Digest of Public Opinion on Jewish Matters

[The purpose of the Digest is informative: Preference is given to papers not generally accessible to our readers. Quotation does not indicate approval-Editor.]

That the Jews in the United States have “passed the saturation point” and emigration on a large scale would be a solution for their problem, is the opinion of the London “Jewish World” (June 10), in commenting on the account concerning the Jewish situation in America given recently by the New York “Daily News” correspondent, who stated that there is a “hidden war” between Jews and non-Jews in this country and that the “spirit of the pogrom thrives in sight of the Statue of Liberty.”

Expressing the hope that the account of the “Daily News” is greatly exaggerated, the paper observes:

“The real difficulty in the United States is, first, that the Jew is there to the extent he is. He has passed the saturation point,” the paper writes. “And if the consequences of the present position are to be avoided, one of the speediest methods would be a great migration from America of Jews. Where to, is altogether another question, and it may seem paradoxical, but it is none the less true, that American Jews are faced with the Wohin problem as surely as are the Jews in Eastern Europe, whom these American Jews are helping so royally. The fact is also that assimilation by Jews-I mean of course the sinking by Jews of their own individuality as Jews in the vast sea of Americanism (and that can most effectually be accomplished by marriage)-there has been comparatively little in the United States. The social ban against Jews has naturally had a great deal to do with this. But whatever the cause, the Jew in America has not assimilated even to the extent, proportionately, he has in this country. And so we bring the wheel of circumstance full tilt round to the eternal Jewish problem: Assimilation to the extent of racial and religious suicide or the suffering involved in an environment of racial hate and religious prejudice-one or the other and sometimes both. It was thought that America, with her fine traditions and professions of Freedom and Humanity would prove the exception for the Jew, and that in ‘Gawd’s own country’ at least he would find rest and peace. Alas! the Jewish Question was not to be solved by the Statue of Liberty!”

MISSIONARIES IN AUSTRALIA PREYING ON JEWISH IMMIGRANTS

The Presbyterian Church of Victoria. Australia, has been conducting a “Christian Mission to the Jews,” whose energies are especially directed to converting the newly arrived immigrants, who do not know the language of the country and are in material need, we learn from an editorial in the “Australian Jewish Herald,” Melbourne, of May 20.

Calling attention to this situation, the paper writes:

“In his investigation our representative discovered that a number of immigrants who were unable to speak English had been receiving tuition in the language from the mission. The matter is one that deserves immediate attention from the communal authorities. This is but one of the results of our ‘muddling through’ policy.”