[The purpose of the Digest is informative: Preference is given to papers not generally accessible to our readers. Quotation does not indicate approval.–Editor.]
Justice Louis D. Brandeis is the subject of wide editorial comment in the Jewish and non-Jewish press on the occasion of his seventieth birthday.
The “Day” paying tribute to his great achievements as a lawyer and jurist, takes occasion to recall the five years of Brandeis’ leadership of the Zionist movement in America, which, the paper declares, “was the most brilliant epoch in American Zionism, the epoch of its spring, of its transition from an organization of individuals to a movement of the masses.” The paper adds:
“Only now it is becoming generally recognized how just and correct Brandeis was in his analysis of many of the Palestine problems. In the present critical moment Zionism is in need more than ever of Brandeis’ active cooperation. The Zionist movement needs his clear vision, his brilliant analysis of things, his ability to unravel the most complicated problems and to find a solution to them. It is appropriate today, on his seventieth birthday, for the Zionists of America to point this out to him and, wishing him many more years of fruitful activity, to ask him to return to the work he abandoned five years ago.”
Brandeis’ first contact with the Jewish masses and its effect on him are described in the “Forward,” Socialist daily, by H. Lang, who reviews Brandeis’ activities as mediator in the cloakmakers strike of 1910 and arbitrator in other labor conflicts.
“Brandeis,” we read, “regarded the Jewish masses with great esteem. On more than one occasion in those days he declared that through his close contact with the cloakmakers and the strikes of the Jewish workers, he discovered in the Jewish masses so much idealism that he began to feel proud he was a Jew. In fact, it was at that time that he became a Zionist.”
The New York “World” dwells especially on Mr. Brandeis’ contributions as a great jurist to the United States Supreme Court. The paper remarks:
“Louis Brandeis celebrates his seventieth birthday with the best wishes of all groups of American citizens and amid general recognition of the fact that he is one of the most valuable members the Supreme Court has had in this generation.”
The New York “American” terms Brandeis a “brilliant Jew” and observes:
“He has now been a justice of our highest court for nearly ten and a half years. He is still an indefatigable seeker of truth. So far as is possible he keeps in touch with the broader currents of life here and abroad. Men and women who have light to shed on any difficult problem find his interest keen and hospitable.
“He was a great lawyer and a great citizen. He is a great jurist.”
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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.
