Chapter 1
JEWISH HISTORY IN THE UNITED STATES
The story of the Jews in America begins with
Christopher Columbus. On August 2, 1492, more than 300,000 Jews
were expelled from Spain and on August 3, the next day, Columbus
set sail for the west, taking a group of Jews with him.
They were not, however, refugees, for the prophetic
navigator's plans had aroused the sympathy of influential Jews
for a long period previously. Columbus himself tells us that he
consorted much with Jews. The first letter he wrote detailing his
discoveries was to a Jew. Indeed, the eventful voyage itself
which added to men's knowledge and wealth "the other half of
the earth" was made possible by Jews. The pleasant story
that it was Queen Isabella's jewels which financed the voyage has
disappeared under cool research.
There were three Maranos or "secret Jews"
who wielded great influence at the Spanish court: Luis de
Santagel, who was an important merchant of Valencia and who was
"farmer" of the royal taxes; his relative, Gabriel
Sanchez, who was the royal treasurer; and their friend, the royal
chamberlain, Juan Cabrero. These worked unceasingly on Queen
Isabella's imagination, picturing to her the depletion of the
royal treasury and the likelihood of Columbus discovering the
fabulous gold of the Indies, until the Queen was ready to offer
her jewels in pawn for the funds. But Santagel craved permission
to advance the money himself, which he did, 17,000 ducats in all,
about 5,000 pounds, perhaps equal to 40,000 pounds today.
Associated with Columbus in the voyage were at least
five Jews: Luis de Torres, interpreter; Marco, the surgeon;
Bernal, the physician; Alonzo de la Calle, and Gabriel Sanchez.
Luis de Torres was the first man ashore, the first to discover
the use of tobacco; he settled in Cuba and may be said to be the
father of Jewish control of the tobacco business as it exists
today.
Columbus' old patrons, Luis de Santagel and Gabriel
Sanchez, received many privileges for the part they played in the
work, but Columbus himself became the victim of a conspiracy
fostered by Bernal, the ship's doctor, and suffered injustice and
imprisonment as his reward.
From that beginning, Jews looked more and more to
America as a fruitful field, and immigration set in strongly
toward South America, principally Brazil. But because of military
participation in a disagreement between the Brazilians and the
Dutch, the Jews of Brazil found it necessary to emigrate, which
they did in the direction of the Dutch colony of what is now New
York. Peter Stuyvesant, the Dutch governor, did not entirely
approve of their settling among his people and ordered them to
leave, but the Jews had evidently taken the precaution to assure
their being received if not welcomed, because upon revoking the
order of Stuyvesant, the Directors gave as one of the reasons for
the Jews being received, "the large amount of capital which
they have invested in the shares of the Company."
Nevertheless they were forbidden to enter public
service and to open retail shops, which had the effect of driving
them into foreign trade in which they were soon exercising all
but a monopoly because of their European connections.
This is only one of the thousand illustrations which
can be given of the resourcefulness of the Jew. Forbid him in one
direction he will excel in another. When he was forbidden to deal
in new clothes, he sold old clothes-that was the beginning of the
organized traffic in secondhand clothing. When he was forbidden
to deal in merchandise, he dealt in waste-the Jew is the
originator of the waste product business of the world; he was the
originator of the salvage system; he found wealth in the debris
of civilization. He taught people how to use old rags, how to
clean old feathers, how to use gall nuts and rabbit skins. He has
always had a taste for the furrier trade, which he now controls,
and to him is due the multitude of common skins which now pass
under various alluring trade names as furs of high origin.
Unwittingly, old Peter Stuyvesant compelled the Jews
to make New York the principal port of America, and though a
majority of New York Jews had fled to Philadelphia at the time of
the American Revolution, most of them returned to New York at the
earliest opportunity, instinct seeming to make them aware that,in
New York was to be their principal paradise of gain. And so it
has proved.
New York is the greatest center of Jewish population
in the world. It is the gateway where the bulk of American
imports and exports are taxed, and where practical all the
business done in America pays tribute to the masters of money.
The very land of the city is the holdings of the Jews.
No wonder that Jewish writers, viewing this
unprecedented prosperity, this unchecked growth in wealth and
power, exclaim enthusiastically that the United States is the
Promised Land foretold by the prophets, and New York the New
Jerusalem. Some have gone even further and described the peaks of
the Rockies as "the mountains of Zion," and with
reason, too, if the mining and coastal wealth of the Jews is
considered.
In the time of George Washington there were about
4,000 Jews in the country, most of them well to do traders. They
favored the American side and helped the revolutionary colonies
out with loans at critical moments.
In fifty years the traceable increase in the Jewish
population of the United States was more than 3,300,000. What it
is today no man can estimate with any hope of accuracy.
To make a list of the lines of business controlled by
the Jews of the United States would be to touch most of the vital
industries of the country-those which are really vital, and those
which cultivated habit have been made to seem vital. The
theatrical business is exclusively Jewish;: play-producing,
booking, theater operation are all in the hands of Jews. This
accounts for the fact that in almost every production today can
be detected propaganda, sometimes glaringly commercial
advertisement, sometimes direct political instruction.
The motion picture industry; the sugar industry; the
tobacco industry; fifty per cent or more of the meat packing
industry; over sixty per cent of the shoemaking industry; most of
the musical purveying done in the country; jewelry; grain;
cotton; oil; steel; magazine authorship; news distribution; the
liquor business; the loan business;these, to name only the
industries with national and international sweep, are in control
of the Jews of the United States, either alone or in association
with Jews overseas.
The American people would be vastly surprised if they
could see a line-up of some of the "American business men'
who hold up our commercial prestige overseas. They are mostly
Jews. This may throw a sidelight on the regard in which
"American business methods" are held in Some parts of
the world. When many different races of people can carry on
business under the name "American," and do it legally,
too, it is not surprising that Americans do not recognize some of
the descriptions of American methods which appear in the foreign
Press. If the reputation of American business has suffered, it is
because something ether than American methods have been used
under the American name.
Instances of Jewish prosperity in the United States
are commonplace, but prosperity, the just reward of foresight and
application, is not to be confounded with control. It would be
impossible for any Gentile coalition under similar circumstances
to attain the control which the Jews have won, for the reason
that there is lacking in the Gentile a certain quality of
working-togetherness, a certain conspiracy of objective, and the
adhesiveness of intense raciality, which characterizes the Jew.
It is nothing to a Gentile that another man is a Gentile; it is
next to everything to a Jew that the man at his door is another
Jew.
The International Jewish plan to move their money
market to the United States was what the American people did rot
want. We have the warning of history as to what this means. It
has meant in turn that Spain, Venice, Germany or Great Britain
received the blame or suspicion of the world for what the Jewish
financiers have done. It is a most important consideration that
most of the national animosities that exist today arose out of
resentment against what Jewish money power did under the
camouflage of national names.
"The British did this," "The Germans
did this," when it was the International Jew who did it, the
nations being but the marked spaces on his checker board. Today,
around the world the blaming word is heard, "The United
States did this. If it were not for the United States the world
would be in a better shape. The Americans are a sordid, greedy,
cruel people."
Why? Because the Jewish money power is centered here
and is making money out of both our immunity and Europe's
distress, playing one against the other; and because so many
so-called "American business men" abroad today are not
Americans at all-they are Jews.
Citizens wake up with a start to find that even the
white nations are hardly allowed to see each other nowadays
except through Jewish eyes. Great Britain and France seldom see a
special American spokesman who is not a Jew. That may be the
reason why they reciprocate by sending Jews to us, thinking
perhaps that we prefer them.