History of the Jews, Vol. 5 (of 6)

The northern Hanse Towns, where German guild-narrowness joined to ossified Lutheranism scarcely allowed the Jews to breathe, were compelled by order of the French garrison to grant them equality. Hamburg agreed to place all its inhabitants, including Jews, upon an equal level (1811), and also admitted them to seats in the civic council. The following testimony was afterwards adduced in their favor —

"With all the privileges of equality received, or guaranteed, their much-feared presumption did not obtrude itself, nor had any disadvantages accrued to the Christian citizens; on the contrary, the Jews displayed a quiet, modest, and friendly demeanor in spite of additional prerogatives, and showed eagerness to work for the public weal. Several gained distinction by their great benevolence and patriotism."

The small town of Lübeck showed more opposition to the settlement and emancipation of a few Jews under French protection. Hitherto only about ten families were tolerated in the town as "protection Jews," who were forbidden to engage in trade, join the guilds, or obtain possession of houses. These privileges were regarded as exclusively Christian; no Jews dared claim them. Only three Jews were allowed to come daily into Lübeck from the neighboring town of Moisling (under the dominion of Denmark or Holstein), and these were compelled to pay a sort of poll-tax at the gate. Any deputy of the merchants' guild could lay hands upon them, and take them before the police, if they sold goods, and everything found in the possession of such suspects was confiscated. With the advent of the French (1811–1814), about forty-two Jews from Moisling and fourteen foreigners with their families moved to Lübeck, thus bringing the number of families in Lübeck up to sixty-six. These sixty-six Jews aroused the fierce rage of the Lübeck patricians even more than Napoleon's sovereignty. The embargo laid by Napoleon upon the Continent to annoy England had attracted several Jewish families to North Germany, hitherto unfriendly to Jews.

In the Hanse Town of Bremen, which until then had known only traveling Jews, who paid toll on entering the town, Jews took up residence under French protection, not indeed in great numbers, but too many for the bigotry of the patricians. Here, too, they were allowed equal rights with other citizens. Even the Duke of Mecklenburg, Frederick Franz, granted the equalization of the Jews (February 22, 1812), and allowed marriages between Jews and Christians, a greater concession than those made by any other code. Prussia also could no longer resist the tide in favor of the Jews. In Prussia they had displayed much greater love for their native land, and brought more sacrifices during the times of trouble than many of the corrupt nobility, who had ingratiated themselves with their victorious enemies. But a long time elapsed before King Frederick William III could overcome his aristocratic and religious repugnance to them. He only abolished the insulting cognomen of "protection Jews," declaring them not only admissible to the citizenship of towns, but under compulsion to perform its duties. They were forced to take the oath as citizens of towns and to share in the burdens of the cities in which they lived. But they were not to be recognized as state citizens, their position being the reverse of that of the Jews in Baden. The prospect of equalization as state citizens was continually held out to them, but the promise remained unfulfilled for several years. When Hardenberg again assumed control of the disturbed affairs of the state, and insisted upon the repeal of decayed laws and the removal of rotten conditions, he favored the removal of the civil disabilities of the Jews, so that by their help new strength should be infused into the mutilated, bleeding, impoverished territory, – help which it could ill spare in its wretched state of deep depression. David Friedländer and his friends, Berlin capitalists, used their utmost efforts to bring about the state equalization so long promised. The king again and again delayed the ratification of the law submitted to him by the chancellor. At length – moved, it is said, by the interest taken by the Berlin Jews in commemorating the death of the much-suffering, lamented Queen Louise, – Frederick William gave his assent (March 11, 1812) to the equalization of all Jews at that time settled in Prussia. They were to be admitted to posts in schools and colleges; but the king withheld the privilege of admission to state offices. With the privileges, they were to assume the duties, especially as soldiers. Their religious affairs were to be regulated afterwards: "When the plan for their religious organization is drawn up, such Jews as enjoy public confidence both on account of their knowledge and probity will be consulted."

Three German princes alone withstood the spirit of the age: those of Bavaria, Austria, and Saxony. The first, Maximilian Joseph, appointed king of Bavaria by Napoleon, promulgated an edict (June 10, 1813), which appeared to concede equality to Jews, at least to those who possessed the right of settlement. But it was equality with many limitations. In cities to which no Jew had hitherto been admitted, their settlement was to depend upon the royal pleasure, and even in those places where they had dwelt for a long time their numbers were not to be increased, but rather diminished. In Austria, Leopold II and Francis I, the successors of Emperor Joseph, who had somewhat loosened the chains of the Jews, left the favorable intentions of their predecessor unexecuted, and imposed new humiliations. In addition to the unendurable burden of taxes in Bohemia, Moravia, Silesia, and Galicia, – taxes upon candles, upon wine, and meat – a collection-tax was imposed in Vienna, which was a toll upon every Jew who entered the capital. Spies closely watched the Jew who stayed in Vienna for a short time unprovided with a passport, and treated him like a criminal. Marriages among Jews were still restricted, and could be contracted only by the eldest son of the family, or by one able to pay heavy bribes. Although Austria was so often overrun by the soldiers of liberty, yet, impenetrable as the wall of China, it resisted every innovation. In the newly-created kingdom of Saxony all the restrictions imposed in the time of the Electoral princes and the Lutheran Church were maintained in their fullest rigor. Saxony was rightly called the Protestant Spain of the Jews. Indeed they were not suffered to dwell in the country at all; only a few privileged Jews were admitted to the two towns of Dresden and Leipsic, but under the express condition that they could be expelled at any time. They were not allowed to have a synagogue, but only to meet for prayer in small rooms, on condition that they made no noise. In Leipsic and Dresden every privileged Jew was compelled to pay annually seventy thalers for himself, besides other sums for his wife, children, and servants. The Jews were rigidly constrained in their choice of trades and occupations, and were placed under strict supervision while traveling. When all other German districts had abolished the poll-tax, Saxony still retained it. The example of the two neighboring countries – Westphalia and Prussia – had no influence upon this district, which at that time was rendered doubly selfish by trade jealousy and religious prejudice. The reactionary movement found plenty of fuel in Germany.

CHAPTER XIII.

THE REACTION AND TEUTOMANIA

The Jews in the Wars for Freedom – The Congress of Vienna – Hardenberg and Metternich – Rühs' Christian Germanism – Jew-hatred in Germany and Rome – German Act of Federation – Ewald's Defense of Judaism – Jew-hatred in Prussia – Lewis Way – Congress at Aix – Hep, hep Persecution – Hartwig Hundt – Julius von Voss – Jewish Avengers.

1813–1818 C. E

Like the Persian monarch Xerxes, Napoleon, hitherto invincible, and grown haughty and brutal through his successes, summoned the nations and princes to a universal war, and they followed him as submissively as slaves follow their master. Proudly he led forth Europe, subdued by him, against Asiatic Russia. Within the memory of man such an immense expedition had not been known. But, if ever, the words of the text were fulfilled in this gigantic contest: "An horse is a vain thing for safety, neither shall he deliver any by his great strength"; if ever, Divine justice manifested itself in him who had trampled upon right and liberty. Napoleon was defeated, not by the power of his enemy, but by a Higher Hand which struck him with blindness – a blindness which permitted the glow of the flames at Moscow and the ice of a Russian winter to work his ruin. When God and fortune had forsaken him, the princes who had promised him service and allegiance fell away from him, and turned the points of their swords against him, and the people, which, relying upon his own warlike talents, he had so greatly despised, rose up against him. But the nations likewise were stricken with blindness; whilst breaking asunder one sort of bonds, they forged new ones for themselves. The two years (May, 1812-April, 1814) form an instructive chapter in history, from the moment when Napoleon led an army of more than half a million men against Russia, until the day when, abandoned by all, he was compelled to flee, in order to escape the threats and insults of the embittered French people. It was a sanguinary, horrifying drama.

No one could have suspected that the greater would drag down the less in its ruin, that by the downfall of Napoleon, the Jews whom he had liberated, though reluctantly, would be hurled into their former slavery. Jewish youths belonging to wealthy families had emulated their Christian friends in courage, and rushed to battle to help in slaying the giant. Large numbers of Jews, especially in Prussia, animated by burning love of country, had joined the volunteers, had rejoiced to be accepted in the ranks, and wipe away with their blood on the battlefield the stain of cowardice, so often imputed to them by the opponents to their emancipation. Jewish young men paid for the freedom accorded them on paper with their lives. Jewish physicians and surgeons sacrificed themselves in the camps and hospitals in their devoted attendance on the wounded and the plague-stricken. Jewish women and girls spared no efforts to bring help and comfort to the wounded. Again, as in the days of national independence, sons of the same race and religion were opposed to each other – German Jews engaged in deadly combat with French, Italian, and Dutch Jews, and recognized each other only in the last hour, in time to embrace as brothers. Those unfit to bear arms had shown their attachment to Germany and their worthiness of emancipation by sacrifices in other ways. Nevertheless, the seemingly forgotten Jew-hatred was rekindled in the hearts of the Germans, extended ever further, and robbed the Jews of the reward which the hard-won victories had promised to bring even to them.

With the fall of the hero began the rule of petty, intriguing, reckless speculators, who bartered both men and lands. They misled the princes who earnestly desired to restore long banished freedom, and ensnared them with lying artifices. In France these intriguers, the Talleyrands, reinstated the throne of the Bourbons. In Germany Metternich and Gentz turned the struggles for freedom into mockery. Only the more far-sighted knew that Europe, owing to the closer connection between the rulers, would be reduced to a more degrading state of slavery, because sloth and pettiness were the order of the day.

The Jews felt the first effects of the reaction now commencing in Germany. It arose in Frankfort, the seat of unmitigated, mediæval anti-Semitism. As soon as the artillery of the retreating enemy had ceased within the precincts of this city, loud voices were heard encouraging each other to demand that boundaries be set at once to the unheard-of presumption of the Jews. In Lübeck and Bremen, the citizens did not content themselves with depriving the Jews of their recently-acquired rights, but energetically strove to banish them altogether. The proposal was seriously made to drive all adherents of the Mosaic religion from the town. In Hanover, Hildesheim, Brunswick, and Hesse, they were at one blow divested of their rights of equality. These events naturally gave great anxiety to the Jews throughout Germany. If the privileges granted them by law, as in Frankfort, could be abolished, what security had they for the continuance of their equality? What a contrast this reaction presented to that in France! Here, although the nobility, who hated freedom and were thirsting for revenge, and the Catholic clergy were in power at the court of Louis XVIII, and looked upon the terrible events since 1789 as if they had not happened, yet the rights of the Jews were not abridged.

The Jews, concerned about their freedom, honor, nay, their very existence, especially in the so-called free towns, looked hopefully forward to the Congress of Vienna, which was to readjust dismembered Europe. The monarchical and diplomatic members of the Congress, however, did not hasten to act the part of Providence assigned to them. They opened the meetings in November instead of in August, and from the bosom of this Congress, intended to establish eternal peace, a desolating war arose. The community of Frankfort had sent two deputies to Vienna, one of them Jacob Baruch, the father of Börne, chosen because he had patrons at the Viennese court. Baruch fulfilled his task in a disinterested manner worthy of his great son. Together with his less known colleague, he presented a memorial (October, 1814) to the Congress, wherein the arguments in favor of the claim of the Frankfort Jews were clearly set forth. They made the formal claim, that their equalization had been duly purchased for a large sum, and the patriotic claim, that they had taken part in the liberation of Germany. Their chief aim was to remove the suzerainty of the Senate over them.

The Jews of the three Hanse Towns sent a Christian lawyer as deputy, to guard their interests in Vienna, who of his own accord had drawn up an appeal for the equalization of the Jews. In combination with the deputies, certain influential personages worked quietly and unobtrusively. The banking-house of Rothschild by its circumspection and fortunate enterprises had made itself a power in the money world; and not even prying suspicion could find a trace of dishonesty in the accumulation of its riches, which might be used as a pretext by anti-Jewish opponents. The founder of the house, Mayer Amschel Rothschild, was held in the highest esteem in Frankfort, and in consequence of the equalization had a seat in the Electoral College. Happily he died before the beginning of the reaction (September, 1812), but his five sons increased the wealth left by their father. Although they appear to have adhered to the principle, not to throw the power of their riches into the scale on behalf of their co-religionists and their faith, yet they could not be indifferent to the attempt made in Frankfort, their home, to reduce the Jews again to a state of serfdom. One of the brothers probably addressed words of remonstrance to the most influential German members of the Congress against diminishing the rights of his co-religionists.

The statesmen who controlled German affairs in the Congress showed themselves favorable to the Jews. Hardenberg and Metternich in a letter on the subject expressed their disapproval of the oppressions to which the Jews in the Hanse Towns were subjected (January, 1815), and advised the Senate – advice which amounted to a command – to treat them in a humane, just spirit. Hardenberg pointed out to the Hanse Towns the example of Prussia and the edict of March 11, 1812, and remarked, with some sarcasm, that they would succeed in depriving the Jewish houses of the prosperity to which they had attained, and that constant oppression would compel them to withdraw their capital. In the sketch of the constitution for Germany drawn up by the Prussian plenipotentiary, William von Humboldt, which was submitted to Metternich, and accepted as a basis for discussion, the Jews were promised equality, even though they were mentioned separately. "The three Christian religious sects enjoy equal rights in all German states, and the adherents of the Jewish faith, so long as they undertake all the duties of citizenship, are to enjoy corresponding rights." But the goodwill of the two chancellors, even though their sentiments had been shared by the monarchs whom they represented, did not suffice at that time. A new enemy rose up against the Jews, tougher and more dangerous than envy and bourgeois pride. This terrible enemy who now turned his arms against the Jews was the German visionary. The yoke so long imposed on the Germans by the French, the compulsion under which they had been to obliterate their most characteristic peculiarities, had rendered hateful to them, not alone everything French, but all that was foreign, that did not bear the stamp of pure German origin. Allowances should certainly be made for a nation which, arriving at a consciousness of its strength and solidarity, breaks its fetters, if it conceives an exaggerated notion of its importance. But it was unpardonable and childish that grown men should dream in broad daylight, representing their dreams as truth and trying to foist them upon others. Extravagant Teutomania was a dream of this kind, and resulted in the ruin of the Germans. For the first time the German nation had acted as a unit; hitherto it had been the tool of princes in Italian expeditions, Turkish wars, or civil strife. The Germans sought analogous cases in their own history by which to regulate their conduct, and found them only in the Middle Ages, in the time of the Empire and the omnipotence of the papacy, or in early Teutonic times when uncouth barbarism and childish simplicity prevailed. The romantic school, the Schlegels, Arnims, and Brentanos, had shown them this grewsome specter of the Middle Ages in so wonderful a light, that the Germans in their delusion considered it an ideal, the realization of which was a holy task. To the Middle Ages belonged Christianity, credulity, unthinking clericalism, which became the dearest possessions of the Germans, because they were diametrically opposed to the unbelief of the French and the revolutionary epoch. From that time the hollow phrase, Christian-German (or Teutsch), arose, and speedily became a catchword.

But only the devoted followers of Catholicism, with the papacy as supreme authority, could be pious in the sense of the Middle Ages. Honest romanticists, such as Görres, Frederick Schlegel, Adam Müller, etc., logically went over to the Roman Church, and helped to re-establish the empire of the Jesuits and the Inquisition. As for the German Protestants, "God had poured out upon them the spirit of confusion and they tottered like drunken men." Instead of directing their attention to Vienna, where the Congress, amidst dancing and revelry, was running its quarry, the German people, to earth, the romanticists built castles in the air, and at once announced that certain people would be denied admission.

Christian Teutomania was the armed specter which for many decades robbed the German Jews of rest, honor, and joy in life. Because this race, strongly marked by descent and tradition, was distinguished from the Germans by external marks, by features, carriage, and vivacity, although akin in language, feeling, and temperament, they were repelled as foreigners, as a force breeding disturbance and discomfort, and had the spirit of the times permitted they would have been expelled from German territory. But to find a reason for this blind hate, the enemies of the Jews had recourse to old contemptible publications, and extracted rubbish from sources where others had found the rich intellectual treasures of the Jews, and drew such a portrait of them as to arouse terror both in themselves and others.

The first to clothe vague prejudice in words and heap abuse upon the Jews was not a knavish writer, but an academical professor named Friedrich Rühs, whom the newly-founded Berlin University had appointed to the chair of history. He wished to investigate the decline of Germany, and hit upon the Jews, as though they had been the authors of Germany's disgrace during its occupation by foreign powers. Rühs discussed the "Claims of the Jews to German Citizenship," developed the unwholesome theory of a Christian state, and thence derived his justification, if not actually to expel the Jews from Germany, yet to humble them and thwart their growth. He drew up a complete programme for their treatment, which was afterwards conscientiously carried out.

Above all things he wanted the Jews to live merely on sufferance, and on no account to claim equal rights of citizenship. They were once more to pay protection-money, a Jew-tax, and limits were to be set to their increase. The cities which had hitherto not tolerated them were to be supported in this course, and naturally Jews were not to be admitted to any office, nor even permitted to defend their country. Rühs, moreover, insisted that the Jews should again wear a badge, not a repulsive yellow patch, but a "national cockade"; at any rate some mark of distinction, "that the German who could not recognize his Hebrew enemy by face, gait, or speech, might do so by the doubtful badge of honor." Above all things, Rühs exhorted the German states and the German people to promote the conversion of the Jews to Christianity; that was most important. It was generally asserted, even in Christian quarters, that only bad and abandoned men exchanged Judaism for Christianity; but that was prejudice.

Rühs' pamphlet excited great interest. Worthy and learned men declared their agreement with him. The learned German world at the time of Lessing, Abt, Kant, and Herder, the apostolic messenger of universal humanity, now talked the language of the Church Fathers, and stirred up hate and persecution. Schleiermacher and Fichte brought the representatives of German intellect so low that they actually competed with the ultra-Catholics in hatred of the Jews. Pius VII, who in consequence of the Restoration once more reigned in the Papal States, and reintroduced the Inquisition, in order to drive out godlessness by means of the auto-da-fé, ordained that the Jews should forfeit the freedom enjoyed under French rule. The Jews of Rome had to forsake their beautiful houses in all parts of the city and return to the dirty, unhealthy Ghetto; the Middle Ages had returned to the Papal States. The Jews, as in the seventeenth century, had to attend sermons for their own conversion on pain of punishment. Meantime history had enacted one of those surprising interludes, which was to prove the instability of the reactionary Restoration. Napoleon had contrived to land on French ground despite English sea-guardianship. The props of the Bourbon throne – the nobility, the clergy, and intriguers, who had ostentatiously displayed their power, – collapsed before a single shot had been fired, and Napoleon entered Paris in triumph. The empire of the hundred days was established. The whole of Europe armed itself against one man, and the fortune of war decided in favor of the allies on the Dutch battlefields at Waterloo. In the Prussian army, which next to the English had been most instrumental in turning the tide of victory, there were many Jewish soldiers, among them several militia officers.

What reward did the German Jews receive for their sincere devotion to their country? When the Congress, alarmed by Napoleon's sudden reappearance, ceased to dally and began to hold regular sittings, the Act of Federation for the German states, which despite their union were to be autonomous, was brought up for consideration, and a paragraph in it devoted to the Jews. Citizenship was to be assured them, and in countries where obstacles to this reform existed, they were to be removed as far as possible. But this paragraph was accepted only by Prussia and Austria; all the other members of the league, especially those from the free towns, voted against it. To arrive at an agreement, a colorless compromise was proposed: "The Congress of the allies will consider how the civil improvement of those professing the Jewish faith in Germany is to be effected in the most harmonious manner, and how in particular the enjoyment of civil rights and participation in civil duties may be secured to them. The rights already conceded them in the several federated states will be continued."

The first portion was harmless, and could be accepted by all, since it remained open to every state to prevent its favorable interpretation. The latter portion, however, was apt to put the Free Towns into a delicate position. There the Jews through French influence were actually in possession of civil equality. Accordingly, the deputy for Frankfort (the syndic Danz) emphatically protested, and was supported by the Saxon deputies. To shame German narrow-mindedness, the Danish government, as if it had anticipated that the hatred of Jews in Germany would spread, ordered Bernstorff, its representative for Holstein, to declare that the adherents of the Jewish faith, if they fulfilled the duties of citizenship, might there expect a constitutional provision ensuring them against persecution, oppression, arbitrariness or uncertainty of legislation in respect of the rights conceded to them. The deputy for Bremen, Senator Schmidt, was cleverer; he did not protest, but defeated the suspicious resolution by a master-stroke. Remarking that the privileges of the Jews conferred by the French in North Germany (the 32d military division) could not be binding on the Germans, he stated that they need only change the word in into by, and everything would be right. Nobody at first took notice of this apparently insignificant change. Metternich and Hardenberg, who hitherto either from inclination or in pursuance of promises had appeared to favor the Jews, passed over this point in an incomprehensible manner. Thus the paragraph referring to the Jewish question in its final form read: "The rights already conceded the professors of the Jewish faith by the several federated states will be continued." Of the federated states, however, only Prussia and Mecklenburg, and perhaps also Baden, had conceded citizenship to the Jews. The enactment of the French authorities was thus made null and void, and Germany was saved. What did it matter to the delighted nation that this verbal change would cost so many tears?