The true northerner. [volume] (Paw Paw, Mich.) 1855-1920, 1880-12-31
The Jews In Germany.

Inc JEWS lii UeTHlanys
The outbreak of feeling against the
Jews.in Germany would seem to be I'm
anachronism, if we had not seen signs OF
the same disposition in this country.
Petitions have been numerously signed
to restrict the civil rights of the Hebrew
population, and to repeal the laws which
provide for its equality with the rest OF
the people. An association called the
Anti-Semitic League has been formed,
and there have been great public meet
ings hostile to the Jews. The Hebrew
sepulchres in some parts of the country
have been desecrated by mobs, and an
chaplain, supposed to be favored by the
court, has openly denounced the Jews
without reproof from the ConsistOrium.
There are some million and half of He
brews in Germany, and they have be-
come so substantial and important an
element of German life and society that
crusade against them contemplating
their disability is an event OF vital sig
niticance.
Ii Is, indeed, the fact that they have
become this important element OF the
population which stimulates the hostile
movement 1t is felt that people who
control enormous capital, who influence
the trade and commercial relations of
the empire, whose acuteness and ability
give them command of the intellectual
and aesthetic development of the cOun-
try, are essentially aliens, with no natu-
lal or permanent interest in the COM
munity, and that, as the Turks were
IA 10, h,
the Jews are but encamped IN Germany.
They fill the places, they carry off the
prizes, they are becoming too powerful.
The great landed estates are passing in-
to their hands. They own the palaces
in the towns. They are the merchant
princes. They are the professors and
Judges and magistrates. In another
generation, say the alarmists, if the
laws remain unchanged, they will be the
lords of the Teutons, and do what they
will Disraeli's "Asian mystery" re-
appears. 1t is certainly one of the most
striking spectacles of modern history; q
great and proud people, still flushed
with triumph after a vast war which
humbled one of the ancient powers Of
Europe. and changed the European
ihAp-.a war directed in the Cabinet by
the most renowned Of modern statesmen,
and led III the field by most sagacious
and famous soldier-recoiling with the
apprehension that shrewd alien people
among its population should by essential
! superiority absorb the controlling ma
tional power.
For that is the root Of the feeling. It
is not concealed. Bismarck himself III
his earlier years shared the apprchen:
sion aud expressed the hostility. But
it will end probably i'll this widespread
ebullition OF feeling. OF the great null
.tude of Hebrew people in Germany a
large proportion are undoubtedly thor
oughly Germanized. Germany is their
home and that of their ancestors, and
will be that of their children. Ii they
are magistrates and governors, it is be-
cause they are found to be more capa-
be. Ii they are great proprietOrs, it is
because they are c.everer traders. Ii they
are professors and authors and artists,
it is because the Hebrew genius is not
extinct. Germany will not go backward
and discredit her civilization with the
wrongs of .feudalism. The rule of mod
ern times is freedom, and the tools to
him who can use them. Bismarck could
no longer be called the greatest of mod
ern statesmen if under his sway Ger
many were forced to confess that upon
! It's own soil, in its own pursuits, it could
not compete under equal laws agains,
M alien and homeless race.-Harper's
! UpekIU.