BECOMING PUBLIC: JEWS IN BADEN AND HANNOVER AND THEIR ROLE IN THE GERMAN PRESS, 1815-1848 by DAVID ANDREW MEOLA B.Sc., University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 2000 M.A., University of British Columbia, 2007 A THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY in THE FACULTY OF GRADUATE STUDIES (History) THE UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA (Vancouver) October 2012 © David Andrew Meola, 2012 Abstract This dissertation proposes the necessity of using local German newspapers as a valuable source for evaluating German Jewish publicness during the Restoration (1815-30) and Vormärz (1830- 48) eras. It focuses on both the quotidian and extraordinary uses of the local press to achieve Jewish objectives. The dissertation proposes a re-evaluation of Jürgen Habermas’ Öffentlichkeitstheorie (publicness theory) by seeking to further spatialize the public sphere through the lens of local newspapers in the German states during the Restoration and Vormärz . Integrating spatial theory with theoretical perspectives about the public sphere, this project argues that newspapers became both places and spaces of German Jewish publicness. They were places that became familiar through extensive use, and spaces that became locations of freedom for German Jews and thus helped to destabilize the status quo—including prior definitions of Jewishness and Judaism. These local and public places and spaces became as important for the process of Jewish emancipation as the internal German Jewish press. By concentrating their efforts on the local level, Jews in Baden and Hannover, when allowed to participate in local newspapers, played an important part in creating the narrative about their own lives, helped facilitate their own emancipation, and showed they were actually equal to other Germans despite their political inequality. This project also identifies numerous reasons for German Jewish uses of local newspapers, including personal, religious, economic, state-political, and national-political. Within these contributions by German Jews to the press in Baden and Hannover, a fair amount of conflict among German Jews was also observed. These conflicts can be divided into three distinct types: secular conflict, inter-confessional conflict (the public fight over emancipation), and inner-Jewish conflict (religious reform). Yet, it was through this conflict that German Jews were able to make claims not only to play a role in the local public spheres, but also to be included in society as citizens and as “Germans.” ii Table of Contents Abstract ........................................................................................................................... ii Table of Contents ..........................................................................................................................iii List of Figures ........................................................................................................................... v List of Abbreviations .................................................................................................................... vii Acknowledgements......................................................................................................................viii Dedication .......................................................................................................................... ix CHAPTER 1 Introduction....................................................................................................... 1 1.1 Jewish Participation in Local Debates about Jewish Lives ................................................ 1 1.2 Transitioning to the Modern Era in the German States ...................................................... 9 1.3 Badenese-Jewish Lives during the Restoration and Vormärz .......................................... 19 1.4 Hannoverian-Jewish Lives during the Restoration and Vormärz..................................... 21 1.5 Writing about German Jewish lives and Jewish Reforms ................................................ 25 CHAPTER 2 Thinking Spatially about the Public Sphere.................................................... 36 2.1 German Jews and the Habermasian Public Sphere in the Early Nineteenth Century....... 36 2.2 Spatializing the Public Sphere .......................................................................................... 47 2.3 Newspapers as Places and Spaces of Publicness .............................................................. 56 CHAPTER 3 Local Newspapers, German Jews, and the Places and Spaces of Publicness. 75 3.1 The Evolution of the Newspaper into the Modern Era..................................................... 77 3.2 The Early Nineteenth-century German Newspaper in Hannover and Baden................... 87 3.3 The Places and Spaces of German Jewish Publicness before the Nineteenth Century .. 110 3.4 The Evolution of the German Jewish Press as a Place and Space of Publicness............ 118 3.5 Conclusion ............................................................................................................... 128 CHAPTER 4 German Jewish Participation in the Public Sphere....................................... 131 4.1 German Jewish Publicness during the Early Nineteenth Century .................................. 132 4.2 A Quantitative Analysis of Jewish Appearances in Local Newspapers ......................... 149 4.3 Qualitative Meanings of Jewish Public Expression in Local Newspapers..................... 157 4.3.a Donations in Local Newspapers and their Multiple Meanings............................... 160 4.3.b The Multifaceted Nature of Personal Appearances in the Local Press................... 168 4.4 State-Political and Religious Appearances in the Press: An Introduction...................... 178 4.5 Conclusion ............................................................................................................... 183 iii CHAPTER 5 Inter-confessional Conflict in Local Newspapers in Baden and Hannover – The Emancipation Debates ..................................................................................................... 187 5.1 Hannoverian Jewish Publicness and Emancipation (1824-1837)................................... 192 5.2 The 1845 Petition for Jewish Emancipation and the Northern Badenese Press ............. 211 5.3 Conclusion ............................................................................................................... 226 CHAPTER 6 “The Most Intense Conflict Changes Natures” Inner-Jewish Conflict and Religious Reform in Hannover and Baden ............................................................................. 230 6.1 Religious Reform and Publicness in the German States................................................. 232 6.2 Hannoverian Jewish Publicness and Jewish Educational Reform (1824-1837)............. 238 6.3 Jewish Religious Reform and the Rabbinical Conferences of the 1840s ....................... 248 6.4 The Local Debate about Jewish Reform in Northern Baden .......................................... 257 6.5 Conclusion ............................................................................................................... 272 CHAPTER 7 Public Antagonism in Constance and the Confluence of Societal Conflicts 277 7.1 Jewish Participation in the Constance Press in the early 1840s...................................... 279 7.2 Non-Traditional Jewish Writings in the Constance Press............................................... 283 7.3 Inner-Jewish Discussions in the Constance Press........................................................... 288 7.4 Jewish Intercessions in the Debate about Jewish Inclusion............................................ 297 7.5 Conclusion ............................................................................................................... 304 CHAPTER 8 Conclusion: Spatial Appreciation of German Jewish Appearances in the Local Newspaper ....................................................................................................................... 310 8.1 Conclusions ............................................................................................................... 310 8.2 Moving Forward ............................................................................................................. 322 BIBLIOGRAPHY ....................................................................................................................... 326 APPENDIX A Jewish Population of the Grand Duchy of Baden in 1825............................ 349 APPENDIX B Jewish and General Population of the Kingdom of Hannover during the 1840s (sorted by largest population of Jews) .................................................................................... 356 APPENDIX C Tauschwitz’s Divisions of Newspapers in Baden during the 1848-49 Revolutions ....................................................................................................................... 366 APPENDIX D Badenese and Hannoverian Rabbinical Ordinances ..................................... 367 iv List of Figures Chapter 1: Figure 1.1 – Map of the German States……………………………………………………. 14 Figure 1.2 – Jewish Communities in the Kingdom of Hannover………………………...... 15 Figure 1.3 – Jewish Communities in the Grand Duchy of Baden…………………………. 16 Figure 1.4 – Jewish Population in the German States……………………………………... 17 Figure 1.5 – Ten Largest Jewish Communities in Baden in 1825………………………….. 18 Chapter 2: Figure 2.1 – Hannoversche