bears a peculiar stamp. Regarded on its moral and political side, it offers us a spectacle such as England may perhaps have presented at the close of the eighteenth century, in the time of Walpole and Pitt. But whereas in England at that time the power of the nobility, of the feudal aristocracy, held sway, in America to-day the aristocracy of the Stock Exchange, the trust kings, and so forth, rule without restraint. The principle of life is money, and the most popular political doctrine is: with money one can procure anything, even votes. Everywhere, from the lowest rungs of the official hierarchy to the very summit, one hears of venality and money-swindling. Such are the conditions that meet the unhappy Jewish emigrants who come from their petty backwaters in Russia or Galicia to the vast metropolis of New York. They become utterly bewildered, and cannot find their way in the tangle of ideas and views of life that here collide and interlock. The leaders of the Jewish community, who would fain appear to the outside world as princes of the Exile and representatives of Judaism, concern themselves as good as not at all with the inner circumstances of these poor Jews astray in the great city. The attitude of the American population towards the Jews is just as antisemitic and hostile as in most European states, but it is so steeped in politics, surrounded with such a flood of phrases and such a din, that one can truly make nothing of it.

The readers of "Die Welt" will doubtless be aware that a riot recently took place in New York. Rabbi Jakob Josephs, rabbi of several synagogue congregations, died. Only the West Side knew of his existence; the East Side had long since forgotten to support him; but when he died, the Orthodox assembled in a countless multitude, numbering tens of thousands, to accompany him on his last journey. The street rabble, however, also followed the coffin, and those who are accustomed daily to pluck the beards of the old Jews in their traditional garb now threw stones at the coffin; the police beat the Jews — and the riot broke out! And yet there is no antisemitism in America. The people who threw stones at the dead man's coffin were no more antisemitically minded than those hotel-keepers who will not admit Jews to their hotels. This one hears everywhere, and in the newspapers of that time one found a veritable outburst of sympathy for the Jews. With time the sympathy grew as well. At first it was said that a poor rabbi, Jakob Josephs, had died; then he became a Hebrew Demosthenes; later still it was said that the great rabbi had distributed his whole fortune among the needy and had suffered want of his own free will; and finally, after a fortnight, I was myself convinced that one of the greatest of Jews had passed away and that Israel was orphaned. What is the meaning of this? 99% of all this noise is tricks of political agitation. Politics required that a Jewish lawyer should call a protest meeting and represent the modest rabbi as an embodiment of the divine. The facts — that is, the death of the rabbi, the street riot, and the appointment of the Government commission — have been drawn into the labyrinth of politics, and everything aims at winning the Jewish vote, which, held compactly together, may be decisive. How, then, is a Jew wholly ignorant of political affairs to find his way in this confusion, especially when he learns that the district politician wishes to maintain his position only because it "pays," and that there is money enough for every parasite who cares to cling to the district "Boss"*)?

I am told that New York is now a paradise compared with what it was two years ago, the Reform administration having cleared away many pernicious elements. I cannot imagine what New York was like two years ago. Under such circumstances it is truly no easy matter for Zionism to maintain itself. For since an office is at the same time a power, everyone strives after it, and one who is invested with an office is in turn always suspected. The Jew, that is to say, assimilates, consciously or unconsciously. Since New York, as a political centre, as the capital of the State, will not suffer anything to be imposed upon it by other cities, New York must also "rear up" in Zionist affairs. Since there is no organic centre, there strikes

*) "boss" in English properly means a fat man; figuratively, a man of money.