Part 7 — CHAPTER XLIV.

PRESENT CONDITIONS. THE NUMBER AND THE DISPERSION OF JEWS IN AMERICA. CONCLUSION.

Dispersion of the Jews over the country and its colonial possessions—The number of Jews in the United States about three millions—The number of communities in various States—The number of Jews in the large cities—The number of the congregations is far in excess of the recorded figures—The process of disintegration and the counteracting forces—The building of synagogues—Charity work is not overshadowing other communal activities as in the former period, and more attention is paid to affairs of Judaism—The conciliatory spirit and the tendency to federate—Self-criticism and dissatisfaction which are an incentive to improvement—Our great opportunity here—Our hope in the higher civilization in which the injustices of the older order of things may never reappear.

Jews are living at present (1911) in every State and Territory of the United States, and there are small communities in Hawaii, Porto Rico and the Philippine Islands. There are some forms of Jewish organizations, synagogues, lodges or cemetery associations in more than 750 separate localities, from places where there is only a “minyan” on the High Holidays at the beginning of the Jewish year, to the immense Jewish community of New York City, which is estimated to consist of nearly 1,000,000 souls. Wherever actual figures as to the number of Jewish inhabitants in smaller places and the number of synagogues in larger cities are obtained, they are usually far in excess of the published figures and estimates, and there seems to be justification for placing the number of Jews in the country at not far below 3,000,000, if not actually at that number. While the largest communities, as well as the largest number of communities, remain in the East and the Middle West, the dispersion is much more extensive than is generally supposed.

There are, for instance, nearly forty cities and towns in Texas which have Jewish communities; other Southern States, like Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi and Virginia, have each about, or nearly, half that number, and Arkansas, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Tennessee about ten each. Each of the new States of Arizona and New Mexico have three or four Jewish communities, Oklahoma has five; Florida, in the extreme South, and Maine, the furthest North, each have about a half dozen; California has more than both of them together; Washington has three, and Oregon one. Of the other far Western States Utah has two communities, Montana two, Nevada one, Idaho one, Wyoming one and Colorado nine.

Coming to the nearer Western States and toward the border States, we find four communities in Nebraska, eight in Kansas, twelve in Missouri, thirteen in Iowa, eight in Kentucky and five in West Virginia. North Dakota has five, Minnesota eight, while Wisconsin, with nineteen, and Michigan, with twenty-four, show the result of proximity to the great Central States where Jews have been settled in considerable numbers for the last two generations. Among those States Illinois has the largest number of Jews, owing to the great community of Chicago, while the number of cities containing Jewish communities—twenty-three—is somewhat smaller than that of Indiana, which has twenty-six, and of Ohio, with its twenty-seven. We notice the same in the two greatest States in the East, where, if we consider Greater New York City as one community, the number of places containing Jewish organizations is slightly less than in Pennsylvania, which has sixty-two such places. New Jersey has more than forty, and of the New England States Massachusetts leads with thirty-five, and Connecticut is second, having twenty. Rhode Island has seven; Vermont and New Hampshire four each. The list is completed with one community in the District of Columbia, five in Maryland and one in Delaware.64

Philadelphia and Chicago are, besides New York, the only two cities which contain about 100,000 or more Jews each. Boston has about three-fourths of that number, Baltimore, Cleveland and St. Louis about 50,000 each, and after them come in the order named: Newark, San Francisco, Pittsburg and Cincinnati (with about 30,000 each); Detroit, Buffalo, Providence and Jersey City, each having about half of that number, while Rochester, Syracuse, New Haven, Milwaukee, Louisville, New Orleans and Kansas City belong to the class which have 10,000 or more. The twin cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul would belong to that class if they were considered as one, which they really are. Washington, the national capital, belong to the class of cities having between 5 and 10,000 Jews, which includes Albany, N. Y.; Columbus, Ohio; Dallas, Tex.; Denver, Colo.; Pall River, Mass.; Hartford, Conn.; Indianapolis, Ind.; Los Angeles, Cal.; Memphis, Tenn.; Omaha, Neb.; Paterson, N. J; Portland, Ore.; Scranton, Pa.; Seattle, Wash., and Trenton, N. J. There are some old and important settlements containing less than 5,000, but the number which would have to be included in a class of communities of that size is too large to be mentioned.

Congregations are continually being organized and synagogues built in localities where none existed before, thus showing a gradual dispersion of Jews to all parts of the country, while new houses of worship in the large cities usually owe their erection to consolidation or to the settlement in new neighborhoods. But only the buildings which are entirely devoted to religious services are apt to be noticed by those making records or gathering statistical material, while the small congregation which worships in a private dwelling is usually overlooked. The statistics about Jewish congregations in the United States are for this reason more defective than the figures about any other phase of Jewish activity, and the total given by the above mentioned Year Book (for 5669, p. 65), i. e., 1745, for the entire country, should be doubled to be nearer the truth, even if the lowest estimate of the number of Jews in the country is accepted as the most probable one.

If it must be admitted that a process of disintegration is going on, in which the pessimist sees something worse than a transformation or re-adjustment to new conditions in a new world, it is, on the other hand, obvious that a strong effort is made to counteract the forces of dissolution. The various elements of the community, representing many countries and different strata of immigration, are coming together in a conciliatory spirit, as if instinctively impelled to co-operate. The widespread activity in the building of synagogues, in which many whose attitude was formerly indifferent, and even hostile, now participate, is only one phase of the attempt to preserve Judaism in this country. Much is done for charity and for Jewish education, the latter receiving more attention than ever before. The public school systems of most of the larger cities, following New York’s example, have taken over the largest part of the work which was done before in Jewish institutions to Americanize the immigrant. Not only the proportion, but the actual number, of the dependents on charity is decreasing, and while the needs of Jewish charitable institutions are still great, more attention can now be paid to specifically Jewish matters than at the time when the problem of the material wants of the immigrants was overshadowing every other communal activity.

The attempts to organize on a more general scale, and to consolidate or federate existing organizations, which are frequently made and are more often successful than in the preceding periods, are the clearest manifestation of the spirit of the times in American Jewry. In most of the large cities outside of New York the important local Jewish charities are now federated, and the plan of federation is continually gaining in favor. The federations, of which there are now more than a dozen, and many other benevolent institutions of large and of smaller communities, are represented in the National Conference of Jewish Charities of the United States (organized 1899).

There is also noticeable in our communal life, as in American public life in general, that tendency to self-criticism which often degenerates into slander—that eternal dissatisfaction with things accomplished and with present conditions, which implies a sincere desire to achieve still better results. While this discontent and the poor opinion which many of us have of the spiritual condition of the Jews in America are of immense value as incentives to improvement, it dims the eye of the foreign observer, especially if he comes from a country where complacency and self-praise are the rule. It may still be too early to summarize the communal activities of the Jews in America, or to attempt to indicate how far we have approached the solution of the most pressing problems. But signs of throbbing life are visible everywhere, and the interest of the individual Jew in Jewish affairs is increasing. There is, therefore, every reason to believe and to hope that the opportunity which is afforded here to set the Jewish house in order—the best, and perhaps the first, in the diaspora—will be utilized to its full extent by the future generations of native American Jews.

We are happy to have no Jewish problem here, in the sense in which the term is understood in the backward countries of the Old World. We need not waste a part of our best energies in repelling attacks from an anti-Semitic press or a Judophobe party, and our usefulness to ourselves as well as to our neighbors is thereby enhanced. Members of strange and hostile races and nationalities get along together in this country much better than anywhere else in the past or the present time, and their native children emerge from the “melting pot” united by a patriotism and a desire for improved conditions and improved relations which characterizes the American. The secularity of the Government and the diversity of religious beliefs preclude the spread of the denominational bigotry which is the real cause of the persecution of the Jews in other countries; while the liberty and equality which are vouchsafed to every citizen must themselves be lost before the unfavorable conditions which prevail elsewhere can confront us here. The Jew can become an American and at the same time preserve his religious distinctiveness, which he can lose only by his own negligence or disloyalty. Let us hope that those who now earnestly work to strengthen and build up Judaism in America will be successful, and that the fate or Divine Providence which has preserved us for thousands of years brought us here to participate under new circumstances in the advancement to a higher civilization in which the injustices of the older one may never reappear.