The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1903-09-27
THE JOSHUA OF THE FUTURE.
Foundation OF an American Jewish
Statistical Society Proposed.

Foundation OF an American Jewish
Statistical Society Proposed.
DR.. Isidor Singer. in New York Sun.
In few days the American delegates will
have returned from the sixth Zionist Con-
gress at Basel, and we shall have authentic
information not only on the true bearing of
the Uganda proposition of the British gov
eminent. but also with regard to the gen.
eral outlook of the whole Zionistic move
ment, which undoubtedly has reached its
turning point.
The merits and shortcomings OF the great
scheme of Jewish salvation that forever will
be identified with the names of my two col
lege friends and countrymen, Theodor Herzl
and Max Nordau have so often and so ably
been described in the columns of your paper
that / need not add new arguments either
pro con. The Zionists, here and abroad,
have fought and are still fighting against
mighty odds. They deserve for their cour-
age and strenuousness full recognition even
from the ranks OF their opponents. But the
question now arises Is il within the power
of these modern Maccabees TO bring to a
speedy and happy end the misery of their
| 5,le9,O00 (RuSsian official census of 1880
wards in the empire of the Car, about
100000 in Roumania and $1,000 in Galicia, in
view OF the hostile attitude of the Russian
| government toward Zionlsm of the impend-
ing revolutions in the dominions of the Sui
| tan, and, finally, in view of the indifference,
| yea, direct opposition, TO their scheme on the
| part of nne-tenths of the well-to-do Israel
ties of western Europe and America?
| Goethe says somewhere that there are
/ times when mo righteous man has the right
to keep silence The International sit1a-
| ton Of the Jewish people is nowadays such
as not to permit any Jewish scholar, profess
| sional or business man to refuse his share
of active cooperation and moral response
| bility in the great war of deliverance in be-
| half of his six million down-trodden breth-
! rem. The well-to-do Jewish lawyer, physi-
| clan. banker, trader and manufacturer OF
| London and Paris. New York and San Fran
| cisco have not done their full duty men
/ and Jews i'm paying for their family pews in
| some synagogue and throwing an annual
| contribution of Il few dollars to- some Jew
| ish benevolent institution.
| and to half the tribe of Manasseh. snake
| Joshua, saying: Your wives, your
little ones and your cattle shall remain i'm
| the land which Moses gave you on this side
of Jordan; but we shall pass before your
| brethren armed, all the mighty of
| valor, and help them until the Lord hath
| given your brethren rest, as He hath given
you, and they also have possessed the land
| which the Lord your God giveth them;
then We shall return unto the land of your
possession and enjoy ii, which Moses, the
Lords servant. gave you this side Jor-
| dan toward the sunrising Joshua i,
| l2-15)
The Jews of western Europe and above
| all, of America, upon whom with the be-
| ginning of the twentieth century the course
| of events imposed the leadership of con-
| temporaneous Israel, are indeed in SIM
| liar position toward their Russian, Rou-
manian and Galician brethren the Reu-
| benites, Gadites and the half tribe of Ma
| nasSeh of old were toward their kin after
the death of Moses.
"And they answered Joshua saying All
| that thou commanded us we will do, and
| Joshua i, 16.)
Is there one living leader in modern Israel
| who could boast of the unconditional fol-
| lowing of all his brethren? No. And be-
| cause of this and their lack of organization
the Jews as a corporate body are weak, and
the Russian state councillor, Ivan Stanislo-
vich Bloch, may be right in considering
the weakness of the Jews as one of the
principal causes of anti-Semitism.
The time of hollow rhetoric and melan-
cholic despair has passed. We must have
the pluck to beStir ourselves to a heroic
deed, not only for the sake of the general
PRINCIPLES tsI OF justice and humanity but also
and grandchildren. The world is imposing
solidarity upon us, and we ourselves are
slavery and misery hangs above the heads
| of two-thirds of the house of Israel
The Jews of America know neither their
numerical nor their social or financial
strength Happy people have no history
still less do they care for scrupulously
exact statistics. In 1923 the immortal
| 1Oun0er OF MODERN jewish science, Leopold
Zunz, pointed in a remarkable essay to the
necessity of the establishment of thorough
Jewish statistics; but eighty years had TO
pass before DR.. Alfred Nossig could pub
fish the first volume of his ''Judische Sta
| tistik Berlin, 1908. Judischer Verag.) In
his Introduction Nossig pleads with the
strongest possible arguments for the estab-
lishment all over the world of branches of
the Berlin central bureau. I deem 1t a
rare privilege TO be I'm position to make
myself, through the columns OF your val
liable paper, the American interpreter of
the great German statistician i'm proposing
the foundation of an American Jewish sta
tistical society, with its main Office in New
| York city, and branch offices in Boston.
Philadelphia, Baltimore. New Orleans Gin
cinnati, st. Louis. Chicago, San Francisco
The statistcian is the bookkeeper of po-
| litical economics and sociology. There is
no up-to-date business man manufac-
turer who is not convinced of the absolute
! impossibility of carrying on business even
on modest scale, without scrupulous book
keeping And what is true of individual
concerns is still more cogent for societies
or a world-embracing commonwealth. In
deed. all schemes which have been here
tofore proposed for the solution of the
Jewish problem-from Major Mordecai
Noahs project 0s25) to establish city of
refuge for the Jews upon Grand Island
in the Niagara river. to the vast Argen-
tine Republic plan Of Baron de Hirsch.
, with si5,Uo.0oO as financial basis, and To the
Zionistic scheme itself--have been and are
carried OH in rather slpshod way. Our
, under their feet
The first systematic attempt to obtain
statistical information about the Jews in
the United States was undertaken by the
. Board of Delegates of American Israelites
through committee of which William
, Hackenburg (Phiadelphia) and Simon Wolf
, CWashington) were members. They esti-
mated the Jewish population of this coun-
: try in 1880 at 80, 257. How many are there
; now-1,d1O.O0. 0.0OO or more? Nobody
knows. Are the 100000 well-to-do Jewish
families living throughout the United States
and Canada able and willing TO sacrifice
not fer one. two, or three years. but for a
whole lifetime. part of their income fol
the rescue of their 6.ooo6o hapless brethren
, and. indirectly, for the final solution of the
: problem of the Wandering jew? The Si5..
! tUoOo or Baron de Hirsch. now i'm the safe.
Keeping OF the London Jewish Colonization
; Association can only serve as solid basi.
? Tor the gigantic scheme under which the
Joshua of the future. he who is destined tC
! lead modern Israel into the Promised Lane
+ OF Liberty. will marshal the energy. intel
, ! lectuahty and savings of 100000 well-to-dC
! Jews scattered throughout Europe the two
Americas, Africa and Australia