Chapter XVIII: Appendix: I

PRESIDENT ROOSEVELT AND THE JEWS

(_From the Daily Press_)

WASHINGTON, June 15.--Through their representative association, B’nai B’rith, the Jews of America to-day laid their case before President Roosevelt and Secretary Hay, and they are content to abide by whatever the Executive decides is best for them.

A statement of the proceedings given out at the White House concerning the conference consisted of a memorandum submitted by the B’nai B’rith on the recent Kishineff massacre, a tentative draft of a petition to the Tsar, which it is desired this Government should unofficially or semi-officially assist in delivering to the Tsar, and procuring a reply thereto, and copies of the replies of Secretary Hay and President Roosevelt to their callers.

The memorandum says that the facts concerning the Kishineff massacre as officially reported by the Russian Government have appalled and horrified not only the Jews in Russia and elsewhere, but the whole American people, who want something done, and whose hostility to Russia, if nothing is done, will become intensified and fixed.

In his reply to the memorandum Secretary of State John Hay said:

“No person of ordinary humanity can have heard without deep emotion the story of the cruel outrages inflicted upon the Jews of Kishineff. These lamentable events have caused the profoundest impression throughout the world, but most especially in this country, where there are so many of your coreligionists who form such a desirable element of our population in industry, thrift, public spirit, and commercial morality.

“Nobody can ever make the Americans think ill of the Jews as a class or as a race--we know them too well. In the painful crisis through which we are now passing the Jews of the United States have given evidence of the highest qualities--generosity, love of justice, and power of self-restraining.

“The Government of the United States must exhibit the same qualities. I know you do not doubt the sentiments of the President. No one hates more energetically than he does such acts of cruelty and injustice as those we deplore. But he must carefully consider all the circumstances and then decide whether any official action can be taken in addition to the impressive and most effective expressions of public opinion in this country during the last month. You will have observed that no civilised government in the world has yet taken official action--this consideration alone would bid us to proceed with care.

“The Emperor of Russia is entitled to our respect, not merely as the ruler of a great and friendly nation, but as a man whose personal character is even more elevated than his exalted station. We should not be justified in assuming that this enlightened sovereign, who has given so many proofs of his devotion to peace and religious tolerance, has not done and is not doing all that lies in his power to put a stop to these atrocities, to punish the guilty, whether they belong to the ignorant populace or to high official circles, and to prevent the occurrence of the outrages which have so shocked humanity. In fact, all we know of the state of things in Russia tends to justify the hope that even out of the present terrible situation some good results may come; that He who watches over Israel does not slumber, and that the wrath of man, now as so often in the past, shall be made to praise Him.”

The call on the President at the White House followed, and there President Roosevelt, after the memorandum was laid before him, said:

“Mr. Chairman: I need not dwell upon a fact so patent as the widespread indignation with which the American people heard of the dreadful outrages upon the Jews in Kishineff. I have never in my experience in this country known of a more immediate or a deeper expression of the sympathy for the victims and of horror over the appalling calamity that has occurred.

“It is natural that while the whole civilised world should express such a feeling, it should yet be most intense and widespread in the United States; for of all the great powers I think I may say that the United States is that country in which, from the beginning of its national career, most has been done in the way of acknowledging the debt due to the Jewish race, and of endeavouring to do justice to those American citizens who are of Jewish ancestry and faith.

“One of the most touching poems of our own great poet, Longfellow, is that on the Jewish cemetery in Newport, and anyone who goes through any of the old cemeteries of the cities which preserve the records of colonial times will see the name of many an American of Jewish race who, in war or in peace, did his full share in the founding of this nation. From that day to this, from the day when the Jews of Charleston, of Philadelphia, of New York, supported the patriot cause and helped in every way, not only by money, but by arms, Washington and his colleagues, who were founding this Republic--from that day to the present we have had no struggle, military or civil, in which there have not been citizens of Jewish faith who played an eminent part for the honour and credit of the nation.

“I remember once General Howard mentioning to me the fact that two of his brigade commanders upon whom he had placed special reliance were Jews. Among the meetings of the Grand Army which I have attended one stands out with peculiar vividness--a meeting held under the auspices of the men of the Grand Army of Jewish creed in the temple in Forty-fourth Street--Temple Emanu-El--to welcome the returned veterans of the Spanish-American war of Jewish faith.

“When in Santiago, when I was myself in the army, one of the best colonels among the regular regiments who did so well on that day, and who fought beside me, was a Jew. One of the commanders of the ships which, in the blockade of the Cuban coast, did so well, was a Jew.

“In my own regiment I promoted five men from the ranks for valour and good conduct in battle. It happened by pure accident, for I know nothing of the faith of any one of them, that these included two Protestants, two Catholics, and one Jew; and while that was a pure accident, it was not without its value as an illustration of the ethnic and religious make-up of our nation and of the fact that if a man is a good American, that is all we ask, without thinking of his creed or his birthplace.

“In the same way, when I was Police Commissioner in New York, I had experience after experience of the excellent service done--an excellent work needing nerve and hardihood, excellent work of what I may call the Maccabee type in the Police Department under me, by police officers of Jewish extraction.

“Let me give you one little incident with a direct bearing upon this question of persecution for race or religious reasons. You may possibly recall, I am sure certain of my New York friends will recall, that during the time I was Police Commissioner a man came from abroad--I am sorry to say, a clergyman--to start an anti-Jewish agitation in New York, and announced his intention of holding meetings to assail the Jews. The matter was brought to my attention.

“Of course, I had no power to prevent those meetings. After a good deal of thought I detailed a Jewish sergeant and forty Jewish policemen to protect the agitator while he held his meetings; so he made his speeches denouncing the Jews protected exclusively by Jews, which I always thought was probably the most effective answer that could possibly be made to him, and probably the best object lesson that we could give of the spirit in which we Americans manage such matters.

“Now let me give you another little example dealing with a Russian Jew, an experience I had while handling the Police Department, and that could have occurred, I think, nowhere else than in the United States.

“There was a certain man I appointed under the following conditions: I was attracted to him by being told on a visit to the Bowery branch of the Young Men’s Christian Association that they had a young fellow there, a Jew, who had performed a feat of great note in saving people from a burning building, and that they thought he was just the type for a policeman. I had him called up and told him to take the examination, and see if he could get through. He did, and he passed.

“He has only been an excellent policeman, but he at once, out of his salary, proceeded to educate his younger brothers and sisters, and he got either two or three of his old kinsfolk over from Russia, through the money he had saved, and provided homes for them.

“I have given you examples of men who have served under me in my administration of the Police Department in New York and my regiment. In addition thereto, some of my nearest social friends, some of those with whom I have been closest in political life, have been men of Jewish faith and extraction. Therefore, inevitably, I have felt a degree of personal sympathy and personal horror over this dreadful tragedy, as great as can exist in the minds of any of you gentlemen yourselves.

“Exactly as I should claim the same sympathy from any one of you for any tragedy happening to any Christian people, so I should hold myself unworthy of my present position if I failed to feel just as deep sympathy and just as deep sorrow and just as deep horror over an outrage like this done to the Jewish people in any part of the earth.

“I am confident that much good has already been done by the manifestations throughout the country, without any regard to creed whatsoever, of horror and sympathy over what has occurred. It is gratifying to know--what we would, of course, assume--that the Government of Russia shows the feelings of horror and indignation with which the American people look upon the outrages at Kishineff, and is moving vigorously not only to prevent their continuance, but to punish the perpetrators.

“That government takes the same view of those outrages that our own government takes of the riots and lynchings which sometimes occur in our country, but do not characterise either our government or our people.

“I have been visited by the Russian Ambassador on his own initiative, and in addition to what has been said to Secretary Hay, the Russian Ambassador has notified me personally, without any inquiry upon my part, that the Governor of Kishineff has been removed; that between three hundred and four hundred of the participants in the outrages have been arrested, and he voluntarily stated that those men would be punished to the utmost that the law would permit.

“I will consider most carefully the suggestions that you have submitted to me and whether the now-existing conditions are such that any further official expression would be of advantage to the unfortunate survivors, with whom we sympathise so deeply. Nothing that has occurred recently has had my more constant thought, and nothing will have my more constant thought, than this subject. In any proper way by which beneficial action may be taken it will be taken, to show the sincerity of the historic American position of treating each man on his merits as a man, without the least reference to his creed, his race, or his birthplace.”