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Historical Alliance of Blacks and Jews
The history of Jewish - African American relations in the United States is one of mutual cooperation. Each group has faced obstacles and a series of struggles and together they have worked side-by-side for equality and social justice. Unfortunately, this once successful alliance has faded in recent memory. Ever since the Civil Rights Movement, a period of unprecedented cooperation between Blacks and Jews, racial tensions have grown significantly. Below are examples in history of Blacks and Jews working together, supporting each other's rights and agenda and finally clashing against each other with rising tensions.
1838 |
24 prominent Jews led petition effort in the Senate for abolition of slavery |
1850 |
Rabbi David Einhorn of Congregation Har Sinai in Baltimore denied slavery as a sin against God and crime against humanity Lloyd St. Temple, Baltimore, used matzo ovens to hide slaves |
1860 |
"With the exception of the Jews, under the whole heavens there is not to be found a people pursued with a more relentless prejudice and persecution than are the free colored people of the U.S." - The Colored Patriots of America by William Cooper Nell |
1862 |
Gen. Ulysses S. Grant expelled Jews from having businesses in the South. |
1864 |
Jews, Protestants and Catholics met to denounce slavery. This was the first interdenominational event in American history. |
1866 |
Ku Klux Klan founded. |
1889 |
"There is such similarity between the Jews and the Negro. One is despised almost as much as the other". - New York Age - Black newspaper |
1896 |
Founding of Black-Judaic institution in Boley, Oklahoma. |
1902 |
“It's our turn to save the Negro.” - Theodore Herzl |
1905 |
Students at Hampton Institute raised $52 for Jewish Relief Fund Committee to help Jewish victims of Russian anti-Semitism. |
Early 1900s |
Marcus Garvey, leader of Back to Africa Movement, based his movement on his understanding of Zionism. |
1909 |
NAACP founded by Blacks and Jews: Julius Rosenthal, Lillian Wald, Rabbi Emil G.Hirsch, Stephen Wise, Henry Malkewitz. |
1910 |
Jews and Blacks and a few white Christians started The Urban League |
1912 |
Coalition led by Booker T. Washington and Julius Rosenwald (Sears, Roebuck) founded over 5,000 schools and colleges for Blacks in the south called the Rosenwald schools. |
1913 |
Leo Frank lynched in Georgia. Frank is the only known Jew to have been lynched. |
1914 |
Jewish ILGWU (Int'l Ladies Garment Workers Union) and ACW organized blacks for membership. |
1945 |
Black battalion liberated Gunskirchen concentration camp, subcamp of Mauthausen. |
1945 |
Adam Clayton Powell spoke re anti-Semitism. |
1949 |
Jewish boys leaflet outside Ebbits Field demanding integration of baseball to make it better during the time of Jackie Robinson. |
1958 |
The Temple bombed in Atlanta |
1960s |
Civil Rights Movement is the best time of collaboration between Blacks and Jews. 30% of whites in Civil Rights Movement were Jewish. They registered voters together, participated in Freedom Summers and Freedom rides together, and died together. John Lewis doesn't think Civil Rights movement would have succeeded if Jews hadn't been involved. Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel (historian, theologian) and Rabbi Joachim Princz and MLK,Jr. marched arm in arm in Selma, Alabama. 90% of lawyers involved in cases during the Civil Rights Movement were Jewish. |
1964 |
Three civil rights workers, Schwerner, Chaney and Goodman (one Black, two Jewish) murdered in Mississippi by the KKK. |
1964 |
Civil Rights Bill of 1964 passed. |
1965 |
Voting Rights Act passed. |
1980s |
Establish MLK, Jr. Day together - Barbara Jordan, Dorothy Height, and Roger Wilkins. |
1984 |
Jesse Jackson refers to New York as "Hymietown." |
1991 |
Crown Heights riots between Black and Jewish communities. |