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

The humiliation of the Jews soon showed itself in practical life. Lübeck, protected by the unfair interpretation of a paragraph, ordered more than forty Jewish families to leave the town (September, 1815). Bremen did the same with its Jews. Frankfort could not eject its Jewish inhabitants, but their lives were embittered; they were shut out from civil assemblies, Jewish functionaries were deposed, they were excluded from many trades and industries, marriage permits asked by Jewish couples were refused with the heartlessness of the Middle Ages, they were forbidden to live in certain parts of the town, and were treated as though they were still servi cameræ. But as the Senate knew that Prussia and Austria regarded it as a point of honor to preserve intact the civil rights of the Jews of Frankfort, and that the Federal Diet, at the instance of both great powers, might easily determine the controversy in favor of the Jews, it applied to three German juridical faculties, those of Berlin, Marburg, and Giessen, to have the question decided as one of law.

This struggle between the Frankfort Senate and the Jews, protracted during nine years (1815–24), and occasioning many vexations, will ever remain a stain on the time, a monument of German narrow-mindedness. The Jews, relying on the assurance of the two German powers, believed that their civil rights were guarded as by a triple wall.

But just this manifest truth, the Teutomaniacs and sophists, suddenly developed into bigots, sought to obscure and cry down. From all parts of Germany there resounded simultaneously outcries against the Jews, urging the nation, or the German federation, to enslave the Jews or destroy them. Journals and pamphlets raged against them, as if Germany or Christendom could be saved only by the destruction of the Jews.

The most violent attack was that of a physician and professor of natural science at Heidelberg, J. F. Fries, "Danger to the Welfare and Character of the Germans through the Jews" (summer, 1816), in which he asserted that the Jews ought to be expelled the country, that the tribe must be exterminated root and branch, as among all secret and political societies they were most dangerous to the state. "Ask man after man, and see, whether every peasant and every burgher do not hate and curse the Jews as national pests and bread robbers." The Jews, he said, had contrived to get more than half the entire capital of Frankfort into their hands. "Let them go on for forty years, and the sons of the first Christian houses will seek service among the Jews in the meanest capacities." It is remarkable that in the face of such passionate incitement, wild outbreaks against the Jews did not occur at that time, especially as Fries' pamphlet was read in all taverns and public-houses.

Was no Christian voice raised against this injustice? For the honor of the Germans it must be mentioned that some men had the courage to contend against crass prejudice and blind hatred. A highly respected and learned councilor in Ratisbon, August Krämer, wrote a defense, "The Jews and their Just Claims on the Christian States; a Contribution to the Mitigation of the Cruel Prejudices against the Jewish Nation." Councilor Schmidt, in Hildburghausen, on the one hand, pictured the abominable scenes which Christian fanaticism had in the past enacted against Jews, and, on the other hand, showed the superiority of culture possessed by the latter over the Christians in Spain. But their most thorough-going advocate was Johann Ludwig Ewald, a reformed clergyman of Carlsruhe, of high position, and seventy years old. Rühs' and Fries' malignant statements about the Jews incensed him so deeply, that he denied himself a season's recreation in Baden, and employed the time in giving the lie to their impudent assertions in a pamphlet (1816). Ewald vindicated the downtrodden sons of Israel in the name of Christianity, whose representative he was. Every groundless complaint against them he dissolved into nothing. From England and France, too, admonitions reached the Germans not to expose their own pettiness by their insane hatred of the Jews. An English paper thought that the town of Lübeck, as well as all the free towns, ought to be deprived of their independence (of which they had made so infamous a use) by the German federation, on account of the ignorant intolerance displayed against the Jews. A French writer, M. Bail, vindicated the unhappy people in glowing language, and covered their German enemies with shame.

"The Jewish nation to a higher degree than any other possesses the ancient, sanctified character which excites astonishment. I never meet a rabbi adorned with a white beard without thinking of the venerable patriarchs. Nothing is more elevating about the Israelites than their solemn life, which makes them the most devoted and honorable people on earth. In their midst is to be found the illustration of all domestic virtues, of loving care for the needy, and profound reverence for parents. Happy, a thousand times happy, are the nations among whom the basis of morality has been preserved."

But if truth and justice had spoken with angels' tongues, the Germans of those days would have remained deaf to their voices. They were so deeply imbued with hatred of the Jews that they were irrational.

An organ of the Austrian government directed a sort of threat against the encroachments of the people of Lübeck upon the rights of the Jews.

"How can the future Federal Diet discuss the improvement of the condition of the Jews, if individual states anticipate it by the most cruel and arbitrary resolutions? This conduct exhibits want of respect as much towards the ensuing Federal Diet as towards the foremost courts of Germany, whose principles in regard to this matter have been often and loudly enough expressed."

What was done by Austria itself, which displayed such righteous indignation against Lübeck on behalf of the Jews? Francis I and his ruler Metternich completely forgot the benevolent intentions of Joseph II, and kept in mind only the hateful laws of Maria Theresa against the Jews. They did not indeed expel the Jews, as in Lübeck and Bremen, but they were relegated to Ghettos within Austria, beyond which they were not allowed to pass. Tyrol, the secluded mountain province, was closed to them as to Protestants. In Bohemia the mountain cities and villages were forbidden them, and in Moravia, in the great cities of Brünn and Olmütz, they were allowed to stay only over-night or for a short time. Everywhere there were Jew-streets; the restrictions imposed on the Jews of Austria had become proverbial, whilst in Galicia they met with greater oppression than in the Middle Ages. Even the benevolent regulations of Joseph II, in regard to compulsory school attendance and practical religious instruction, were carried out not so much to spread culture among the Jews as to torment and injure them. Emperor Francis ennobled a few Jews, but the others were humiliated; they were obliged to render military service, but the bravest were rarely admitted even to the lowest rungs of the military ladder.

Austria, to be sure, had made the Jews no promises, and had awakened no hope of freedom. But Prussia, where they had already enjoyed full citizenship, conjured up a hobgoblin worthy of the Middle Ages, and wounded their honor the more deeply. Frederick William III, who had confirmed the equality of the Prussian Jews by law, annulled it, or rather left it unexecuted, a dead letter. Unconsciously he succumbed to the theory of the Christian state set up by the Teutomaniacs and sophists, who insisted that no place of honor be conceded the Jews. The promised equalization of the Jews in the newly-acquired or reconquered provinces was continually delayed. In the latter they remained subject to the restrictions of a former time, and Prussia's legislation regarding the Jews was a curious petrifaction. There were twenty-one fundamental laws for their treatment, and they were divided into French, old Prussian, Saxon, and Polish Jews, naturally to their disadvantage.

The specific aim of Prussia was to make Jews despicable in society. Whereas formerly the government had been at pains to avoid in official correspondence the words Jew, Jewish, as having an offensive connotation, they were now insisted upon.

The Judæophobist spirit in Prussia showed itself in a case which challenges comparison with France. The unjust Napoleonic law which had suspended the equality of the Jews of the German departments for ten years in respect of free migration and commerce was to fall into abeyance after the end of the respite (March 17, 1818), unless it was prolonged. The government of Louis XVIII, although besieged by clerical and political reactionaries, did not for a moment make an attempt to preserve the limitation. In the Chamber, which occupied itself with this point (February and March, 1818), only one hostile voice (Lathier) was raised against the Jews in Alsace. This opponent of the Jews alleged that the whole country would soon be in the hands of the Jews, if a check was not put to their greed. Not even the Right, which was clerically disposed, uttered a word against the Jews in general and for the restriction of their liberties. The phantom of a Christian state was quite unknown to the French. The Chamber rejected Lathier's proposal, and thus the Jews of Alsace were restored to their former equality. A similar law had been passed against the Jews of the district on the left bank of the Rhine, which was added to Prussia, or the Rhine province and Westphalia. The Prussian government, on taking this former French territory, had permitted the continuance of restrictive legislation, and a cabinet order of March 3d, 1818, renewed it for an indefinite period.

About this time a distinguished Englishman, with the Old and New Testaments in his hand, advocated the equality and freedom of the Jews throughout Europe with extraordinary zeal. Lewis Way, a disciple of the Fifth Monarchy enthusiasts of the English War of Independence, accepted the prophecies of the Old Testament and the Apocalypse, and was convinced that the Jewish nation would be resurrected, and be restored in glory to the land of their fathers. Only when they had recovered their independence would they be converted to the doctrines of Jesus. It was therefore a matter of conscience with him to promote the welfare of the Jews. He made a journey to Poland to ascertain the number and condition of the Jews in that country. Way now elaborated a remarkable memorial in which he dwelt on the high significance of the Jews in the past, and also in the future. With this memorial he betook himself to Aix, where the king of Prussia and the emperors of Russia and Austria with their ministers and diplomatists were met in Congress (end of September, 1818). He sought to make a favorable impression on Emperor Alexander, whose mystical temperament was known to him. As soon as the Czar showed himself in favor of the equalization of the Jews, it could not be doubted that Frederick William III and Emperor Francis would also be well disposed towards it.

Way started with the supposition that the Jews were a royal nation, and had not ceased to be so even in exile, in the misfortunes of their tragical career. This people possessed the key to the history of the whole globe. The same divine grace which had guided them in former times rested on them in banishment and exile. The promises which the prophets had foretold for the Israelite race would not fail to be accomplished; they would once more be gathered together in the land of their fathers. All the nations of the earth which have received salvation through them, were bound by gratitude to show the Jews the greatest honors and boundless beneficence, so as to wipe out the guilt incurred against this divinely-gifted race by the cruel persecutions inflicted on them. The present moment was highly favorable to their complete liberation. In some countries fanatical, narrow-minded clamorers had raised their voices against the emancipation of the Jews, but they no more represented public opinion than the furious outcries of a few American planters against the suppression of slavery. If Way was an enthusiast, when he tried to prove the necessity of emancipation in a mystical manner from prophetic and apocalyptic verses, he was still true enough to the practical instincts of the English race to be able to prove to their majesties what profit the emancipated Jews would bring the state. He conceded that much about the Jews must be altered, but their national peculiarity was holy property, which must not be touched. It was the invisible tie which bound the past of the Jews with their future, the past of mankind with its future; the fulfillment of prophecy depended on Israel.

This mystical, yet sensible memorial was handed by Way to the Emperor of Russia, on whom it must have made an impression, for he delivered it to his plenipotentiaries, Nesselrode and Capo D'Istrias, charging them to bring it and the emancipation of the Jews under the notice of the Congress. Out of respect for Alexander, who at that time pulled the strings of European politics, the plenipotentiaries were obliged to give attention to the matter, if only in appearance. The protocol said (November 21, 1818) that, though they could not in every respect accept the point of view of the writer of the memorial, they must render justice to the tendency and laudable aim of his conclusions. The plenipotentiaries of Austria and Prussia (Metternich, Hardenberg, and Bernstorff) declared themselves ready to give any information with regard to the question in both monarchies, which might aid in solving a problem important to the statesman and the philanthropist; but this was no more than a courtly phrase. Another voice addressed enthusiastic words in favor of the German and Polish Jews to the Congress at Aix-la-Chapelle. Michael Berr, like his father, untiringly active in the elevation of his co-religionists, poured forth the stream of his oratory in their cause.

"In Charlemagne's favorite city the monarchs will finally decide concerning the political existence of my co-religionists in Germany. The honor of Germany, the honor of the age and that of monarchs, loudly demand the reinstatement of the Jews in their civil and political rights. With justice are they exercised about laws, which still exist here and there to the disadvantage of the Jews."

The Italian Jews also combined to send a petition to the Congress of Aix-la-Chapelle concerning the abolition of their grievances and the cessation of persecution. They lost nothing by failure to carry out their design. The time had passed when princes and statesmen, sages and citizens, interested themselves in "the improvement of the condition of the Israelites," as the phrase ran.

The ill-feeling against the Jews in Germany continued to grow without ground or provocation. Jewish preachers celebrated the battle of Leipsic (October 18, 1818) in the synagogue with great enthusiasm, but to the Teutomaniacs this was no proof of their patriotic love. The hatred against Jews assumed so violent a character that a writer, one not badly disposed, saw reason to foretell the outbreak of popular attacks on life and property.

Germany was at that time intensely excited by the murder of Kotzebue, in Mannheim, by a half-mad Christian student, Karl Sand (March, 1819), and by the harsh regulations of the government against demagogic and Germanizing movements, which it had formerly fostered. The Germanizers panted for a sacrifice, and, as they could not attack the statesmen, such as the Metternichs, Gentzes, and Kamptzes, the helpless Jews were marked as victims. A series of brutal outbreaks occurred during several months. With the cry of "Hep, hep!" against the Jews, the Middle Ages revived again like a jeering ghost, and persecution was galvanized into life by the student and commercial classes.

The city of Würzburg commenced the attack. A new professor was inducted into office (August 2) amidst the rejoicings of the students, who were joined by a large number of people. Suddenly an old professor, Brendel, was noticed, who had shortly before written in favor of the Jews, for which it was alleged that he had received a box of ducats. On seeing him, there resounded from the mouths of the students the insane cry, "Hep, hep!" together with the outcry "Jude, verreck," i. e., "Jew, die like a beast." The former expression, then used for the first time, meant in student's slang, "Jerusalem is destroyed" (Hierosolyma est perdita). Brendel was pursued, and had to flee for safety. Perfect fury took possession of the people of Würzburg, who broke into the shops of the Jews, throwing the goods into the streets, and when they defended themselves with stones, the bitterness increased to frenzy. A regular battle ensued, many wounds were received, and several persons killed. About forty citizens took part in the affray. The military had to be called out, or the Jews would have been massacred. The next day the burghers appealed to the civic authorities to order the dismissal of the Jews from Würzburg, and to this they had to submit. Overcome with grief, about four hundred Jews of all ages left the town, and encamped for several days in the villages or under tents, looking forward to a terrible future. The persecution of the Jews in Würzburg was repeated in Bamberg, and in almost every town of Franconia. Wherever a Jew showed himself, he was assailed with the insulting cry of "Hep, hep!" and ill-treated.

This persecution of the Jews in Franconia was a hint to the Frankforters how to humble their hated fellow-citizens, who had dared bring an action against the Senate, and were protected by the Federal Diet. Thus a riot was re-enacted here (9th and 10th August), which began with the cry, "Hep, hep!" and with the breaking of windows in Jewish houses; then the mob advanced to brutality, and drove away all Jews from the promenades with insults and outrage. Artisans, workmen, shop assistants, secretly encouraged by their employers, as in the time of Vincent Fettmilch, two centuries before, made violent attacks on Jewish houses. The house of the Rothschilds in particular was selected for attack, their wealth and political importance being a thorn in the side of Christian patricians. In Paris at this time, all the ambassadors and diplomatic representatives appeared at a ball given by James Rothschild, and in Germany the Rothschilds were still treated as peddlers. Several wealthy Jews left Frankfort after this outrage. The storm, which became frenzy in Frankfort, the seat of the Diet, was not an indifferent matter to the ambassadors. The moneys of the Diet were placed in Rothschild's coffers for security. The president, Count von Buol Schauenstein, summoned a conference of members, and it was resolved to call out the federal troops, as the city militia could not be trusted. The persecution of the Jews in Frankfort aroused great attention throughout Europe, but the excitement against them continued, in spite of the arrival of the troops. Several Jews consequently sold their houses, and even the Rothschilds put no trust in the lull, and had serious thoughts of leaving Frankfort; they would have had to emigrate to France or England, as they were not safe anywhere in Germany.

This massacre of the Jews spread like wildfire in Germany, as if the people had everywhere waited for a sign to break out. In Darmstadt and Bayreuth the riots were repeated (August 12). The few Jews in Meiningen were expelled. In Carlsruhe, one morning, a placard was found posted on the synagogue and the houses of prominent Jews – "Death and destruction to the Jews!"

In Düsseldorf black marks and threatening placards were found on the doors of several Jewish houses. In the territory of Baden, where Sand had sealed the Teutomaniac folly with a murder, and the excitement still lasted, the bitterness against the Jews was so great that not one could appear in the streets without being maltreated. In Heidelberg a tumult arose (beginning of September) in consequence of a vulgar scene, which curiously illustrates German chivalry. A citizen had outraged a Jewish maiden, and had been arrested by the police. Nearly the whole populace immediately rushed to rescue the hero and destroy the Jewish houses. Cries of "Hep, hep!" resounded in the streets; axes, crowbars, tools of all sorts were collected as if to carry a place by storm. The city guard, which ought to have dispersed the assaulting party, refused their services. The city governor, Pfizer, instead of standing by the persecuted, assisted their assailants. Blood would have been spilled, had not the Heidelberg students, humanized, perhaps, by contact with France, defended the unprotected people at their own risk, under the leadership of two professors, Daub and Thibaut. When at length the armed force appeared, and patrols swept through the whole province of Baden, and every small town and village was made responsible for the attacks of certain of their number upon the Jews, the outbreaks against the Jews gradually subsided, but the hatred against them was only intensified.

"From Germany the spark of Jew-hatred flew even into the capital of the Danish state," which a few years before had extended citizenship to the Jews, and had refused to revoke it. In Copenhagen the mob rose up (September), and commenced by throwing stones at the Jews, and ended with acts of violence. The government proclaimed martial law. The citizens, in the few cities where Jews lived, stood by them, and the preachers preached tolerance and love to them from the pulpit. In Germany the ministers of religion did not utter a single protest during these outrageous scenes. That no feature of the persecution of the Jews of the Middle Ages might be wanting, a synagogue was stormed in a small Bavarian place, and the scrolls of the Law rudely torn to pieces. Even where actual violence could not be resorted to, the insulting cry of "Hep, hep!" was hurled at the Jews in small and large towns, to the amusement of the spectators. The police or military force which appeared against the rioters and disturbers secretly took part against the Jews, and the governments which protected them did so more from fear, because they suspected a demagogical movement behind the outbreaks against the Jews. Reference was afterwards made to these outrages, as illustrating the feeling, or rather ill-feeling towards the Jews, to withhold equal rights from them.

The zenith of Teutomaniac Jew hatred was reached by the inflammatory pamphlet which appeared at this time of excitement, "The Mirror of the Jews" (November, 1819). Hartwig Hundt, a man of adventurous life, boldly advocated the slaughter of the Jews. He made most laudable propositions, which, he flattered himself, would satisfy the "Hep, hep" people.

"Although I for my part hold the killing of Jews neither a sin nor a crime, but only a police offence, I would nevertheless never counsel that they be condemned and punished unheard, as seems to be the fashion now."

What then? His proposals were: —

"Let the children of Israel be sold to the English, who could employ them in their Indian plantations instead of the blacks. That they may not increase, the men should be emasculated, and their wives and daughters be lodged in houses of shame. The best plan would be to purge the land entirely of this vermin, either by exterminating them, or as Pharaoh and the people of Meiningen, Würzburg, and Frankfort did, by driving them from the country."

The "Hep, hep" storm and Hundt's murderous lessons were the poisonous fruit of the seeds which Fichte and Schleiermacher had sown, and which had shot up quickly and abundantly.

Hundt's inflammatory book, in which every word is an abomination, was as ravenously swallowed by the German reading public, as his bad novels. Only at the request of Jews it was forbidden and confiscated by the censorship, which had become omnipotent through the Carlsbad regulations. In Portugal, at about the same time, a motion was brought forward in the Cortes to re-admit the banished Jews and atone for the crime perpetrated against them, whilst in Germany authors and statesmen justified this crime, and wished it to be repeated in the nineteenth century. Hundt did not stand alone in his advocacy of the extirpation of the Jews. Who cares to enumerate all the virulent, hostile writings against the Jews of the years of the "Hep, hep" storm? Conversation on questions of the day, however remote from the subject of the Jews, always ended in abuse of them. If an author glorified Sand and his murder of Kotzebue, and praised his Christian religious spirit, he did not fail to add that "Christian hate would call down a day of judgment upon the Jews, the accomplices of financiers who worked the ruin of the state, even though no writer had ever printed a syllable to the disadvantage of the Jews."