The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1899-09-17

''The Jews" wrote George Elicit, "are
among the aristocracy of every land;
If literature is called rich in the pos
session of few classic tragedies, what
shall we say to a national tragedy last
ing for fifteen hundred years, in which
the poets and the actors were also the
heroesT The publication of book
that does justice to the Jew has special
significance at this time, when the
whole world is ringing with defense
of a Jewish officer, the victim of the
juggernaut of military system that
sought to unload it's sins upon Dreyfus
because he belonged to the Scattered
Nation. The reflection that in ten thou
sand pulpits in Christendom last Sun
day there were heard vigorous protests
against injustice to the individual Jew
recalls the centuries of persecution
which Abraham's descendants have sur
fered, and speaks trumpet-tongued
of the triumph which justice
and religious liberty have won.
1t is in the memory of men now living
when in countries highly civilized, the
Jew was more or less a Hagar, tolerated,
but not treated as an equal Happily
in those portions of the world where
men know most that feeling has passed
away, and Jew stands upon the same
footing with his Gentle brother. Still
today one half of the Jews in the world
are made subject to special laws and
denied the rights of citizenship because
one half of them live in Russia and
Roumania In all the world today there
are probably eleven million Jews, four
million more than in the time of David.
TT,,lo 10, IoS md anna1ity thpv
growing i'm numbers and Importance,
there being in the United States alone
937, 1900 members of that race. AS a
rule a Jew family is large, and the
spirit of the family love is still strong
among them. There is seldom any .fric-
ton in a Jew family and little marital
infelicity. Under their own vine and
fig tree, in their mansion or in their hum
BILE abode, the Jewish family sets an ex-
ample to all the world for devotion to
each other. The same devotion embraces
to degree all their race, for a tramp
or convict Jew is rare sight. Cover
nor Vance during his last term, when
pardoning the only Hebrew in the North
Carolina penitentiary, who was serving
ten years sentence for manslaughter,
endorsed on the document these words:
l.
the pardon in part as recognition of the
good and law-abiding character of our
Jewish citizens, this being the first Sc
rious case brought to my notice on the
part of that people," Judge Briggs, of
Philadelphia, in sentencing a jew to
prison for burglary, said: You
are the first Israelite / have ever seen
convicted of crime" No Jew was con-
g ,,Ja ha SfataS
during the first century of its existence.
When Mordeca NJ Noah, on his ac-
cession to the office of sheriff of New
York, was tainted with the remark:
pity Christians have to be hung by
Jew he promptly replied: PITY Chris
tians require hanging at ALL" In 1918
Mr.. Noah estimated that there were
5000 Jews in the United States. III
1910 there were $4,000. In 1880 the
total number was 221 ,064, of whom $50
lived in North Carolina. David Sulz-
berger estimates that there are now
1900 Jews in the United States,
crediting North Carolina with 1900,
which is probably an over-estimate.
In the $50 pages of DIR. Peters most
interesting book, which ought to have
a wide reading. he treats of the jew
in every war the Jew has shown that
he was ready to die for his principles
and his country; as a poet artist, nov
elist, lawyer, musician, physician, show
ing such names as Halevi, Heine, Disra-
eli, Millais, Mendelssohn, Maimonides. Jul
dab z. Benjamin; as a statesman, pro-
ducing such leaders as Abarbanel, Gre
mieux, Sir Moses Montefiore, Baron
DofhSohiId I1iSraali Salipnan TSa1nr
Rayner, Straus Yulee, Jonas, Mayer
and Jefferson NJ Levy, the owner of
Monticello; as judges, among whom
were Moses Levy, presiding judge of
Philadelphia; Franklin j. Moses, Chief
Justice of South Carolina; Solomon
Hydenfeldt, Justice of the Supreme
Court of California, three members of
the New York Supreme Court bench;
as diplomats, Mordecai Noah, sent to
Tunis by Monroe; Otterbourg to Mexico,
Straus to Turkey, Hirsch to Turkey;
as financiers, where the jew has stood
first, claiming such kings of finance as
Poliakoff, the Rothschilds, Strauss Selig
man. In every walk of life the Jew has
won distinction where equal opportunity
has been afforded him.
Mr.. Peters lays claim for the jew
lHdI II was IiS IubH1y
Christopher Columbus to discover Am
erica. He says that DIR. Moses Kayser
ling has demonstrated beyond a doubt
that it was a Castilian Jew, Louis de
Santangel, Councillor and Comptroller,
of Aragon, who supplied to Columbus
the funds needed to fit out his caravels.
Isabella did not sell her valuable jew
els to fit out Columbus for his voyage,
for the very good reason that she had
already pawned or sold them to defray
the expenses of the wars then deyasting
her country.
1.-THE maps which Columbus used were
drawn up by Portuguese Jew. Co
lumbus derived much value from the
astronomical tables of Abraham Nacnto.
These tables were translated from the
Hebrew into Latin ard Spanish by
Joseph Vecincho, Zacuto's pupil, another
Jew, distinguished as a physician, cos
mographer and mathematician, and it
was lie who presented a copy of these
tables to the Genoese navigator. Rod
rigo Sanchez, nephew Of Gabriel San
chez, was designated to accompany the
expedition as yeedor, or superintendent,
at the special request Of Queen Isabella