The history of fifty years of the Jewish labor movement in the United States and the changes which occurred in Jewish life with the wave of Jewish immigration to this country were reviewed at a banquet given on Friday night at Webster Hall. in honor of Mr. and Mrs. Ab Cahan.
The banquet was given on the occasion of the publication of Mr. Cahan’s autobiography which is published in three volumes in Yiddish, under the title “Leaves from My Life.”
Over 600 persons prominent in the Jewish labor movement came to pay tribute to the veteran labor leader and editor of the “Jewish Daily Forward.” B. C. Vladeck, manager of the “Forward,” was toastmaster. Addresses were delivered by Peter Zussman of Chicago, Mr. Weinberg, James O’Neil, Adolph Held, B. Schlessinger. Isidore Cohen and Judge Jacob Panken. An address written on parchment was presented to Mr. Cahan, signed by the forty-three members of the editorial staff of the “Forward.”
In reply to the toasts. Mr. Cahan referred to his forty-four years in the United States and reviewed the Jewish labor movement in this country during that period. He recalled that in the very same hall thirty-two years ago, a dispute occurred in the Socialist Labor Party and that it was in Webster Hall that he delivered his first Socialist speech in Yiddish.
“We then started to plough the field of enlightenment among the Jewish immigrants. Poor, ignorant and suppressed, the Jewish immigrant had even to be taught to carry a handkerchief in his pocket. We started to teach him how to fight for better living conditions. It is a great and difficult task, an important and holy work which we, all together, have performed in America,” Mr. Cahan said. “For this reason. I am heart and soul, with my entire energy, in the present fight to prevent the destruction of all that we have built with so much difficulty. I feel as young as a man of 22, prepared to share in the fight against the destroyers of our labor movement,” he declared.
Many messages of congratulations from prominent leaders throughout the country were received at the banquet.
COMMUNICATION TO THE EDITOR
Sir
With reference to the report of the “Tewish Daily Bulletin” on the meeting of the Zionist Council of Greater New York at the Hotel Pennsylvania last Thursday. I would ask you to state the following:
I did not say that Mr. Linsky should resign. The tone and idea of my speech were in accordance with my known attitude toward the negotiations between Dr. Weitmann and Lonis Marshall. In this connection I said that the agreement, the exchange of letters and the form of the negotiations have put the Zionist Administration in such an odd position that the only logical way would be for it to resign as a body and to leave it to a special convention, to be called as soon as possible to reorganize the leadership of the American Zionist movement and to take a definite attitued toward the general policy of the Zionist Organization.
DR. A. CORALNIK. New York, Jan. 31, 1927
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
