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The Defense Against Antisemitism: Minor Victories, Major Defeats, 1890–1939

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The Defense Against Antisemitism: Minor Victories, Major Defeats, 1890–1939 RichardS.Levy The Defense against Antisemitism: Minor Victories, Major Defeats, 1890–1939 Since Iwrotethis paper in the summerof2018, Ihavefound myself wondering if its title constitutes ajust judgment on nearly130 years of struggle by Jews and non-Jews to eliminate organized antisemitism.Surely, if Ihad subtitled it “Major Victories,Minor Defeats,” we would have to ask ourselvesabout the pur- pose of this great conference. Antisemitism, ever-changing, ever-threatening,is still very much with us. What Iwas wondering about instead was whether we can speakofevenminor victories,and, more generally, whether the history of the fight against organized antisemitism during manydecades has anything use- ful to teach us today. Ibelievethat this history and both the victoriesand defeats are still instructive. First some clarifications, beginning with the coiningofthe term: Ihavenot been able to find the use of the word antisemitism before 1860,when it was em- ployed in aculturalrather than apolitical sense. By late 1879,the German jour- nalist and political activist Wilhelm Marr seized upon the word antisemite as a wayofdistinguishing his political agenda from traditionalChristian Judeopho- bia and from the commonplaceprejudices of his day, thus hoping to give his views the aura of ascientifically derived truth, the product of his personal expe- rience and historicalresearch. Importanttonote about the earlyhistory of antisemitism is how rapidlywhat was essentiallyaneologism achievedthe broadest currency. There must have ex- isted aperceivedneed for anew wordtodescribethe resurgenceofconflicts be- tween Jews and the peoples among whom they lived, fondly thought to be nearly overcome in this ageofprogress but which in fact werebecomingevermore openlyexpressed.The need for anew wordaffected not justself-identified an- tisemites but Jews, non-Jewishcritics, and neutral bystanders throughout Europe and wherever Europeans settled in the world. The wordappeared in titles of books and pamphlets and on the mastheadsofnewspapers in English, French, Italian, Hungarian, Dutch, and Russian—all by 1894 and in places wherenoor- ganized antisemitism existed, as well as whereitwas developing into full- fledgedpolitical movements. Even to outsiders, something new seemed to be ag- itating the vexedrelations between Jews and others.¹ Forthe earlyhistory of the term, see R. S. Levy, “Antisemitism, Etymology of,” in Antisemit- ism: AHistorical Encyclopedia of Prejudice and Persecution,ed. R. S. Levy (Santa Barbara: ABC- OpenAccess. ©2021Richard S. Levy,published by De Gruyter. This work is licensed under the CreativeCommons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110671995-012 234 RichardS.Levy Certainly, some periods in Jewish history were characterized by oppression and violence before the 1880s. What wasmarkedlydifferent about this new phe- nomenon, however,was the swift institutionalization of antisemitism in political parties, grassroots organizations, lobbying agencies, newspapers,learned jour- nals, and avariety of voluntary associations. In the past,persecution had been episodic; outbursts of terrible violence alternated with long periods of quiet relations between Jews and their neighbors. Now,since the emergence of organized antisemitism in the 1880s, the action programs aimed at Jews, but- tressed by modern massmediaand new technologies, werebeing playedout in the political life of nations; the announced intention of the movement was to continue the struggle for as long as it took to solve the “JewishQuestion.”² When it was no longer just amatter of ancient prejudice—what people said or thought about Jews—and had become aquestion of what they intended to do about them, an organized response among Jews and non-Jews took shape. It is not surprising that the first systematic, nationallyfocused, defense efforts emergedinGermany, wherethe organized antisemitic movementexperienced its first successes. The following essayconcentratesonthis specific history be- cause it was and remained the most important,setting precedents in the re- sponse to antisemitic assaults in many places.Itremains significant because anti-antisemitism’ssuccesses and failures in Germanywerereplicated elsewhere in subsequent years. It bears mentioning here that,while Idonot give great weighttoall-too- common Jew-hatredinmyunderstanding of antisemitism, the importance of cas- ual prejudiceamong large parts of the population cannot be discounted. Without this reservoir of animosityand suspicion,there would be no constituencyfor those who wanted to act against Jews. This essaydoes not address anti-Jewish feeling because no organized defenseagainst antisemitism has ever been able to conquer popularanti-Jewishsentiment, and, in fact,very few have even tried. Therefore, the focus here will be on the exploiters of popularJew-hatred and the effortstodisarm them. It took several years for Jews in Germanytoformulate aresponsetothe sus- tained threat against their rights and well-being.Anumber of historicallybased attitudes and experiences first had to be overcome. Forexample, the tortuous grantingand withdrawing of legal equalityfor German Jews duringthe first Clio Press, 2005), 1:24–25.OnMarr see M. Zimmermann, Wilhelm Marr:The Patriarch of Anti- Semitism (New York: OxfordUniversity Press,1986). See R. S. Levy, “Settingthe Pattern,” in TheDownfall of the Anti-Semitic Political Parties in Im- perial Germany (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1975). Expectationsofjust how long it would take to vanquish the Jews varied greatlyamongantisemiticactivists. The Defense against Antisemitism: Minor Victories, MajorDefeats, 1890 – 1939 235 half of the nineteenth centuryhelped keep them in perpetual insecurity.When Emancipation came in 1869, it was not because of apopularmandate or the re- sult of an imaginary Jewishpower but agift from the liberal-minded North German Reichstag.Liketheir antisemitic enemies, manyJews believed that Jew- ish emancipation was conditional, acontractual agreement.Civil equality, ac- cording to this view,was not essentiallyaninalienable right.Jewishemancipa- tion had come because manynon-Jews had finally recognizedtheir worthiness. Implicit in emancipation, to German Jews, was the faithful fulfillment of their side of the contract—continuingtobeexemplary citizens and demonstrating the ability to become good Germans. In their anxiety to show themselvesgood Germans, however,Jews hesitated to defend their own cause,concerned about appearingtonon-Jews as aspecial interest group thatneeded protecting.To make afuss would onlygivemoreammunition to the antisemites. To ask openly for special intervention by the state would be tantamount to asking for aprivi- leged status, akin to that enjoyed by “court Jews” of earlier centuries.Manywere reluctanteventoconcede that Jews werethe real targetofantisemitism, theoriz- ing that it was reallyamatter of displaced social protest,oranattack on liber- alism,oronmodernity in general.³ Manyofthe problems German Jews wrestled with before enteringanactive struggle against antisemitism werereplicatedin France, Austria, Britain, and America. The compellingreason for not launching afrontal attack on theirenemieswas ageneral lack of confidence in the sympa- thies of the mass of their fellow citizens. Thisremains an issue today, and it still influences Jewishself-defense efforts. During the 1880s, Jews in Germany made relatively slight responses to an- tisemiticattacks. Individuals,speaking for themselves, repeatedlycountered the more infamouspamphlets of the antisemites. Part of the problem of mount- ing a collective defense, however,was the fragmentation of the Jewish communi- ty.Onlyantisemites werecertain that Jews always and everywhereconstituted a monolith. In fact,there was no acknowledgedspokesperson, no agreement about what constituted Jewish identity,orhow to meet the antisemitic threat. This was not onlytrue of Germany. In defending themselves, Jews have nowhere in the modernworld ever spoken with one voice. Forthe most part,Jews werewilling to relyonthe good offices of “unim- peachably objective” Christian defenders. There wereanimpressively large num- ber of such individuals willing to speak out against the “deeplyshameful … ra- Forabrief but illuminatingdiscussion of the concept of antisemitism as “displaced social pro- test,” see S. Rohrbacher, “The ‘Hep-Hep’ Riots of 1819:Anti-Jewish Ideology,Agitation, and Vio- lence,” in ExclusionaryViolence: Antisemitic Riots in Modern German History,ed. C. Hoffmann et al. (Ann Arbor:University of Michigan Press, 2002), 24–27. 236 Richard S. Levy cial hatred and fanaticism of the Middle Ages.”⁴ But the help of liberal-minded Christians had its problems. Forjust one example, Theodor Mommsen, the great historian of Rome, had helped write the Declaration of Notables, quotedabove, and then worked to gather signatures for it.Hewas also instrumental in rallying liberal professors at the University of Berlin, isolating Heinrich vonTreitschke, after the latter’shostile “AWord about Our Jews,” in 1879.But for Mommsen, as for manynon-Jews who had supported Jewishequality, from Christian von Dohm onward, the ideal solution to the JewishQuestion was the disappearance of Judaism.⁵ Barbaric and shameful as it was for Mommsen and manyothers, an- tisemitism was most harmful in its retardation of completeJewishassimilation, that is, the abandonment of Jewishidentity.The alliance between German and Jewishliberals who carried on the fight against antisemitismwas
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