Echoes of An Infamous Anti-Semitic Jersey Past Are Heard in A New Report

This week the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) published its annual report on Anti-Semitic incidents in the Garden State. The results, as reported in many of our area’s papers, are mixed. While it is true that an overwhelming majority of Jewish people living in New Jersey go about their daily lives without having to face this historic scourge, still, 78 incidents occurred in 2013. According to the ADL, these incidents involved acts of vandalism, assault and threats. 

Racism and discrimination in all their perverse forms are bad, but ‘modern’ Anti-Semitism is its own kind of historical nemesis. I’ve been in education for over a decade, and I can honestly tell you, most New Jerseyans, despite our state’s Holocaust awareness requirement, fail understand the danger of organized Anti-Semitism to humanity in particular, and it’s long history in New Jersey (of all places!). It’s worth a retelling.

Medieval anti-Semitism is rooted in the Christian Bible, which has been interpreted as blaming Jews for the conspiracy to arrest and kill Jesus. Much of this hatred was fed to Europeans over the centuries by the Catholic and later Luther-inspired Protestant Churches. To be fair, this belief in collective Jewish guilt has been formally renounced by the Roman Catholic Church and most Protestant Churches. Over the past three decades, in fact, the Papacy has gone to great lengths to embrace good Jewish-Catholic relations through Papal Synagogue visits and various edicts. I do not think that I would be inaccurate in stating that, at least in New Jersey, if any Christian priest or preacher got up on next Sunday morning and told his or her congregation that Jews were “Christ Killers” the parishioners would simply walk out, throw the preacher out, or both. But this kind of anti-Semitism isn’t what motivates modern day Jew haters anyway.

Modern, formerly "respectable” Anti-Semitism is not ancient. It’s not even German. It’s not from the Arab world and it had nothing to do with the Spanish Inquisition or the Crusades. It wasn’t born in the desert or amongst some maniacal civilization. It emerged, largely, from one of the most cosmopolitan centers of European civilization, from a city that still prides itself on its Baroque architecture, its cobblestone streets, and its sumptuous coffeehouses. Modern-day Anti-Semitism was born in Vienna, Austria, between 1880 and the outbreak of World War I.

These people, whoever they are – be they punks, White Supremacists, or Klansman, who are going around New Jersey committing acts of hatred are believers, for the most part, in this kind of anti-Semitism. Though Modern Anti-Semitism’s origins are a bit complex, the movement really crystalized and gained respect and electoral power in Turn-of-The-Century, cosmopolitan Vienna. It was there that, in the effort to gain votes and create some kind of national identity out of a diverse population, leaders pointed to the Jews as a common enemy. These anti-Semites stipulated that Jews, both religious and secular, were a cancer on humanity. These people preached, to great success, that Jews, through their achievements in the professions, were climbing to the top of their fields in a conspiratorial plan. This “plan,” was to be executed at the ‘right’ moment, on some kind of international basis, when Jews would strike to enslave and degrade all Christians. The conspiracy theory took several forms, but this was the most common one. In the meanwhile, most Anti-Semites said, Jews, by increasing their power and influence, were out to make the lives of Christians impoverished and marginal.

The moment of “respectable crystallization,” happened with the election of one of the great urban mayors of the early 20^th century: Dr. Karl Lueger. Today Austrians like to forget about his intense anti-Semitism, as he was responsible for much of the modernization of Vienna. But at the time, Lueger’s intense hatred for the Jewish people – who comprised of a sizable minority of Vienna itself – was well known. Lueger used his tremendous oratory and persuasive powers to convince city voters that Jews were the main problem. In 1907, a few years before his death, Lueger told one reporter:

“A Jew must remember that neither Germany, nor Austria, nor Poland is his land. He must remember that wherever he may be, he is a stranger to the native population…I do not care about the welfare of the Jews. If their life here is miserable, let them go away.”

Today any big city mayor who made such a statement would be branded as crazy…insane. But these were the words of one of the most popular, elected politicians in the civilized world, and his words would not go unheeded. Under Lueger’s rule, Jews would be discriminated against, publicly assaulted, ridiculed and pushed out of organizations of all kinds. But his admirers were many, including one down-on-his-luck, failed artist and frequent inhabitant of the city’s homeless shelters and rooming houses named Adolf Hitler.

Now wait just a second. I thought this was a blog about New Jersey? What does an infamous Austrian mayor who died in 1910 have anything to do with anti-Semitism in, say, Newark or the Jersey Shore?

The respectability that Lueger gave to such hatred had transatlantic consequences, and this influence spread quickly. How quickly? He died in 1910; within a decade his organized, articulate anti-Jewish rhetoric would assist the growth of two of New Jersey’s most infamous – and powerful – hate groups: the Klan and the Nazis.

The Anti-Semitic Klan, partly due to the ‘respectability’ that Lueger and others had given the hatred of Jews and Judaism, spread rapidly here. Klan groups and “klaverns” organized by the thousands and the repressive organization established its headquarters in Newark. Amazing as the sight would be today, during holiday parades in several New Jersey towns and cities, Klan members marched by the hundreds – even the thousands – to promote their nefarious cause. Their organization published newsletters and newspapers and endorsed candidates running for local and state offices. 

The Klan held huge ceremonies in the summertime, particularly at the Shore. One New York Times article claims that a July 1924 rally near Long Branch drew 20,000 supporters. The Klan participated in open, publiziced acts of terrorism. In April of 1922 they burned a huge cross on top of Paterson’s Garrett Mountain that was visible throughout much of Passaic County. While publicly promoting itself as another civic organization, Klansmen terrorized Jews, Catholics and immigrants through assaults and even bombings. Amazing right? Yes, it happened right here, in New Jersey. And it wasn’t over.

The Klan’s national power faded in the late 1920’s due to a variety of factors, one being a major murder scandal involving its Grand Wizard. The movement’s deterioration was reflected in New Jersey as well. But by the early 1930’s, Anti-Semitism was back in the Garden State and in a big, terrifying way.

In the years before the Second World War, New Jersey was home to a major

New Jersey Nazi Camp, Andover, 1938

Nazi movement that called itself “The Bund.” Like its evil twin in Germany, New Jersey’s Nazis dressed up in brown uniforms, held gatherings in beer halls, and established their own “base camps” in places like Andover. Yes, I am not kidding here. In the mid-1930’s, there was a Nazi camp, with real, goose-stepping, Hitler saluting, anti-Jewish stormtroopers, in Sussex County.

Area residents, like my grandmother who lived in Irvington at the time, grew concerned and frightened. When a collection of Nazi organizations from New Jersey and New York sold out Madison Square Garden for a rally in the mid-1930’s, the movement was on the borderline of – and its frightening to say – respectability. I would like to report that it was the outrages of the Nazis in Germany that led to the Jersey Bund’s decline, and that is frequently taught, but it was more likely the efforts of the state and Federal governments to squash the movement that probably brought on its end. And, of course, The War.

So here we are again, sort of, but on a much smaller basis. The Neo-Nazis or the Anti-Semites or whomever you want to call them are in our presence, but they’re not respectable. The average New Jersey resident, of course, knows from our present perspective what these kinds of ideas lead to: violence, mass death, collective sadism…etc. We’re all decent people, right? We’ll continue to work together as a diverse community towards the future. Yes, we’ll have our disagreements, but this is all our land. We still believe in those ideals…don’t we?

Man, I hope so. But the ADL’s report of 78 Jersey-based incidents in 2013 does shake my faith. A little bit.   

Ukrainian Blood: More than Just Sacrifice; For Putin, It's the Writing on the Wall

The events of the past 48 hours in Ukraine mirror that of a movie ending. While it is important to remember that this is real life, and real people died horribly fighting a tyrant who was clearly contemptuous of human life, the rapidity of events and sudden reversal of fortunes must be noted. And more importantly, so should the effect that these events will have – probably this summer – on a certain, fraudulently elected Russian strongman and aspiring dictator.

Let’s have a short (biased) review that will undoubtedly do Ukraine’s recent

Putin: Witness Your Future

history an injustice. (Former?) Ukrainian president, Viktor Yanukovych was elected under questionable circumstances. After this election he quickly had the leader of the opposition arrested and convicted of corruption amongst other charges, even as he built a complex of palaces around his nation, some of which have been discovered to have small zoos and wholesale replicas of Greek ruins. Then Yanukovych began the process of selling out his nation to Russian President Vladimir Putin by signing a series of political and economic agreements with the so-called “Russian Federation.” And it’s no secret that he did this though much of his nation favored a more independent and Western-leaning Ukraine, while Putin is clearly trying to reconstitute the Russian empire through a new regional pact.

When protesters showed up a few months ago and began to seize parts of the capital, Kiev, things really got out of control. Riot police were called out. At first, protesters clashed with police, resulting in some deaths and several injuries. Then through the anti-tyrannical magic of social media, thousands transformed into tens of thousands, then hundreds of thousands, then millions. A week ago, apparently, whether acting on the “advice” of his good neighbor Putin or on his own volition, the Ukrainian president had had enough. He ordered the police to stop enforcing the law, and to start executing protesters from snipers’ nests positioned in the central core of his capital city. If the protesters weren’t going to understand orders, they would understand bullets. Stalin did it in Ukraine in the 1930’s. Mao did it in China in the 50’s and 60’s. The Chinese Communist Party leaders did it in Beijing in June of ’89. So he gave the order. Shoot, and shoot to kill.

But it didn’t work. This time, things were different. The problem is that this isn’t 1935, or 1966, or 1989. This is not a world where, aside from North Korea, a ruler can simply act out without consequence and start randomly killing his or her citizens in broad daylight. Not if such a leader wants to remain part of the larger global economic and political order. Not in the age of the Internet, of YouTube, of Facebook, Twitter, of global flows of capital and information. No, this is not the 20^th century at all. This is the Age of Connectedness. This is a time where, regardless of how strongly your supporters back you, your supporters still want to live and prosper in comfort in this information-soaked world. This is an age where, if you start killing people, everyone sees it, comments on it, blogs on it, posts it, from Kiev to Katmandu to Kansas City. This is an age, at least from the point of view of tyrants and would-be tyrants, of strict and instant responsibility.

And it is because of this rising tide of massive and instant communication and information that the (Former) President of Ukraine is driving aimlessly around his furious country, at this very moment, with less than a dozen armed supporters. Perhaps he hopes he can sneak into Russia. Perhaps he hopes that Putin will order some kind of invasion to reinstall him, but that’s unlikely. The Cold War is over, and Putin knows that if he acts to do that, the entire world will condemn him, or more terrifyingly, stop buying Russian natural gas. Putin’s Russia is no Soviet Union. It is a dictatorship set atop a fragile nation-state. It is a cumbersome political machine lubricated by ready cash, period. No cash, no supporters, no power.  

Yes, as revelers celebrate their victory in Kiev’s central square this evening, Putin and his inner circle must be feeling really scared. Perhaps scared is not the world: terrified. The mini-Putin in Kiev just played his last card and, though future events in Ukraine are hard to guess at, they probably will not include him except for making some room in a prison cell. Putin and Yanukovych may call this a coup, but any Russian and Ukrainian and American would tell you that when a democratically elected, multiparty national legislature unanimously votes to remove a murderous executive from office, it’s not a coup. It’s good democratic governance.

Last year Moscow saw some huge demonstrations against Putin’s rule. The Russian President knows now that, judging from recent events in Ukraine, the endgame from a similar event would be, well, similar. Additionally, Russians are acutely aware of their shrinking population and demographic crisis. To open fire on the nation’s best and brightest on, say, a July 2014 day would amount to genocidal charges from his own people, and would mean an end to Putin and his sham government.   

Putin, the blood of Ukranians is more than just a sacrifice for freedom. It’s the writing on your wall. Get out now. 

Hunters and Hunted in Newark After the Revolution

Newspaper Illustration of Runaway Slave, early 1800's

When teaching about the nature of personal freedom in the Newark of America’s early years (1800-1850), students at Arts High, and just about any high school, typically start out with an inaccurate picture. In their elementary years, New Jersey’s students are taught that before the Civil War, a person was either “free” or “slave.” But a quick glance through the archives of Newark’s earliest publications proves that the human condition, from a legal standpoint, was far more complicated than that. To be blunt, a majority of human beings in Newark during colonial and up to early Republican times were not “free” at all, at least not in the modern sense of the term.

When I ask my wonderful, curious students how they define the concept of “personal freedom,” their responses are almost always similar. Earlier this year, one student defined it as “the right to go where I want to go, make money, and be who I want to be with.” Another student, I feel, hit the concept more directly on the head when she said it meant “people don’t have the right to get into your personal space and grab or hit you whenever they want to.”  Either way, I agree with both definitions. And there were a lot of people in Newark the early 1800’s that wanted to be free, no doubt. We know this for a fact because pursuers of all types not only chased those they claimed to own or control, they took out ads to ask for help. Both the hunters and hunted are found in the advertisement sections of local papers.

Though America had recently fought and won a war for independence against Britain, the local social order had changed little. History tells us that there were several categories of people who were not “free” in any sense of the word during this period, both in Newark and the nation at large. They were: black slaves, indentured servants, married women, anyone under 21 and those who could not afford to pay their debts. All were present in Newark, and (combined) made up the majority of the people living in not only the city but the state as a whole. None of these people had the right to vote, to travel freely or to earn their own money. Free, adult white males were the minority. They could usually vote (if they owned enough property), but Newark was no democracy.

Black slaves were present in the city and state in the early 1800’s, and in large numbers. New Jersey was a northern state, but its complicated and gradual emancipation laws kept slavery alive right up to and including the Civil War years. Under the Constitution’s Fugitive Slave Clause, slaves who fled their masters for any location in the U.S. would always be slaves from a legal standpoint. And so would their children – even if they were born in so-called “freedom”.

White masters would chase their runaways to the ends of the Earth, and they would put up big money to bring them in. In one 1802 ad appearing in Newark’s so-called Centinel of Freedom, Matthias Denman offered a $20 reward for a runaway. The slave, named Frank, was described in typical bigoted manner as “a short chunky fellow, full faced, big mouth, thick lips, and a flat nose pocked-marked.” Denman went on to say that anyone capturing and imprisoning Frank would not only receive a reward but also any additional money for “reasonable charges.”

That same year the pages of the Newark Centinel told of the efforts some black slaves undertook to keep their families united against a society that was bent on their degradation. In one extensive ad, master Nathaniel Seabury tells of a 25 year old runaway named Bill. The description reveals the brutality of the bondage of the times, as the ad states that Bill had “a large scar on the calf of his leg, occasioned by a cut with a scythe.” For those who don’t know, a scythe is a machete like tool, frequently used by masters and overseers to inflict large gashings on the flesh of uncooperative or resistant laborers. Bill, the ad continued, fled with a woman named Hannah, “who he calls his wife.” Generously, the master offered $20 reward for both, but $10 if only one can be brought in.

Black slavery was not the only form of involuntary servitude in the early 1800’s. There was a form of white slavery too, though it was limited by legal contract, called “Indentured Servitude,” or “Bonded Apprenticeship.”

This strange kind of servitude was for a limited time only (5-7 years), though from an early-American standpoint, it might as well have been for an eternity. Basically there were two ways a white person could become an indentured servant. The most common method was to have a master pay for one’s transatlantic voyage from England or Ireland. In return, the servant pledged to work, wage-free, for a master. Poor parents (or orphanages) could also “sell” their children into this bonded state. But there were stipulations. The master was traditionally and legally required to teach the servant a skill, and provide room and board for him. Indentured servants were not considered property, and they couldn’t be killed or maimed. During the contracted period the servant was “bonded,” in that, he or she could not just get up and leave or find other compensated work. At the end of the duration, the servant became free and equal to his or her master, and was generally given some tools, money, property and an all-important letter of reference.

Both then and now, a five to seven year contract was dangerously long for a young person. This was a time in history when many people died in their 20’s and 30’s. Equally important was that this was an age where a free man would earn high wages for his physical labor, as well as purchase cheap land west of the Delaware River. The temptation to flee was a powerful one, and flee they did.

Masters tried to fight back, again by taking out ads offering rewards for “absconding apprentices” and also warning potential employers that paying these escapees for work was illegal. One master named Jacob Davey offered Newark residents a $10 reward for the return of one Thomas McKenzie. The servant was “bound to learn the Blacksmith’s trade,” and had gone off with permission to visit his parents in New York. But since then had vanished. Davey was particularly worried that the boy was interested in long-distance travel. Knowing Newark was an East Coast port, the master warned that the boy might be interested in boarding an outgoing ship. Smart kid.

We know that debtors fled too. Today, if you don’t pay your bills, you get sued and a bad credit report. In the Newark of 1800, you went to jail, or fled (usually west). The Newark Centinel was filled with ads of “Creditors’ Meetings” where the assets of “absconded” debtors would be divided up in an orderly fashion. It would only be later in the century that the state constitution would ban imprisonment for debt.

And finally, let us not forget the wives. My students are always surprised when I explain to them that when a woman married in the early 1800’s, she became “civically dead.” All of her property, child custodial rights and her very name became that of her husband’s. This very legal practice, called “coverture,” was the norm. Today we see its symbolic legacy continued in the traditions of married women adopting their husband's last names, daughters being “given” away by fathers in wedding ceremonies, etc. But in 1800’s, there were real legal implications for leaving your husband in Newark, New Jersey.

In 1797 we see one furious husband placing an ad in the Centinel. John Liddell tells Newark readers that his wife Sarah had “absconded from my bed and board,” and “in other respects behaved in an unbecoming manner.” Liddell doesn’t so much want her back, as he wants to completely impoverish her. “Therefore, I forbid all persons from trusting her on my account, as I am determined not to pay any debts of her contracting after this date.” In an age when personal reputation commanded one’s level of financial credit, this ad was the equivalent of a financial death warrant.

Newark’s history is America’s history, and when it concerned the never-ending struggle between the controlled and their controllers, this statement could not be truer. One of the most interesting aspects of the American epic is that the concept of “personal freedom” evolved from a limited notion in the years immediately after independence to one of near adult (legal) equality today. But I try to tell my students that this process did not happen automatically. To gain freedom, people – especially in the Newark of the 1800’s - had to run for it, defend it, protect it.