Polish Jewry Hopeful Pilsudski Government Will Bring Security and Prosperity out of Chaos

The recent parliament election campaign in Poland found Polish Jewry divided into two camps, two middle class parties fighting among themselves. On the one hand were the Zionists, with all their factions, General Zionists, Mizrachi, Histachduth, etc., and on the other hand were the Agudath Israel, and the Merchants’, Craftsmen’s and Volkists parties. The fight was a bitter one, and the result of this bitter contest is: In Warsaw, the largest Jewish community of Europe, 2 Jewish deputies; in all of Old Poland, 3 Jewish deputies, 2 Zionists and one Agudist; in all Poland, including Galicia, 7 deputies elected, 6 Zionists and one Agudist. Polish Jewry in proportion to its population is entitled to at least 25 deputies and 6 senators. Now there are only 7 Jewish deputies and not one Jewish senator representing Jewish parties.

This is both a defeat and a victory. It is a victory when one takes into consideration how much the Jewish vote was split, since the Socialist Bund too received in Warsaw alone 13,000 votes, while thousands of Jews voted for the Communists and thousands of others voted directly for Marshal Pilsudski. Nevertheless Warsaw alone elected two Jewish deputies. It is also an especial victory for Zionism, forty thousand votes were polled in Warsaw for a Zionist ticket. The Agudath too can point to victory; at former elections it polled in Warsaw twenty-odd thousand votes, whereas this time it polled thirty-odd thousand votes.

LOSS FOR ZIONISTS

This election may also be interpreted as a defeat for the Zionists, since in the former Sejm they had 14 Jewish deputies and senators, while now they have only six deputies. The Agudath too may be said to have been defeated in a certain sense, for in spite of the great moral and material support which it received from the government, it did not elect in all Poland more than one deputy, while the Zionists, in spite of the lack of funds and the persecution under which they had to labor, did manage to elect six deputies.

The influence the Jewish delegation in parliament will have will probably be nil, since the overwhelming majority of the Sejm is controlled by Marshal Pilsudski. Out of a total of 444 deputies, Pilsudski’s group has 249, which means that he always has a majority and is not dependent on the votes of the other groups. In the Senate the situation is even worse. Out of a total of 111 senators, 74 are Pilsudski’s adherents. The only thing the other parties in the Sejm will be able to do will be to criticize, if they will be able to do that, since long debates will probably not be allowed.

MAN IN STREET HOPEFUL

But the man on the street in Poland, who is sick and tired of politics, has accepted the new parliamentary situation, which gives the government a stable majority, with a certain degree of satisfaction. He hopes that perhaps Marshal Pilsudski will succeed in bringing order into the economic chaos of Poland. Pilsudski has repeatedly claimed that the politicians of the various factions in the Sejm did not permit the government to accomplish anything positive. Now that he has a majority in the Sejm he can carry through whatever he may wish. And so the man on the street says to Pilsudski’, “Now let’s see what you can do to bring security and prosperity to Poland.”

This feeling is even stronger among a large part of the Jewish population. The Jewish population is tired of the perennial crisis from which it suffers most. There is darkness all around. Jewish poverty is increasing and the Jewish people in Poland stand before an abyss and look with fear and trembling into the future. And like a drowning man they clutch at a straw. Perhaps a government of Marshal Pilsudski, which will be able to do things undisturbed, will after all do something for the harassed Jewish population. The government has claimed all along that it must be first permitted to stabilize its own life, and then it will begin to think about its Jewish citizens.