The Jews in the Eastern War Zone

It was against this background of ever-spreading persecution and misery that the great war broke upon the Jews. They accepted it as loyal Russian citizens, and not without hope that it might lead to some improvement in their own conditions.

The Kehillas (communities) of Petrograd, Odessa and other cities officially sent large sums in gold for the reservists, established hospitals for the use of the wounded without distinction of race or creed, held great patriotic demonstrations in the synagogues, at which the Rabbis urged the Jewish youth to render their full share of military service, and in other ways, presented, as the Mayor of Odessa said, “an example of readiness to sacrifice everything for the army.”

The spirit of the Jews of Russia at the outbreak of the war is well expressed in the appeal which the Jewish community of Vilna, the oldest in Russia, at the very heart of the Pale, issued in connection with the establishment of a military hospital:

“Our beloved Fatherland—the great Russian Empire—has been provoked to bloody, terrible conflict. It is a struggle for the integrity and greatness of Russia. All true sons of Russia have risen as one man to shield their country, with their own breasts, against the onslaught of the enemy. Our brothers of the Jewish faith, all over the Russian Empire, have also responded to the call of duty ... and many have voluntarily joined the army which has gone forth to the field of battle. But circumstances now demand that those of us who have not been fortunate enough to be called forward to fight for our country with weapons in our hands should also make whatever sacrifices we can. We owe a sacred obligation to those who have left their families behind, those who are defending our country, and us, with their blood and their lives. It is our duty to assume all responsibility for the families of the reservists. It is our duty to take care of those who will fall wounded or ill in the war. No doubt this sacred duty will be assumed by the entire Jewish population of the Empire, by individuals no less than by entire communities. The history of all past wars, especially those of the nineteenth century, beginning with the war of 1812, shows that the Jews have honestly and sacredly fulfilled their duty as citizens and were ever ready to sacrifice upon the altar of their country their wealth, their blood and even their lives.... In like manner, at this great crisis in the life of our country, we, the representatives of the Jewish community of Vilna, the oldest in Russia and at the very heart of the present conflict, take the liberty of appealing to our co-religionists to begin at once the work of organizing relief for the wounded and for the families of the reservists. We must care equally for all the soldiers of our glorious army, without distinction of race or creed, for all are brothers, sons in common of our great Fatherland....”

The Jewish press also gave resonant voice to this spirit of loyalty and devotion. The “Novy Voskhod,”[14] one of the leading Jewish organs in Russia, issued this call:

“We were born and brought up in Russia. Our ancestors are buried here. We Russian Jews are bound to Russia by ties which cannot be broken, and our brothers who have been driven beyond the ocean by cruel fate cherish their memories of Russia all through life. Custodians of the commandments of our forefathers, nucleus of the entire Jewish nation, we, the Jews of Russia, are nevertheless united inseparably with the country in which we have dwelt for hundreds of years, and from which neither persecution nor oppression can tear us away. At this historical moment, when our country is threatened by foreign invasion, when brute force has taken up arms against the great ideals of humanity, the Jews of Russia will bravely go forth to battle and will fulfil their sacred duty....”

The Jewish contingent in the Russian army numbered from 350,000 (an estimate made by the Mayor of Petrograd before the Conference of Russian Mayors in August, 1914), to 400,000 (the estimate made by the Jewish Colonization Association, Petrograd). The thousands of Jewish students who have matriculated at foreign universities because the “percentage rule” had closed the Russian universities to them, returned to enroll under the colors, even though they knew that there was no hope of preferment for them.

On the field of battle the Jewish soldiers distinguished themselves for valor. Over one thousand received the Medal or Cross of St. George. From the many letters of appreciation and affection written by Russian officers to the relatives of Jewish soldiers under their command who had been disabled or killed, it was evident that the Jews had won the affection and respect of the fighting men in the field. But it was their eternal misfortune that the war, by the logic of military geography, had to be fought out, on the Eastern side, in Poland; for between the Poles and the Jews there had long been a state of open conflict—and the developments of the campaign in Poland foredoomed the Jews to disaster appalling and almost irretrievable.

The conflict between the Poles and Jews dates back to the earliest period of Jewish life in Poland.

In its early stages it was purely religious. The Church Synod of 1542 declared that: “Whereas the Church tolerates the Jews for the sole purpose of reminding us of the torments of the Savior, their number must not increase under any circumstances.”[15]

The Synod of 1733 reiterated this gospel of hate by declaring that the reason for the existence of the Jews is:

“That they might remind us of the tortures of the Savior, and by their abject and miserable condition might serve as an example of the first chastisement of God inflicted upon the infidels.”[16]

In its later stages the struggle was chiefly political and economic. When Russia acquired Poland, through the several partitions in the eighteenth century, it frankly adopted the old Roman principle of DIVIDE ET IMPERA. It persistently fomented hostilities between the Polish and Jewish population by crowding them together in a restricted area where neither could make a decent livelihood, by pitting them against each other in an economic struggle conducted on the lowest possible plane and on the most hopeless terms, by playing off religious and racial prejudices and by every other device possible to a government with unlimited power and an unprincipled policy. And the Poles, politically undeveloped, instead of combining with the other victims of Russia against the common oppressor, turned upon their fellows with a ferocity truly unparalleled in European history.

Several years before the war broke out this struggle came to a climax over the election of a deputy to the Duma. The Jews of Poland felt that they were entitled to at least one member to represent them in the Duma, particularly in the city of Warsaw, where they constitute nearly half of the population. It happened, however, that in the city of Lodz they unexpectedly elected one Jewish deputy, Bomash. The Jews, therefore, seeking to conciliate the Poles and not to wound their national pride by insisting upon the election of a Jewish deputy from Warsaw, the ancient Polish capital, offered to compromise, stipulating only that the Polish candidate be not an avowed anti-Semite. The Poles, however, insisted upon putting up a notorious anti-Semite. The Jews, equally unable to support such a candidate in self-respect or to elect one of their own, united on a Polish Socialist candidate, electing him to the Duma. This led to retaliation in the form of a boycott directed not only at Jewish tradesmen, but even at Jewish physicians, artisans and other workingmen, which soon spread destitution throughout Poland, affecting, as it did, Jews and Poles alike. So ugly and bitter a form did the boycott assume that at times even the Russian government was compelled to take the part of the Jews as against the Poles.

Anti-Semitism in Poland

A significant observation upon the economic character of the Polish-Jewish struggle was made by the well known Russian journalist, Madam A. E. Kuskova.

“I found red-hot anti-Semitism everywhere in Poland. We have anti-Semitism in Russia, but of a different kind.... Anti-Semitic papers like ‘Dva Grosha’ accused all Jews of all sorts of crimes, without protest from the Progressive press, and succeeded in arousing the Polish people. In Pyasechna, a ruined place near Warsaw, where ten-day battles took place, I spoke to many peasants who accused the Jews of many of their troubles, but could never explain what they really blamed them for. We Russians held a meeting to try to find the causes of this feeling.... We came to the conclusion that ... the Polish-Jewish question is really a Russian-Polish-Jewish question, and touches us as much as the Poles. They have not room enough to live, and more and more Jews are coming there. Even democratic organizations are compelled to take cognizance of this. One peasant organization expresses through its organ the idea that it is true that the Jews are a burden to Poland, but it warns the peasants against anti-Semitism nevertheless.”[17]

When the fighting armies overran Poland, the Poles saw their chance and seized it. The dream of a free Poland had never been absent from their minds. When the world catastrophe came the Poles saw in it not only an opportunity to regain their land, that had been dismembered more than a century before, but also an opportunity to avenge themselves on the hated Jews. Just as the Russians had always played the Poles against the Jews, so now the Poles hoped to play Russian, German, Austrian and Jew against each other. It was indeed to the interest of both Russia and Austria to court the sympathy of Poland. And the Poles seized the occasion to denounce the Jews, now to the Russians, now to the Germans, as spies and traitors.

The position of the Jews under this cross-fire became unbearable. Here are several cases, selected at random, showing its effect upon the Jewish population:

One of the first towns in Russian Poland captured by the Austrians was Zamosti, near the Hungarian frontier, taken by a detachment of Sokol troops in September, 1914. They were soon driven out by the Russians; and at once the Poles of the town denounced the Jews to the Russian commander, accusing the Jews of having given aid to the enemy during the Austrian occupation of the town. Twelve Jews were arrested. They denied their guilt but were sentenced to death. Five of them had already been hanged, when, in the midst of the execution, a Russian priest, carrying an image of the Virgin, appeared and with his hand on the image took oath that the Jews were innocent and that the accusation was merely a product of Polish vindictiveness. He proved that the Poles of the town themselves had supported the Austrians and that even a telephone connection with Lemberg could be found. The seven remaining Jews were then set free. But five had already been hanged.[18]

At Lemberg, in September, 1914, the Poles accused the Jews of firing on Russian troops; as a consequence a great many Jews were arrested, and nearly seventy were attacked and wounded; but an investigation proved them all innocent, and Drs. Rabner and Diamond, the Jews who had been taken as hostages, were released.[19]

At Kieltse and Radom the Poles plundered many Jewish shops and when the Russians returned after the German retreat the Poles denounced the Jews as German sympathizers. Here also those Jews who were arrested were found to be innocent and released after investigation.[20]

At Mariampol, near the East Prussia frontier, because of a similar accusation, the entire Jewish male population, with their Rabbi, Krovchinski, at their head, were compelled to work the roads for three days—September 22–24 (October 5–7), 1914 (the first two of these days falling on the Sukkoth holiday.)[21]

In this town, also, one Gershenovitz was sentenced to penal servitude for six years because he acted as Mayor during the German occu­pation, although the inquiry held by the Russians showed that he had been forced by the Germans to accept the office.[20]

At Jusefow the Jews were accused of poisoning the wells. Seventy-eight were killed outright, many Jewish women were violated and all the houses and shops plundered.[22]

In Drsukenihi a mill owner, Chekhofski, was accused of having given a signal for the German bombardment of the town by blowing his mill whistle. When the Russians reoccupied the town he was brought to trial before the Military Tribunal and the charge was proven to be groundless.[23]

These are only a few instances, taken at random, of Polish slanders. In not a single known case were the charges justified; on the contrary, their gross absurdity was demonstrated on numerous occasions before military tribunals that could not possibly be charged with prejudice in favor of the Jewish side of the issue. A perfect illustration of this is furnished by the story of the villages of Groitsi and Nove-Miasto, near Warsaw.

The Case of Nove-Miasto

The Germans, in their first advance on Warsaw, in September–October, 1914, occupied these villages for a few days. When the Russian troops recaptured the towns the Poles at once denounced the Jews as having welcomed the German troops and having aided them in every possible way—whereas the Poles, according to their own account, had accepted the German rule passively, doing only whatever they were forced to do by the military authorities. They pointed out seven persons, five Jews and two Germans, who had demonstrated such devotion to the invaders as to merit trial for treason and the death penalty. One Jew, Goldberg, it was charged, had revealed to the Germans the hiding place of ten Russian soldiers, resulting in their capture; another Jew had shown them where they might requisition horses and food, and had acted as guide.

The case was brought to trial before the military guard, and there, under strict examination, it assumed an entirely different aspect. A priest, Zemberzhusky, testified that Jews and Poles had acted precisely alike toward the Germans; that their reception of the Germans expressed no joy, that all alike had complained of the invaders’ requisition and pillage, and that it was only due to the tactful conduct of the citizens that the town of Nove-Miasto was not entirely demolished. It was shown that not a single Russian soldier had been captured by the Germans and that the Goldberg charge was entirely false. All the other charges were similarly disproved. It developed that they were based on two facts. In the preliminary investigation the trial officers, being ignorant of Polish, were compelled to employ interpreters. One of these interpreted the statement of a Polish witness to the effect that he had seen a certain Zilberberg walk the streets arm in arm with a German officer. The fact brought out in the new trial was that the witness had actually seen the German officer seize Zilberberg by the neck! In the second place, the story had been started in sheer malice by two notorious gangsters, whose evidence was unworthy of any consideration. All of the accused were therefore acquitted.[24]

The significance of this episode lies in the fact that the Colonel in command in this particular case happened to be a kindly man, who, being unwilling to see injustice done, went to the trouble to have the case carefully investigated. Hundreds of other cases based on equally groundless accusations came to court without the possibility of such a fair investigation.

Another case of this sort is reported from Suvalki. It was charged by the Poles that the Jews of Suvalki had met the Germans with bread and salt (the national Russian custom in welcoming guests). The facts were that practically the entire population of Suvalki had fled at the approach of the Germans. The Germans, however, had, with their usual thoroughness, made out in advance a list of the leading citizens of Suvalki who were to be appointed to the deputation that was “to welcome” the Germans. Only one Jew was on this list.

Not all the Poles were bitterly hostile to the Jews, as may be seen from the following story, reprinted from the Polish paper, “Novo Gazeta,” in “Rasviet,” February 8 (21), 1915, p. 36:

“An army officer, a Pole, reports this: Where our detachment was stationed, I found a group of soldiers surrounding a muzhik, who was telling them that the Jews had cut the telegraph wires. The soldiers were furious and ready to take revenge on the miserable Jews. I approached the group and said to the muzhik: ‘I am glad to see that your patriotic impulses urge you to expose these Jew traitors. You must take me to them at once. You say you know the guilty ones. Show us how we can capture them and dispose of them.’

“The muzhik became confused at once. He stammered: ‘I didn’t—say anything about them. I didn’t see them myself. I didn’t see anything myself. People say so. Everybody says so.’

“I assumed a severe attitude and said to him: ‘You know these people perfectly well, but you don’t want to expose them. You are trying to shelter these traitors. You must take me to them at once!’ After more evasions, the muzhik broke down completely. Thereupon the soldiers turned upon him, and wanted to beat him, but I took him under my protection. He confessed completely to me and I sent him off and told him to beg his priest to preach on the following Sunday on the text ‘Love thy neighbor as thyself.’

“Another instance was this. In a Warsaw street car filled with passengers, I saw a Polish woman physician looking out at a Jewish automobile ambulance. ‘Look here,’ she cried, ‘These Jews also have motor ambulances. I think they must be stolen.’ I took it upon myself to ask her for an explanation of this. She was decent enough to admit that she knew nothing at all about it and that she had said these words without thinking.

“In these two cases it happened that I came out as a Pole defending the honor of Poland, because I believe that Poland does not require such outrageous falsifications and slanders for its regeneration. If they were not so painful to relate, I could give you a whole series of such incidents.”

Even the Polish clergy, usually anti-Semitic, felt compelled to protest against the excesses of their followers. Thus in January, 1915, the priests of Plotsk, headed by Archbishop Kovalsky, interceded on behalf of the Jews with the Russian authorities who had made numerous arrests upon the denunciations of Polish agitators.

So outrageous was the attitude of the Poles that at a Conference of Progressive Deputies of the Duma held at Petrograd in January, 1915, resolutions were passed to extend no help whatever to the Polish Deputies in any of their nationalist projects in the Duma because of their attitude toward the Jews.

The Polish weekly, “Glos Polsky,” published in Petrograd, contains an interview with Professor Milyukov on the Polish question:

“Our point of view is that along the River Vistula live not only Poles, but that there also lives another people, the Jewish people, which has a right to be recognized....

“When the Polish question will be taken up in the legislative chambers, we shall demand that the fundamental act should guarantee the rights of the Jewish minority as well....”[25]

At several conferences of Russian, Polish and Jewish communal workers which took place in Petrograd and Moscow in January, 1915, the majority of the Russians expressed their solidarity with the Jews in this matter.[26]

Even the most reactionary Russians foresaw danger to Russia in the Polish campaign of vilification against the Jews. Thus the “True Russian” (anti-Semitic) leader, Orloff, after a visit to Poland, declared: “I have seen nothing bad on the part of the Jews, although the Poles made up all sorts of accusations against them. But in these Polish reports you feel prejudice, vindictiveness, hatred, nothing else.... The Jews are loyal and brave, and it is most inadvisable to pursue a policy which might convert six million subjects into enemies.”[27]

The Kuzhi Case

But the Russian military authorities, seeking a scapegoat for their own failures, eagerly seized upon the Polish stories, and gave them official standing and wide circulation. The notorious Kuzhi incident illustrates the methods used. The story, as first published in the military paper “Nash Viestnik,” the official organ of the northwestern army, on May 5 (18), 1915, in the official daily newspaper issued by the Russian government, the “Pravitelstvenny Viestnik,” May 6 (19), 1915, and elsewhere, ran as follows:

“On the night of April 28th, in Kuzhi, northwest of Shavli, the Germans attacked a detachment of one of our infantry regiments resting there. This disclosed the shockingly treacherous conduct of a part of the population—especially the Jewish part—towards our troops. The Jews had concealed German soldiers in their cellars before our troops arrived, and at a signal they set fire to Kuzhi on all sides. The Germans, leaping out of the cellars, rushed to the house which our regimental commander was occupying. At the same time two of the battalions, supported by cavalry, attacked our outposts and captured the village. The house in which the commander had his headquarters soon fell in. Colonel Vavilov ordered that the regimental colors be burned, and, refusing to surrender to the Germans, was killed. Our reinforcements then arrived, drove the Germans out of Kuzhi at the point of the bayonet, and saved the remnants of the burning standard. All the local inhabitants who had taken part in this terrible affair were brought before a court-martial and the ringleaders will be sent to Siberia. This sad incident again demonstrates the need of keeping constant guard, particularly over all those Jewish towns which have at any time been held by the enemy.”

This story, in all its circumstantial details, was spread broadcast throughout the Empire, in all the official and semi-official organs of the government, on the bulletin boards, wherever the Russian populace congregates. By military order it was brought to the attention of every man in the army, down to the last private. Country editors were ordered to reprint the story under threat of prosecution. Not a hamlet in all Russia but shuddered at the monstrous treachery of the Jews. In Tashkent the clergy offered a prayer in the Cathedral, petitioning God to deliver the Russian army from the machinations of Jewish traitors. Even the Liberals, usually sympathetic toward the Jews, were silent, as no defense was possible in so black a case.

Then it occurred to someone to make an investigation. Three deputies of the Duma went to the spot in person and discovered that in the entire village of Kuzhi there were only six Jewish families—all but one living in miserable huts without cellar space; that the one cellar in a Jewish house was only nine by seven and too low for a man to stand upright in; that it could not possibly hide enough German soldiers to attack, much less annihilate, a Russian detachment; that the few Jews of the town had left it, with the permission of the military authorities, on April 27th, the day before the town had been attacked by the Germans, and were known to have spent the night of April 27–28 at another village, Minstok; and, finally, that no Jews had been tried, convicted or executed at Kuzhi; in brief, that the story was, from beginning to end, an absolute fabrication.

This Kuzhi story was branded as a lie by the Jewish Deputy Friedman in the Duma on July 19 (August 1), 1915. He was supported by the non-Jewish Deputy Kerensky, who denounced the fabrication in these words:

“I declare now from this rostrum that I personally went to the town of Kuzhi to verify the accusation that the Jewish population of Kuzhi had committed a treacherous assault on the Russian army, and I feel it my duty to reiterate that this is but an ignominious slander. There was no such case, and under local conditions there could be none.”

But the refutation of the lie was not spread throughout Russia. It has been consistently suppressed by the military censor, and to this day the great majority of the Russian people, in the absence of disproof, fully believe the story.

The Shavli Case

Another spy story widely circulated in the anti-Semitic press was that the Jews of Shavli had been expelled from Kurland because they were detected in the act of leading the German troops on to Shavli. This also was printed in all the military and semi-official newspapers of Russia and from there reprinted in the general press. The newspaper “Dehn” pointed out the absurdity of this and similar charges:[28]

“Accepting the story as it stands, without demanding the names of the Jews found guilty, or any other details, let us simply examine the map. Shavli is not in Kurland at all. It is in the province of Kovno, and is 50 versts from the nearest point in Kurland, and more than 50 versts from the nearest point inhabitated by Jews. The Germans, we know, moved to Shavli, not through Kurland, but from the opposite direction. The charge, if true, would therefore mean that the Jews of Kurland went 100 versts out of their way in an entirely strange territory in order to commit treason by communicating with Germans. This is obvious nonsense. Nor is it less obvious that this fiction has been manufactured out of whole cloth. And this is how it was manufactured: Reports reached the newspapers that the Jews of Kurland were being expelled. The anti-Semitic papers at once argued that if the Jews were being expelled they must have committed some treason, and since the line of the German advance was known to be in the general direction of Shavli, and since these people were too lazy to consult the map, they promptly decided that the expulsion must have been due to the fact that the Jews of Kurland had guided the Germans to Shavli.”

And so this preposterous story was started on its way.

Other Spy Stories

No story was too absurd to be given credibility and systematic circulation. It was reported, and seriously believed, that at a place unnamed and a time unknown some Jew had enclosed a million and half roubles in a coffin and shipped the coffin to Germany. The chief Rabbi and the Jewish community of Warsaw telegraphed to the “Novoe Vremya” and several other leading papers, protesting against this monstrous slander against the Jews at a time when their sons were shedding their blood freely on the battlefields. The “Novoe Vremya” declined to publish the telegram.[29]

The Jewish community of Petrograd appealed to the Grand Duke Nicholas, then Commander-in-Chief of the Russian armies, in these words:

“The entire Jewish people would cast out, with scorn and indignation, those base criminals who, forgetting duty and conscience, would, in this year of universal sacrifice, break their sacred vows of loyalty to the fatherland. Such treachery is alien to our faith and was never known to exist among Jews to any greater extent than among other peoples. And never yet, in the course of the centuries, no matter to what persecutions the Jews, under the influence of prejudice created by their devotion to their ancient faith and customs, may have been subjected, has any government denounced ALL of its subjects as traitors to their country. This is the first time in all history that such an attitude has been assumed by any government toward the Jews. At the very time that our sons are fighting in the ranks of the Russian army for the honor and glory of Russia, we, their fathers, are held responsible for the acts of a few criminals and are being persecuted for their vile deeds, aimed at the betrayal of our own sons. Never has any man or any people been subjected to torment greater than this, to humiliation less bearable or more offensive to honor or self-respect.... Your Imperial Highness! In this sad hour of trial we long to implant in our people faith in a brighter future, we long to preserve that tie of loyalty towards our common country which is so essential for the welfare of all the peoples inhabiting Russia, and which was demonstrated so powerfully when the insolent enemy first threw down the gauntlet to Russia. We do not wish to admit discord, despair and sorrow where should reign only unity, harmony, hope. And we dare to appeal to your Imperial Highness in the hope that measures insulting to us will cease to be applied, that the stamp of outcast be removed from our faces and that we may be permitted, as loyal sons of our country, freed from all suspicion, to use our whole strength in the struggle with the common enemy.”

No reply was received to this appeal; on the contrary, the policy of fastening upon the Jews all the blame for Russian defeats was carried out consistently by the military machine. The “Russki Invalid,” the official journal of the War Department, in the spring of 1915, definitely accused the Jews of disloyalty to the State and of sympathy for Germany, and openly attributed Russian disaster to this cause.[30]

Military orders like the following were common:

ORDER No. 89.

Issued to the Soldiers of the Fortified Region, Fortress Novogeorgievsk, Nov. 27, 1914.

“The German newspapers print articles declaring that among the Russian Jews the Germans find reliable allies who, besides supplying them with food, are often the best and unpaid spies, ready to enter any service injurious to the cause of Russia, and that in German victory the Jews see their salvation from Imperial oppression and Polish persecution. Similar information continues to come in from the army.

In order to protect the army from the harmful activities of the Jewish population, the Commander-in-Chief has ordered that the forces of occupation take hostages from among the Jewish population, warning the inhabitants that in case of treacherous activities on the part of any one of the local inhabitants not only during the period of our occupation of a given inhabited point, but also after our leaving it, the hostages will be executed, which order is to be carried out in case of necessity.

Upon occupation of inhabited points, careful searches are to be made to find out whether there are any arrangements for wireless telegraphy, signaling, pigeon stations, underground telegraphs, and so forth, and the full penalty of the law is to be meted out to anyone connected with this.

Reference: Telegram by General Oranovsky of this year under No. 3432. Signed, Chief of the Fortified Region.

General of the Cavalry, Bobyr.”

This order was issued from the press at six o’clock in the evening, December 2, 1914, and immediately proved profitable to the dregs of the Russian soldiery, as was demonstrated at a court martial held in Lomza, where it was proven that three members of a signal corps had “planted” a telephone in the motion picture theater of a Jew named Eisenbiegel, and had then arrested him and demanded 5,000 roubles blackmail. In the course of the trial it developed that one of the men was responsible for the hanging of no less than seventeen innocent Jews as spies solely because they were unable or unwilling to pay the blackmail demanded by him.[31]

Even the loyalty of Jewish soldiers was officially questioned. Order No. 1193 of the General Staff, dated April 27–May 10, 1915, commands all the troops “To watch the Jewish soldiers—especially their readiness to surrender as prisoners—and in general, their entire conduct.”

But the publication and circulation of orders like these reacted disastrously upon the Russian arms. By branding the entire Jewish population as traitorous the military authorities encouraged the Poles to fabricate new slanders, the spread of which only served to heighten the distrust of the populations and to make the fighting area of Poland a quagmire for the Russian armies. The troops did not know whom to trust or distrust. Instead of fighting on friendly ground, welcomed and supported by the moral and economic resources of the civilian population, the Russians fought on ground undermined by hatred, dissension and distrust.

When they began to realize this state of affairs some of the Russian commanders made desperate efforts to check the spy mania.

General P. Kurlov issued the following order in the Baltic provinces on February 25, 1915:

ORDER No. 27

“Of late, more and more anonymous denunciations and reports concerning crimes and actions closely connected with the peculiar conditions of war times are coming in in the provinces given over to my supervision. Such reports not only lack confirmation in most cases, but investigations prove that they are caused in the majority of cases not by a patriotic desire to help the military authorities, but by personal reasons of revenge, not only not admissible in war time, but also particularly criminal. By distracting the attention of officials from their necessary duties, these reports promote disorder and excitement among the local population.

“I have asked the various Governors to order the police officials under their supervision not to institute any investigations on the basis of anonymous denunciations except in extraordinary cases (Article 300 of the Criminal Code), but to forward these denunciations to me and wait for orders.

“In the case of signed denunciations and reports, the police officials must first of all question the denunciator, warning him of the consequence of a false denunciation, and if any signs of crime should be established in the courses of the examination, he should be dealt with according to Articles 250 to 261 of the Criminal Code, or the Governors should impose penalties in their administrative capacity. I order the police officials to strictly follow Article 254 of the Code when making an investigation. Witnesses found to bear false reports shall be subjected to criminal prosecution according to Article 940 of the Code.

“In view of the particularly criminal character of false denunciations in war time, I shall apply the most rigorous measures to those found guilty of this offense.

“I have asked the Governors to make this order public to all.”[32]

It appears also that the similarity of the Yiddish and German languages further laid the Jews open to distrust. The use of Yiddish, in conversation, in correspondence, over the telephone, in the theatre, etc., was prohibited by legal, military and civil authorities under penalty of heavy fine and imprisonment. In Lodz, Vilna, Riga, Warsaw, and other Jewish centers, the performance of plays in Yiddish was prohibited and theatres closed.

Letters from foreign countries to Russia, in any language except Yiddish were generally passed by the censor after scrutiny, but letters in Yiddish were as a rule not delivered at all.

In July, 1915, the commander of the Russian forces issued the following absolute order:

“On the basis of the power entrusted to me according to Paragraph 6, Article 415, Section 6, I prohibit postal and telegraph communications within the district occupied by the army entrusted to me, in the Jewish, German, and Hungarian languages.”[33]

By this order the Russian government not only branded the entire Jewish people as spies and traitors, but also prevented hundreds of thousands of Jewish soldiers at the front from communicating with relatives and friends, because many of the soldiers had been prevented by educational restrictions from learning to read and write Russian. To the Jewish soldier unable to read or write was thus denied even that scant comfort which his Russian comrades might derive from the stereotyped communications checked on the regulation postal card and mailed by field-post.

At the beginning of the war the military censors assumed command of the entire press of Russia. That they used their power with the utmost unfairness against the Jewish press was charged without contradiction in the Duma by Professor Milyukov, Deputies Bomash, Suchanov and others, who pointed out that if the aim of the censor was to suppress every truth and encourage every lie against the Jews, they could not possibly have pursued a more consistent policy. Deputy Bomash furnished the following concrete instances of perversion of facts by the censorship.

1. It systematically expunged or mutilated the names of Jews to whom the cross of St. George had been awarded.[34]

2. When the Mayor of Petrograd congratulated the Jewish community upon the heroic conduct of a lad of 13, named Kaufman, the censor suppressed the fact that Kaufman was a Jew, and that the community referred to was the Jewish community.

3. Stories in the Russian press of the valor of Jews in the French armies are either suppressed or the Jewish names cut out.

4. A news item referring to the fact that General Semenov, whom Jewish soldiers had saved from capture by the Germans, was treating Jews kindly was suppressed by the censor.

5. Letters of regimental commanders to the parents of Jewish hussars congratulating them on the valor of their sons, or notifying them of medals of honor bestowed upon them, were suppressed by the censor.

6. The military censorship also suppressed news of an absolutely non-military nature, whenever it might in any manner have been construed as friendly to Jews. Thus, a news item referring to the non-sectarian activities of the National Relief Committee, headed by the Princess Tatyana, daughter of the Czar, was suppressed. A news item regarding the disapproval of the Council of Ministers of the policy of expelling Jews en masse and of wholesale charges of treachery was also suppressed.

7. Even the official declaration of Count Bobrinski, Military-Governor of Galicia, referring to the correctness of the conduct of the Jews of Galicia, was suppressed.

8. But—outrageously false items published in the notoriously anti-Semitic papers were generally passed by the censor without hesitation. The “Novoe Vremya,” the “Russkoe Znamya,” and other anti-Semitic organs, systematically published reports of wholesale Jewish desertions, treachery, spying, etc., without at any time producing an iota of evidence. Thus, “Russkoe Znamya,” declared that the loyalty of not a single Jewish soldier could be depended upon. The “Novoe Vremya” declared that the Jews were without exception embittered enemies of the Russian army, and that during the Japanese war 18,000 out of 27,000 soldiers voluntarily surrendered as prisoners to the Japanese. Stories without name, date or place to the effect that small Polish boys warned the Russian soldiers to take nothing from Jews because everything they would furnish was poisoned were passed by the censor, and made much of by the press. The notorious Kuzhi canard was not only passed by the censor and printed in the official and semi-official press of Russia, but the censors even hinted to that section of the press which hesitated to publish a tale so manifestly absurd that future relations with the censorship might be imperilled if the story were not given proper publicity. Editors received a continuous stream of circulars forbidding the touching of questions which had absolutely no relation to the war.

9. When the great writers and publicists of Russia decided that it would be desirable, for the honor of Russia, to speak a good word for the Jews and thereby indirectly deprecate before the world the merciless governmental policy, the pamphlet containing their symposium was suppressed by the military censor. Even the preliminary letter of inquiry sent out by these eminent Russians, soliciting information as to the participation of Jews in the war, was suppressed. The Jewish weekly, the “Novy Voskhod,” was fined 2,000 roubles and ultimately suppressed because of the publication of this letter.

In spite of these suspensions, however, the six million Jews of Russia still continued, in a measure, to inform themselves as to the conduct of their sons in the field, and as to matters of Jewish interest in general, through the half dozen, or more, Jewish newspapers, which managed to struggle on in spite of the repeated fines and suspensions imposed by the censor. But on July 5, 1915, the entire Jewish press was suppressed. Lately several papers have been revived in new form, but today the Jews of Russia are practically in the dark. They have no effective means of communicating with one another or with the Russian public. They can neither prevent the instigation of calumnies nor refute them when spread abroad. They live in a constant state of terror lest some new Kuzhi slander set the country aflame against them.

This public official distrust of the Jewish population of Russia increased with the Russian reverses, and the assumption by the authorities that the loyalty of all the Jews was open to suspicion gave added impetus to the spy mania, set the Jews apart as a dangerous people and delivered them helpless into the hands of the Cossack soldiery and the hostile Poles. The atrocities committed upon the Jews in Poland and Galicia have already been referred to. But a more disastrous, though less spectacular, consequence of the governmental attitude towards the Jews was the systematic expulsion of the entire Jewish population from the war zone, an act which assumed the character of a merciless war by Russia upon its own population.

From the very beginning of the war there were individual cases of Jews, who, being suspected of bad faith, were ordered to leave a given locality. There were also sporadic expulsions, or rather a forced exodus, of the entire civilian population of localities which the authorities desired to clear for military operations. But it was in March, 1915, that the authorities began systematically to expel Jews from all the Polish provinces, even those not occupied by German troops, and from the governments of Kovno and Kurland, thus affecting about 30 per cent. of the entire Jewish population of the Empire. Even the Jewish deputy from the Kovno district, Friedman, was expelled, in spite of his constitutional privileges as a member of the Duma.

The first sufferers were the Jewish inhabitants of the smaller towns, because these were readily segregated. In a very brief space of time the region where the Jews constitute over eighty per cent. of the population of the small towns was absolutely denuded of Jewish inhabitants.[35] It was only the rapid invasion of this territory by the Germans which prevented the complete expulsion of every one of the two million or more Jews who inhabited this area. And those who have remained in this territory for the present have been promised, by decree of the supreme military authorities of Russia, immediate expulsion as soon as the Russian troops regain a foothold here.[36]

The enforcement of the expulsion orders was carried out ruthlessly. The time generally allowed was twenty-four hours, rarely forty-eight hours. The Jewish inhabitants of the governments of Kurland and Kovno were given from five to twenty-four hours’ notice.[37]

The Jews of the city of Kovno were notified on the evening of May 3 (16) to leave not later than midnight of May 5 (18), 1915.

Cruelty of Officials

In a speech delivered in the Duma the non-Jewish deputy Dzubinsky declared:

“As a representative of our 5th Siberian division I was myself on the scene and can testify with what incredible cruelty the expulsion of the Jews from the Province of Radom took place. The whole population was driven out within a few hours during the night. At 11 o’clock the people were informed that they had to leave, with a threat that any one found at daybreak would be hanged. And so in the darkness of the night began the exodus of the Jews to the nearest town, Ilzha, thirty versts away. Old men, invalids and paralytics had to be carried on people’s arms because there were no vehicles.

“The police and the gendarmes treat the Jewish refugees precisely like criminals. At one station, for instance, the Jewish Commission of Homel was not even allowed to approach the trains to render aid to the refugees or to give them food and water. In one case a train which was conveying the victims was completely sealed and when finally opened most of the inmates were found half dead, sixteen down with scarlet fever and one with typhus....

“In some places the Governors simply made sport of the innocent victims; among those who particularly distinguished themselves were the governors of Poltava, Minsk, and Ekaterinoslav ... who illegally took away the passports of the victims and substituted provisional certificates instructing them to appear at given places in one of five provinces at a given date. When they presented themselves at these designated places they were shuttled back and forth from point to point at the whim or caprice of local officials.

“In Poltava the Jewish Relief Committee was officially reprimanded by the governor for assuming the name ‘Committee for the Aid of Jewish Sufferers from the War,’ and ordered to rename itself ‘Committee to Aid the Expelled’ on the ground, as stated explicitly in the order, that the Jews had been expelled because they were politically unreliable—and, therefore, presumably, deserved no help.”[38]

No distinction of age, sex or physical condition was made. As most of the able-bodied young men were at the front, those affected by the expulsions were the persons least able to bear up under the suffering and privation entailed—old men and women, children, the sick from the hospitals, the insane from the asylums, even wounded and crippled Jewish soldiers—all were driven out en masse, without the slightest regard for human comfort or decency. Women in labor were given no consideration and many births occurred along the route. Mothers were separated from their children, entire families were broken up and dispersed all over Russia. The Jewish and liberal Russian press is filled with long lists of victims seeking their lost relatives. Where transportation was provided, the exiles were packed in cattle-cars and forwarded to their destination on a way-bill, like so much freight. In many places thousands of them were forced for weeks at a time to stay in congested villages which were absolutely unable to afford them a roof and shelter, or to sleep in the freight cars or in the open fields. And tens of thousands were forced to tramp weary distances along the open road, or, in the fear of the soldiery, to take to the back roads, the woods and swamps, there to die of hunger and exposure.

The total number of Jews who have been expelled to date is unknown. Expulsions are still going on. At the beginning of June, 1915, at the deliberation of the Petrograd Central Committee for the Relief of Jewish War Sufferers, which was participated in by the most prominent provincial committees, it was calculated that the total number of homeless Jews ruined by the expulsion—in Poland and the northwestern district—is 600,000 at the least.[39] After the Kovno-Kurland expulsions there collected in the Vilna government alone some 200,000 exiles.[40] In Riga there gathered, by May 18 (31), some 9,600 families or 42,000 persons.[41] Up to August 6, 1915, there collected in the government of Volhynia upwards of 250,000 refugees.[42]

Hostages

There is evidence to indicate that the Russian government, overwhelmed by the consequences of the expulsion policy, has suggested to the military authorities the advisability of repatriating the exiles; but these authorities have refused to consider the suggestion except on condition that the Jews voluntarily give hostages from among their own ranks, these hostages to include the Rabbi and other leading Jews. This proposal has been universally rejected by the Jews through their representative in the Duma, Deputy Friedman, in a letter to the President of the Council of Ministers:

“As a deputy from the province of Kovno, from which I, together with all other Jews, have now been expelled, I consider it my duty to call the attention of your excellency to the following:—

“According to the latest decrees of the authorities the Jews who have been expelled from their homes are to be allowed to return on condition that they give hostages. This monstrous condition, which the government aims to impose upon its own subjects, the Jewish people will never accept. They prefer to wander about homeless and to die of starvation rather than to submit to demands which insult their self-respect as citizens and Jews. They have honestly performed their duty toward their country and will continue to do so to the very end. No sacrifices frighten them and no persecutions will make them swerve from the path of honor. But neither will any persecutions force them to accept a lie, to give testimony, through base submission, that the monstrous accusations against them are true. When the insolent enemy threw down the gauntlet to Russia the Jews arose to shield their country with their breasts, and I had the honor to appear at the historic session of the Duma as their spokesman in the expression of this spontaneous, inspiring enthusiasm. The Jews gladly assumed all the sacrifices demanded of them by their country because of a feeling of duty to the land to which they are bound by century old, historic bonds, and also because of a sincere hope for a brighter future. And I may say with deep conviction that even now, after all that we have gone through, this sense of duty is as strong as ever. But with the very same deep conviction I consider it my right and my duty to declare that no privations will shake our firm conviction that as Russian subjects we cannot be made the victims of measures applicable only to enemies and traitors; that we consider ourselves and shall never cease to consider ourselves above all suspicion of treason to our duty and our vows. If the authorities really desire to return the Jewish people to the places from which they were driven away by order of the authorities they must take cognizance of this feeling which I can testify under oath, on the basis of many conversations and observations, is universal among us. This permission to return under shameful conditions is only a new and senseless insult. So the entire Jewish population feels, and this feeling is shared by me, their representative.”

Misery of Refugees

This sudden uprooting of an entire people from the land in which it has dwelt for centuries has brought irretrievable disaster to the Jews of Poland and Russia. It has been estimated that nearly three of the six million Jews of Russia and Poland are now without means of support.

Overwhelming and incalculable as the economic loss may be, the moral losses far exceed them in intensity. Jewish communal life is disrupted. Many of the cities and towns from which the expulsions took place were centers of Jewish culture. Most of the Jewish colleges and schools have been closed and many of the buildings and synagogues have been destroyed. It is safe to say that these losses cannot be repaired for generations to come.

The demoralization and pauperization of the individual refugees is painfully noticeable everywhere. Beggary, which was practically unknown among the Jews, is now only too frequent.

The appalling misery of the refugees is fully described in the appended report of the Russian Jewish Committee for the Relief of War Sufferers (see p. 98). The Jews of the Empire living outside of the war zone, have assumed a system of self-taxation which, added to their normal—or rather normally excessive—burden of taxation is practically impoverishing them. The small Jewish community of Moscow alone gives about 85,000 roubles a month, ranging from an average of 200 roubles per month imposed upon 265 manufacturers down to the 10 roubles per month imposed upon their poorest clerks. Other cities are contributing in proportion but they cannot possibly keep pace with the ever-growing need.

Unfair Administration of Relief

And in the midst of this catastrophe the old struggle between the Poles and Jews has continued with unabated ferocity. The local relief committees refused to accept Jews as representatives, denied Jews any help whatsoever and even drove them away, by intimidation and force, from the relief stations supported by their own people. Of seventy-one relief committees operating in Poland, fifty-two contained no Jewish members, although the Jews constituted nearly one-half of the urban population and thirteen to fourteen per cent. of the rural population in these places. In the other nineteen committees the Jewish membership constituted scarcely ten per cent. of the total, although the Jewish population ran from thirty-five to sixty-eight per cent. of the total population in the cities and from ten to fifteen per cent. in the rural districts.[43] And in most of these places the Jews had contributed the major part of the relief funds. Even institutions supported solely by Jewish contributions were expropriated by the Poles.

Thus “the magnificently equipped Hospital for the Wounded, in Warsaw, created at the expense of the Jewish Kehillah, which had refitted the Roman Hotel for the purpose, has been running until now under the official name of the Warsaw Local Relief Committee. But this has turned out to be an anti-Semite organization without a single Jewish representative, its board being made up of rabid Judeophobes, who feel no scruples in the methods and means of their anti-Jewish policy. Private donations, the personal labor of Jews—all this has gone into Polish institutions, all this has disappeared in the Polish river-bed,” declares “Novy Voskhod,” Sept. 11 (24), 1914.

The present attitude of the Jews of Russia toward this problem is well reflected in a letter, published in a recent issue of “Evreyskaya Zhizn,”[44] from a Jew, the owner of a salt mine, who had been invited, among others, to contribute salt for the poorer people of Warsaw, without distinction of race or creed. He replied, in effect, that the proposal met with his deepest sympathy, but he took the liberty of inquiring as to who would have charge of the distribution of the salt. “Everybody knows,” he wrote, “the intolerant attitude of the Polish Relief Committee toward the Jews. This makes us doubt whether your high principle would be carried out conscientiously if administered by Polish hands. The Warsaw Committee is particularly distrusted, and it would be extremely unpleasant for me to feel that the necessaries that we contributed should be withheld from our own fellow Jews. On the other hand, we would welcome gladly every effort on the part of Russian organizations to undertake to cooperate with Poles and Jews in this matter to insure an equitable distribution.”

When the Central Citizens’ Committee of Warsaw was dissolved by the German governor of Poland, in September, 1915, its accounts showed that it had distributed over eleven million roubles ($5,500,000) since the outbreak of the war, of which the Jews received scarcely 100,000, although they constitute one-sixth of the population and the funds had been gathered with the express understanding that the distribution be absolutely without discrimination between Poles and Jews. The Liquidation Commission which disposed of the balance on hand at the time of the dissolution of the Central Committee—some 1,290,000 roubles—allotted it all to Polish institutions. Although there are 300,000 Jews in Warsaw, the majority of them in dire need, not a rouble was offered for their relief.

Finally it must be noted that the occupation of Poland by the German forces has afforded little relief to the Jews, as the scarcity of food in Germany precludes the shipment of any considerable quantities of provisions to ameliorate the distress of the starving Jews of Poland.

The cruelty of the government’s policy toward the Jews has not received the support of the Russian people, as the numerous protests uttered in the Duma, in public assemblies and in the press clearly indicate. When it is remembered that those non-Jews who, in Russia, dare to utter a word in favor of the despised Jews, risk their position and prestige to a degree unparalleled in any other country, the following calendar of protests and manifestoes constitutes a body of evidence against the Russian government which must compel conviction.

These protests have been grouped, for convenience, into four classes:

Early in the session of the Duma the Left groups proposed an interpellation of the Government with respect to its illegal acts against the Jews. After some debate the proposed questions were referred to the Committee on Interpellations, which reported them out, on August 30, 1915, in this form:

I. Do the president of the Council of Ministers and the Ministers of the Interior and Justice know of the illegal conduct of their administrative officers with respect to the following:

1. That officers of the prison administration received persons taken by the military authorities as hostages from the local Jewish population of Riga, Prushkov ... etc.?

2. That the prosecuting attorneys took no steps to obtain the immediate release of these persons, accused of no crime and illegally imprisoned?

3. That the expelled were driven by agents of the police in Vilikomir, Zhagory and Shadov into freight cars inadequate for the accommodation of one-tenth of them, and that the remainder, including children, aged men and women, and invalids were compelled to follow afoot?

4. That the officers of the local governments took no steps to check the repeated robberies by the local population of the property left by the exiles?

5. That the officers of the Gendarmerie of Homel prohibited the supplying of food to the exiles, even though they were at the point of exhaustion from hunger and thirst?

6. That in Novozybkov individuals who sent telegrams appealing for help were arrested?

7. That the officers of the Gendarmerie, with armed threats, refused to admit to sealed cars persons who brought food to the expelled at the station of Bielitsa, on the Poliess railroad?

8. That the police officers locked the exiles in sealed cars for several days at a time?

9. That in the shipment of these exiles from Zolotonosh to Kovno and back some of them were kept in the cars ten days?

10. That the local government administration of the cities of Minsk, Samara and Rostov required the reprinting in the local paper of the story of Jewish treason in the village of Kuzhi, first published in “Nash Viestnik”?

11. That the local administration of Tashkent ordered prayer for the delivery of the army from the treachery of the Jews?

II. If the illegal acts of the authorities are known to the indicated individuals what steps were taken by them towards the punishment of the guilty and the prevention of similar breaches of law in the future?

The significance of this interpellation cannot be overestimated, insofar as the facts implied in these questions are officially accepted by the great standing committee of the Duma as worthy of cognizance. Had the questions originally proposed by the Left groups been without foundation they would have been rejected without reference to the Committee on Interpellations; and had the Committee on Interpellations found, upon examination of the evidence underlying each question by both the Right and Left deputies on the Committee, that the evidence was defective or inadequate, the interpellation would never have been reported out in this form. The fact that it was so reported indicates that the evidence was incontrovertible, and was so accepted by the Liberals and reactionaries alike. The report of the Committee is dated August 30, 1915, but as the Duma was prorogued immediately afterwards, the Government’s answer to the interpellation is not known.

In the course of the debates on these and other questions affecting the Jews the expressed attitude of the representatives of the great bulk of the Russian population left no doubt of their absolute opposition to the Government on the Jewish question.[45]

Professor Milyukov, the leader of the Constitutional Democrats, declared on July 19 (August 1), 1915:

“The strongest factor in the disruption of our national unity was the government’s policy toward our alien subjects. The foul play upon the obscure racial prejudices of the masses, with the customary weapon of this kind of strife—anti-Semitism and the persecution of all dissenting nationalities or religions—has been exercised with unparalleled effrontery. Under the mask of military precaution, measures worse than credible are taken against crimes that are imaginary.... At a time when nations are struggling for the liberties and rights of small peoples, such terrible deeds embitter our friends and evoke joy among our enemies.” (Loud applause from the left.)

Deputy Kerensky. “We are fighting this war in a territory occupied by non-Russian nationalities. But did not our government, this very year, cause these peoples to doubt the wisdom of the path they took a year ago, when they linked their destiny with ours?”

Deputy Tchkheidze. Aug. 3 (16), 1915: “It is well known to you that the Government régime has been based on Jewish oppression and that at all critical moments it aimed its blows first of all at the Jews, because they were in the line of least resistance....

“A year ago the war began and at once accusations of treachery against the Jews were started by the Government. To-day Russia and the whole world knows who is to blame for the condition in which Russia found herself. The guilty ones were not at all the Jews, as the whole country will confirm, but those who stuffed their pockets with the money which they made on Government orders for army supplies (shouts from the left: “That’s true!”) The guilty ones were those who, with the aid of men like Myasoyodyeff, Grotgus and other traitors, betrayed Russia....

“This is supposed to be a war for liberty, fraternity, and equality, but what justice is there in making a whole nation answer for the crimes of individuals, granting that there are any?

“In the name of what truth is the Kuzhi slander being published in the ‘Pravitelstvenny Viestnik?’

“In the name of what truth are the various periodical publications ordered to reprint this communication under penalty of a fine?

“What justice demands that a Jewish volunteer who has several times been wounded be expelled within twenty-four hours when he tries to find a place in Russia to recover from his wounds?

“In the name of what humanity is it forbidden to hand food to starving Jewish refugees cooped up in freight trains? In the name of what brotherhood is one part of the army aroused against the Jewish soldiers who are in the trenches side by side with our own soldiers?

“We accuse the Germans of breaking the laws of warfare, of using poison gases and mutilating prisoners. Such acts can call forth only indignation and protest. Let these acts be a stain upon the ruling classes of Germany. But, gentlemen, in the name of what laws of humanity are orders issued to the Russian army to drive peaceful Jews ahead of the troops and to expose them to fire?

“In the name of what laws of humanity are Jewish-Russian subjects taken as hostages and put into prisons and tortured and shot?

“We denounced the Germans for having destroyed Louvain and the Cathedral of Rheims; but I ask you in the name of what ethical or esthetic principles is a Jewish woman who seeks refuge in the synagogue violated?”

Baron Rosen, former Russian Ambassador to the United States, also protested outspokenly against the continuation of the anti-Jewish policy of the Government in a speech before the Council of the Empire, Aug. 22 (Sept. 4), 1915. (See Appendix, p. 117.)

The leading political party of Russia—the Constitutional Democratic Party—officially voiced its sentiments on the Jewish question at a national convention of the Party, held at Petrograd on June 19–21 (O. S. June 6–8), 1915, at which the Central Committee of the Party submitted a comprehensive report which was adopted unanimously, and which, summarized in the form of a resolution, was ordered published. This resolution, after citing the loyalty and patriotism of the Jews at the outbreak of the war, continues:

“This intense spirit of patriotism manifested by the Jews in the hour of Russia’s danger seemed for a time to have broken down the rooted prejudices of the Government and to have cleared the way for the recognition in Russia, of that civic equality which is accorded the Jews throughout the civilized world. But this would have deprived our reactionaries, those champions of an outlived past, of their old and well-tested weapon of black demagoguery—anti-Semitism. And so we see that under the direct influence of these notorious Jew-baiters measures were early adopted by the Government to set the army and the people against the Jews. Every advantage was taken of the exigencies of war. Isolated cases of espionage, likely to occur among the border populations of all nations, were seized upon as a basis for universal accusations and furnished the occasion for the invention of incredible myths and rumors circulated exclusively to the injury of the Jews.... The Jews have been held collectively responsible for the acts of individuals among them—a policy which outrages the most elementary sense of justice, a policy which is no longer sanctioned by the laws of any civilized land, a monstrous survival of the remote past.... Needless to mention the spread of discord and hatred, the growth of mutual suspicion and distrust among the races inhabitating Russia which must of necessity follow such a policy....

“Not only in the name of brotherhood; not only in the name of that harmony so necessary where different nationalities are fated to live under the shelter of a common government; not only for the sake of keeping alive among the Jewish people, now being driven to despair, some hope of a brighter future, and some faith in that progress of which they have ever been the valiant champions, but also for the sake of the attainment of that ideal of the Russian people—the elevation of our beloved Fatherland to the status of a truly enlightened empire—must we offer united opposition against the forces of reaction.... Our adversaries hope to continue, even after the war, to use the poisoned weapon of primitive race hatred which they have used until now. It is our task to demonstrate to the masses of the people that they are again being duped, that their base passions are now being aroused in order to distract their attention from their own vital interests. We must continue, as before, to point out, firmly and persistently, that there is only one path to a brighter future for Russia, the same path along which the entire civilized world has traveled, and that along this road there is only one solution of the Jewish question—a solution demanded by the most elementary principles of civilized government—and that is to grant them, as individuals, full civic rights, and as a people, the right to free racial and cultural self-development.”

A striking incident occurred during the debate upon this resolution. One of the leaders of the party, Maklakov, a brother of the former Minister of the Interior, advanced a plea in extenuation of the alleged Jewish treacheries.

“The Jews have suffered such cruel persecutions in Russia,” he remarked, “that they might well be excused even if these spy stories were found to be true.”

“We spurn this right to baseness,” cried out former deputy Vinaver, a Jew. “Our loyalty is not for sale. We are not newcomers here. Our ancestors have lived here for hundreds of years. We are patriots because we feel ourselves bound to Russia. We believe in Russia even more than you do.”

Various municipalities outside the Pale have petitioned the government to give equal rights to the Jews.

The Municipal Council of Smolensk, at its session of December 19, 1914 (January 1, 1915), passed a resolution, with only two dissenting votes, petitioning the government “to abolish all measures which restrict the rights of Russian subjects of the Jewish faith, and, in particular, to abolish the Pale of Settlement.” At this session Councillor P. V. Mikhailoff said:

“We are referring not only to those families of Jewish soldiers at the front, to families fleeing from devastated Poland, but even to the soldiers themselves who are placed hors de combat because of their wounds, after having valiantly served in our ranks. Thus, for example, a Jewish soldier wounded in the hand and in the breast, having parents in this city, obtained permission only with the utmost difficulty to stay here three months. At the end of this period he must go back to the Pale and live there without means or medical attention, although he is threatened with tuberculosis.... This is merely one case in thousands which prove to us the horrors of the situation in which Jewish soldiers and their families are placed because of their deprivation of civic rights. Those families whose members have shed their blood for Russia are ruined by the invasion of the enemy. They arrive here to find a refuge from starvation and death, from ruin and violation. We must remember that nearly a half million Jews are fighting side by side with our brave warriors against the common enemy. As to the civilian Jews, they have no less patriotism or enthusiasm than the other inhabitants.... His Majesty, the Emperor, in passing through Lublin, Grodno, and Tiflis, has deigned to express his thanks to the Jews for their faithfulness to our common country. The conclusion from this is clear: There is no serious reason to maintain any longer those measures of restriction so futile and so pernicious and so malevolent.... But the Jewish question is not merely a question of abstract justice. The economic and moral development of our city life is seriously retarded by the restrictions placed upon one part of the population....”[46]

In August, 1914, a meeting of municipality, Zemstvo, Stock Exchange, and University officials and merchants, at Odessa, resolved that the country would benefit by the abolition of all repressive laws and the opening of educational institutions to all citizens.[47]

In August, 1914, the Moscow Conference of Mayors also forcibly condemned the expulsion policy of some governors and resolved to use its influence to ameliorate the position of the Jews.[48]

So also the Congress of Delegates from cities of Western Siberia petitioned for the abolition of all Jewish disabilities.[49]

Within the past few months the municipalities of Samara, Saratov, Ekaterinoslav and other important centers; the Siberian Municipal Conference, and the Conference of twenty Zemstvos held at Yaroslavl, all petitioned the government and the Duma to remove the disabilities affecting the Jews of Russia.

The Military-Industrial Committee, organized in May, 1915, to integrate the economic resources of the country on a war basis, met on August 25, 1915, and condemned the incompetence of the government openly. In his presidential address P. P. Riabushinski deplored the tardiness of the government in calling upon the social forces of the country. “This leadership of the country has been attempted by persons incapable of leadership, and it is now evident to everybody that a new personnel is needed within the government.... We have observed the workings of the government departments from the very beginning of the war, and have come to the conclusion that these departments are unable to cope with the situation. The supply of war material is altogether unorganized, as the army well knows.... The government will from now on transfer to us more and more of its functions. But the longer this is deferred the less benefit will result.... This work cannot be done through a poorly organized government.... The State is a huge business enterprise, whose parts must work harmoniously.... The war has now changed from a struggle of will and spirit into a struggle of machinery. Therefore, the persons entrusted with the defense of the country must know the country.... It cannot be denied that Russia is at the present moment facing a great danger, and we fear that the time may come when our courage will sink.... (censored). Our army is suffering heroically.... (censored). We know that after a while, with the war continuing in the same poor fashion as at present, the government will be ready to meet us half-way, but we also know by experience that it will then be too late and even the very best man called by the government will be unable to accomplish anything.”

This address was met with thunderous applause. Another speaker, Prof. E. L. Zubashov, referring to the Jews, declared that: “The sons of the Jewish nation are now fighting side by side with the Russians for their country. Unfortunately this country has until now been only a step-mother to them. Let us express the hope that it may now become a mother to them.” He therefore proposed a resolution favoring the abolition of all restrictive laws against the Jews. His proposal was met with prolonged applause and was accepted by the convention.[50]

At a meeting of the Free Economic Society—the foremost economic organization of Russia—on January 16, 1915, the following resolution was adopted unanimously:

“The Commission ... has taken into account the exceptionally difficult position in which the Jewish population finds itself, in view of the residence restrictions to which they are subject.

“While they are suffering all the terrors of war together with the rest of the population, the Jewish population, being mainly urban, has suffered particularly from the general disorganization of economic relations not only within the immediate region of military activities, but far beyond.

“Under these conditions it would be a great relief to the suffering population if measures were adopted which would make it easier for them to move about in search of work. In view of the size of our country and the unlimited economic resources of its regions, especially those of the interior, have hardly been touched by the miseries of war. There are regions in the interior of Russia where economic conditions have even improved somewhat, since they have assumed many of the industries abandoned in Poland, and since the commissary department placed large orders here.

“At the same time the Jewish population is even at this exceptional time artificially confined to the cities of Poland and the western provinces by force of existing legal limitations which increases the hardships of war for them. If in time of peace these restrictions, which are economically harmful and morally degrading, are recognized as a relic of barbarism that must be abolished, it is all the more difficult to reconcile ourselves with them at the present time, when hundreds and thousands of Jews serve under the Russian banners on the battlefield.

“In view of these facts the Commission has decided to request the Council of the Free Economic Society to communicate with the government and members of the society who are members of the legislative bodies:—

“To immediately stop the functioning of all restrictive laws relating to the Settlement rights of Jews, and

“To abolish them immediately and permanently by legislative enactment.”[51]

Numerous commercial and technical associations have passed resolutions declaring that the main cause of Russia’s economic backwardness lay in the restrictions placed upon Jews, and that the sole means of combating German predominance over Russian industry and trade is through the abolition of these restrictions. Among these organizations are the national grain, lumber, fur and gold trades; the Chambers of Commerce of Moscow, Petrograd and the leading cities of Russia and Siberia, and the national Congress of Bourses; the Russo-American Chamber of Commerce, etc. Practically every national convention of every industry has petitioned the government to liberate the economic talents of the Jews by the removal of all legal restrictions.

Just as the commercial and industrial elements of Russia demand equality for the Jews on economic grounds, so the intellectual elements of Russia demand it on broad human grounds.

The great manifesto issued at the beginning of the war by 225 of the leading publicists and writers of Russia, declares:

“Russia, in the present great war, is straining all her physical and intellectual forces to an extraordinary degree. All the peoples of Russia are taking part in the war, sharing equally in all the labors. We believe that the blood of the fighters is not being shed in vain. We believe that after having borne the horrors of the war, the population will return with increased energy to the work of building for a better and brighter future. This we believe, and we hope that the relations between the different peoples that inhabit Russia will be built up in the future on the eternal foundations of wisdom and justice.

“But at this moment, so important in history, we see with sorrow and consternation that to the sufferings of one of the nationalities inhabiting Russia new distress and new vexations are added. The limitation of the right of education is now felt with particular pain by the Jewish youth. As the Western frontiers are closed the usual exodus to the foreign schools is checked, while in Russia itself the percentage limitations against the Jews in the schools are maintained in force. The Jews of the destroyed towns have no right to leave the Pale of Settlement, a measure which often leads to a disintegration and a division of members of families, wives and children of wounded soldiers not being allowed to visit their husbands and fathers, and being at the same time exposed to all sorts of chicanery. The sorely-tried Jewish nation which has given to the world such precious contributions in the domain of religion, of philosophy, of poetry; which has always shared the travails and trials of Russian life; which has been hurt so often by prejudice and insult; which more than once has proven its love for Russia, and its devotion to her cause, is now again exposed to unjust accusations and persecutions.

“The Russian Jews, who are industriously working with us in all spheres of labor and activity that are accessible to them, have given so many convincing proofs of their sincere desire to be with us, to render service to our cause ... that the limitation of their right of citizenship is not only a crying injustice, but also reacts injuriously upon the very interests of the State. The Russian Empire can, and must, draw its strength from the complete union of all the nationalities inhabiting Russia, and only by the placing of all citizens upon an equal footing will the power of Russia become indestructible.

“Russians, let us remember that the Russian Jew has no other country than Russia, and that nothing is dearer to a man than the soil on which he is born. Let us understand that the prosperity and power of Russia are inseparable from the well-being and the liberty of all the nationalities which constitute its vast Empire. Let us understand this truth, act according to our intelligence and our conscience, and we may be certain that the ultimate disappearance of persecutions against the Jews and their complete emancipation will form one of the conditions of a truly constructive imperial régime.”

Some idea of the expenditures of the General Relief Committee in Petrograd is given by the following figures:

FOR GENERAL RELIEF

Poland—	Roubles
Warsaw	350,000
Province Warsaw	10,000
Lodz	1,500
Province Lomsha	12,000
Province Suvalki	7,000
Province Liublin	75,000
Province Radom	45,000
Province Cholm	4,400
Province Kielce	40,000
	———	545,000
Southwestern Province—
(Border Places)	14,000
Radzivilov	14,000
Chtin	5,000
Volotchisk	5,000
Gorokov	1,000
Novosselitsy	500
Various small places	5,000
	———	31,000
Northwestern Province—
Province Kovno	55,000
Province Vilna	30,000
Province Bialystock, Minsk, etc.	10,000
	———	95,000
Galicia		112,000
Assistance to Jews in Palestine and Syria (through representative in Alexandria)		10,000
Assistance to Russian-Jewish Refugees from Abroad (when passing Petrograd)		1,500
Assistance to Wounded and Recovered Soldiers returning to the Front		15,000
Purchase of Matzoth for Soldiers at the Front (subsidy to the Rabbinical Committee)		15,000
Subsidy to Various Educational Institutions (Yeshiboth, Jewish teachers, etc.)		16,000
Organization of cheap credit to Jewish artisans, workmen and merchants (through Jewish Cooperative Credit Societies)		[57]22,000
Assistance to clerks of Jewish Cooperative Societies (affected by the war)		1,000
Organization and support of sanitary and feeding expeditions (two expeditions)		50,000
		———
Total		914,000
Expenditure of the Moscow, Odessa, Kiev Committees		350,000
		—————
		[58]1,204,000

According to approximate estimates within the next months the General Jewish Relief Committee, working conjointly with the Jewish Committees in Moscow, Kiev and Odessa, will require the following sums to satisfy the most urgent needs of the organizations now in full operation and yet to be started:

Poland and Northwestern Provinces—	Roubles
Warsaw	From	150,000	to	200,000
Province Warsaw	From	15,000	to	20,000
Province Liublin	From	20,000	to	25,000
Province Suvalki	From	12,000	to	15,000
Province Radom	From	20,000	to	25,000
Province Kielce	From	20,000	to	25,000
Province Kovno	From	25,000	to	30,000
Province Vilna	From	10,000	to	15,000
Province Grodno	From	8,000	to	10,000
Province Lomzha	From	15,000	to	20,000
Province Plotzk	From	6,000	to	8,000
Province Cholm	From	10,000	to	12,000
Southwestern Provinces—
Province Volynia	From	20,000	to	25,000
Province Podolia		...		...
Province Bessarabia	From	40,000	to	50,000
Galicia—
Outside war area	From	10,000	to	15,000
Restoration of trade and industry among war sufferers	From	100,000	to	150,000
Extraordinary expenditure	From	10,000	to	15,000
	———————————
Thus	From	484,000	to	650,000

[Expressed in United States currency, the sum of $242,000 to $325,000 per month will be required, according to this early estimate, to satisfy the most urgent needs of the sufferers.]

As already pointed out, the sphere and extent of distress are ever increasing with the progress of the war. The Jewish relief organizations in Russia thus stand before the alarming problem: whence to obtain adequate funds to satisfy the ever growing demand. This problem becomes the more urgent as new forms of relief must be devised as the time goes on. It will not do merely to feed and shelter the stricken population. Many of the sufferers are able and willing to work, if they but had the possibility of doing so.

The attention of the Jewish public will therefore have to be concentrated on a new problem: to help the ruined artisans to rehabilitate themselves, to rebuild their shattered homes and to restore their ruined business by means of cheap credit provided for them. The solution of this problem will, however, require infinitely larger means, which Russian Jewry is unable to raise....

II.

(August 2, 1915)

(Translated from Petrograd “Retch,” of August 3, 1915, and
published in the New York “Times,” September 23, 1915)

In spite of their oppressed condition, in spite of their status of outlawry, the Jews have risen to the exalted mood of the nation and in the course of the last year have participated in the war in a noteworthy manner. They fell short of the others in no respect. They mobilized their entire enrollment, but, indeed, with this difference, that they have also sent their only sons into the war. The newspapers at the beginning of the war had a remarkable number of Jewish volunteers to record. Gentlemen, those were volunteers who were entitled through their educational qualifications to the rank of officers. They knew that they would not receive this rank; and nevertheless they entered the war.

The Jewish youth, which, as a result of the restrictions as to admission to the high schools of the country, had been forced to study abroad, returned home when war was declared, or entered the armies of the allied nations. A large number of Jewish students fell at the defense of Liege and also at other points on the western front.

The Zionist youths, when they were confronted with the dilemma of accepting Turkish sovereignty or being compelled to emigrate from Palestine, preferred to go to Alexandria and there to join the English army.

The Jews built hospitals, contributed money, and participated in the war in every respect just as did the other citizens. Many Jews received marks of distinction for their conduct at the front.

Before me lies the letter of a Jew who returned from the United States of America:

“I risked my life,” he writes, “and if, nevertheless, I came as far as Archangel, it was only because I loved my fatherland more than my life or that American freedom which I was permitted to enjoy. I became a soldier, and lost my left arm almost to the shoulder. I was brought into the governmental district of Courland. Scarcely had I reached Riga when I met at the station my mother and my relatives, who had just arrived there, and who on that same day were compelled to leave their hearth and home at the order of the military authorities. Tell the gentlemen who sit on the benches of the Right that I do not mourn my lost arm, but that I do mourn deeply the self-respect that was not denied to me in alien lands but is now lost to me.”

Such was the sentiment of the Jews that found expression in numerous appeals and manifestations in the press, and finally also in this House. Surely these sentiments should have been taken into account. One should have a right to assume that the Government would adopt measures for the amelioration of the fate of the Jews who found themselves in the very centre of the war-like occurrences. Likewise, one should have taken into account the sentiments of hundreds of thousands of Jews who shed their blood on the field of battle.

Instead of that, however, we see that from the beginning of the war the measures of reprisals against the Jewish populace were not only not weakened but, on the contrary, made much stronger. Banished were Jewish men and women whose husbands, children, and brothers, were shedding their blood for the fatherland. A wounded soldier named Alexander Roskhov, who had been shot in the eye, came to Charkof for further treatment. On his passport were the words, “To be sent to a settlement.” The private soldier Godlewski, one of whose legs had been amputated, and who found himself at Rostof on the Don for recuperation, they tried to send to his native village in the Government of Kalisch, already under German occupation; and it was only due to the activities of the Rural League that he was permitted to stay. An apothecary’s helper, who likewise had been wounded on the battlefield, was not allowed to remain in Petrograd for his cure, and it was only by virtue of special intercession that he was later allowed to sojourn two months more at Petrograd, with the notice, however, that at the expiration of this period no further extension of his sojourn would be granted.

In a long war lucky events alternate with unlucky ones, and in any case it is naturally useful to have scapegoats in reserve. For this purpose there exists the old firm; the Jew. Scarcely has the enemy reached our frontiers when the rumor is spread that Jewish gold is flowing over to the Germans, and that, too, in aeroplanes, in coffins, and—in the entrails of geese!

Scarcely had the enemy pressed further, than there appeared again beyond dispute the eternal Jew “on the white horse,” perhaps the same one who once rode on the white horse through the city in order to provoke a pogrom. The Jews have set up telephones, have destroyed the telegraph lines. The legend grew, and with the eager support of the powers of Government and the agitation in official circles, assumed ever greater proportions. A series of unprecedented, unheard of, cruel measures was adopted against the Jews. These measures, which were carried out before the eyes of the entire population, suggested to the people and to the army the recognition of the fact that the Jews were treated as enemies by the Government, and that the Jewish population was outside the law.

In the first place these measures consisted of the complete transplanting of the Jewish population from many districts, to the very last man. These compulsory migrations took place in the Kingdom of Poland and in many other territories. All told, about a half million persons have been doomed to a state of beggary and vagabondage. Anyone who has seen with his own eyes how these expulsions take place, will never forget them as long as he lives. The exiling took place within twenty-four hours, sometimes within two days. Women, old men, and children, and sometimes invalids, were banished. Even the feebleminded were taken from the lunatic asylums and the Jews were forced to take these with them. In Mohilnitse, 5,000 persons were expelled within twenty-four hours. Their way led to Warsaw through Kalwayra. Meantime they were forced to travel across fields through the Government of Lublin, and were deprived of the possibility of taking along their inventories. Many were obliged to travel on foot. When they reached Lublin, the Jewish Committee there had provided bread and food for them; but they were not allowed to tarry, and they had to travel on at once.

On the way an accident occurred; a six-year-old child was killed by a fall. The parents were not permitted to bury the child.

I saw also the refugees of the Government of Kovno. Persons who only yesterday were still accounted wealthy were beggars the next day. Among the refugees I met Jewish women and girls, who had worked together with Russian women, had sewed garments with them and collected contributions with them, and who were now forced to encamp on the railway embankment. I saw families of reservists. I saw among the exiles wounded soldiers wearing the Cross of St. George. It is said that Jewish soldiers in marching through the Polish cities were forced to witness the expulsion of their wives and children. The Jews were loaded in freight cars like cattle. The bills of lading were worded as follows: “Four hundred and fifty Jews, en route to ——.”

There were cases in which the Governors refused outright to take in the Jews at all. I myself was in Vilna at the very time when a whole trainload of Jews was stalled for four days in Novo-Wilejsk station. Those were Jews who had been sent from the Government of Kovno to the Government of Poltawa, but the Governor there would not receive them and sent them back to Kovno, whence they were again reshipped to Poltawa. Imagine, at a time when every railway car is needed for the transportation of munitions, when from all sides are heard complaints about the lack of means of transportation, the Government permits itself to do such a thing! At one station there stood 110 freight cars containing Jewish exiles.

Another measure which likewise is unprecedented in the entire history of the civilized world, is the introduction of the so-called system of “Hostages,” and, indeed, hostages were taken not from the enemy, but from the country’s own subjects, its own citizens. Hostages were taken in Radom, Kieltse, Lomscha, Kovno, Riga, Lublin, etc. The hostages were held under the most rigorous régime, and at present there are still under arrest in Poltava Jewish hostages from the Governments of Kieltse and Radom.

Some time ago, in commenting upon the procedure against the Jews, the leader of the Opposition, even before the outbreak of the war, used the expression that we were approaching the times of Ferdinand and Isabella. I now assert that we have already surpassed that era. No Jewish blood was shed in defence of Spain, but ours flowed the moment the Jews helped defend the Fatherland.

Yes, we are beyond the pale of the laws, we are oppressed, we have a hard life, but we know the source of that evil; it comes from those benches (pointing to the boxes of the Ministers). We are being oppressed by the Russian Government, not by the Russian people. Why, then, is it surprising if we wish to unite our destinies, not with that of the Russian Government, but with that of the Russian people? When three years ago there was pending here the Cholm law proposal, did the thought ever occur at the time to the sponsors of the bill that in a short time they would have to scrape and bow before free autonomous Poland? We likewise hope that the time is not distant when we can be citizens of the Russian State with full equality of privileges with the free Russian people.

Before the face of the entire country, before the entire civilized world, I declare that the calumnies against the Jews are the most repulsive lies and chimeras of persons who will have to be responsible for their crimes. [Applause on Left.]

It depends upon you, gentlemen of the Imperial Duma, to speak the word of encouragement, to perform the action that can deliver the Jewish people from the terrible plight in which it is at present, and that can lead them back into the ranks of the Russian citizens who are defending their Fatherland. [Cries of “Right.”]

I do not know if the Imperial Duma will so act, but if it does so act it will be fulfilling an obligation of honor and an act of wise statesmanship that is necessary for the profit and for the greatness of the Fatherland. [Applause on the Left.]

III.

August 22 (September 4), 1915

(Translation from “Retch,” No. 231, August 23 (September 5), 1915)

Baron Rosen began with the statement that while the question of supplies for the army and navy was paramount, there was nevertheless another side to it, and that was the question of the domestic policy of the Empire. He reminded his hearers that in May, 1913, he had warned the Council of the Empire of the catastrophe imminent in Europe, but that his statement had been met with ridicule and skepticism. The result of such an attitude is now obvious to all. In this great conflict, it has become clear that neither side will be able to crush the other, as was expected at the outset of this war. But even as it is, this war of extermination of the white race must, in the end, be decided in favor of one of the two parties at conflict. He thought that certain intangible elements entering into the question would be of great importance in the settlement of this war. Putting aside the political, economic and psychological questions that led to this conflict, he thought that the ultimate issue was the decision of the world to battle against the dictum of Germany that “might is greater than right and right is created only by might.” Under the circumstances, it would seem that the sympathies of the entire world should be on the side of the allies. But in reality this is not the case; and for this there are several reasons.

“It is undoubtedly within our power to do away with one of the factors militating against us in the public opinion of neutral countries. In the struggle that we, together with the most civilized nations of Europe, are waging against the Pan-Germanism, imperialism and absolutism, and for right and justice, for the liberty and independence of the weaker nations, we shall achieve the full sympathy of the civilized world only when we shall have put our inner front—if I may use that expression—on a level with the political ideology of our valiant allies; for instance, in the conduct of our polity with reference to the borderlands, and the so-called alien races composing its population.”

After stating that there were two diametrically opposed political systems, one current among the Allies and the other among the Germans, Baron Rosen continued:

“To the maximum injury of the true interests of Russia, we have adopted and have carried out unswervingly the true German system of politics with reference to our borderlands and the so-called foreign races and foreign faiths, a policy which has been made even more perfect by the admixture of medieval religious intolerance.

“It may be retorted that the fate of a campaign is decided by military power and not by the greater or lesser sympathy of neutral countries for the policy of a given state. The German Government does not think so; for otherwise it would not spend countless millions for pan-German propaganda in all the countries of the world, even the most remote. But we, on the other hand, not only fail to oppose anything to this propaganda, but by the course of our domestic policies we place in the hands of this propaganda powerful arguments for arousing against us public opinion of such countries as the United States, the only great neutral power, and of Sweden, our neighbor.

“It is inconceivable that the framers of our policy should fail to realize that the propaganda directed against us, conducted under official auspices and equipped with the amplest resources, will scarcely cause our own interests and the interests of our Allies one-tenth of the harm which is caused to these interests by our attitude towards the Jewish population of Russia and our systematic violation of the legal conscience of the Finnish population—an attitude which smacks of the dark times of medievalism.

“The question now is, why did not the Government find it possible to put an end to this problem decisively and forever, as it has finally, and, alas, with such delay, settled the question of the autonomy of Poland? This may be explained only by the fact that the Government hesitated to break with the traditional policy so dear to the militant nationalism.

“Accordingly the Duma and the Council are in duty bound to come to the aid of the Government in this regard and take upon themselves the initiative of introducing a bill for the abolition of all laws restricting the rights of the Jews and for the abrogation of the law of July 17 (30) concerning Finland. The passage of these measures would undoubtedly lighten the heavy task now confronting the Government in the sphere of international relations and it would be met by our valiant allies with the liveliest satisfaction.

“We must remember that this great European war is not only a struggle of interests, but is also a struggle of ideas and principles. In the battle against German militarism, Russia has placed herself on the side of right and freedom, and for the triumph of the idea for which we are now fighting, it is necessary that in Russia, too, there should be no longer any people without rights or any people oppressed.”