CHAPTER XXXII

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THE LABOR MOVEMENT AND NEW LITERARY ACTIVITIES.

Difficulty of securing data for the history of the Labor Movement among Jewish immigrants――John R. Commons’ characterization of a Jewish labor union――A constantly changing army of followers under the same leaders――The movement under the control of the radical press――The leaders as journalists and literary men―― They popularize the press and teach the rudiments of politics―― The voter――The “Heften”――Neo-Hebrew periodicals――The Yiddish stylists――The plight of the Hebraists.

Any attempt to give even the merest outline of the history of the labor movement among the immigrant Jews in the United States would lead into a maze of unreliable figures, exaggerations, and conflicting statements, not only between opponents, but also among those most friendly to their cause. The Russian Jew, in America, like the Russian himself at home, has not yet learned to divorce trade unionism from politics; his labor organizations are either organized and managed by Socialistic agitators and politicians, and in the end split from within on account of the continuous wars among the adherents of various schools of Socialistic principles and tactics; or, if it is not Socialistic, and would not permit the machinery of its organization to be used for the benefit of the party――or, rather, of one of the Socialistic parties――it is opposed, and sometimes ruined, by open attacks or by neglect. And so it comes that as long as a labor union is typically Jewish, i. e., as long as it differs from the American trade union in its being much more political and being more interested in a general struggle against capital or against the present order of society, it leads a precarious existence. The small number of labor unions whose members are exclusively Jewish immigrants, which are strictly trade unions and permit their members to have their own political views or preferences, are usually affiliated with American central labor bodies, and belong to the history of the labor movement of the country rather than to one which deals with the Jews as a separate entity.

But the radicalism of the laborer as such, and the radicalism of the union which he enters and upholds, is like the radicalism of the immigrant in general and like his dwelling in tenement houses: a passing phase which seems permanent because new arrivals take up the place of those who are continually dropping out from the ranks on account of their improved material and educational condition. Isaac A. Hourwich (b. in Wilna, 1860; a. 1892), the economist and statistician, in his attempt to review the labor movement among the Jews in this country, could do no better than to quote the following characterization from the pen of a recognized specialist on the subject:

The Jew’s conception of a labor organization is that of a tradesman rather than that of a workman. In the clothing manufacture, whenever any real abuse arises among the Jewish workmen, they all come together and form a giant union, and at once engage in a strike. They bring in 95 per cent. of the trade. They are energetic and determined. They demand the entire and complete elimination of the abuse. The demand is almost always unanimous, and is made with enthusiasm and bitterness. They stay out a long time, even under the greatest of suffering. During a strike large numbers of them are to be found with almost nothing to live upon and their families suffering, still insisting, on the streets and in their halls, that the great cause must be won. But when once the strike is settled, either in favor of or against the cause, they are contented, and that usually ends the union, since they do not see any practical use for a union when there is no cause to fight for. Consequently the membership of a Jewish union is wholly uncertain. The secretary’s books will show 60,000 members in one month and not 5,000 within three months later. If, perchance, a local branch has a steady thousand members, and if they are indeed paying members, it is likely that they are not the same members as in the year before.[46]

This is, with the modifications pertaining to time and place, the history of practically every trades-union organization among the Jewish immigrants from the Slavic countries. From the first union of Jewish tailors, which was organized in New York in 1877, through the time of the first comprehensive strike of workers in the clothing trade in that city in 1890, the still larger one in 1894; down to the great waist makers’ strike in 1909 and the great strikes in New York, Chicago and Cleveland in 1910 and 1911, the leadership has remained almost the same for about a quarter century. Abraham Cahan (b. in Podberezhye, near Wilna, 1860; a. 1882), who was the first to deliver Socialist speeches in Yiddish in the United States, is still practically at the head of that movement among his countrymen. Morris Hillquit (b. in Riga, Russia, 1870; a. 1887) began his activity as a Socialist leader among the immigrants before he was of age, and is now a recognized leader of the Socialists of the country, being also the author of a History of Socialism in the United States. Joseph Barondess (b. in Kamenetz-Podolsk, 1867; a. 1885), the leader of the second great cloak makers’ strike, who is now a communal worker and a leader among the Zionists, is still looked upon as a representative of the Jewish working classes in New York. The same conditions prevail in other large cities; only there the movement began somewhat later, and the local leaders seldom attained lasting prominence even locally; for the movement is more than anything else a newspaper movement, and those who control the Yiddish Socialist press in New York are masters of the situation in every center of population where there is a Socialist movement among the Jewish immigrants.

As the radical press is the means by which the unstable and mostly temporary labor organizations are held in control, it has played a much more important part in the entire Jewish labor movement than the general labor press has played in the much stronger and more lasting American labor movement. This is again on account of its political radicalism, which appeals to a wide circle of readers, who may be neither trade union laborers nor even Socialists. In its latest phase of development the Jewish radical press becomes a sensational afternoon paper, only with a stronger tinge of “red” than the journal of the same type printed in the vernacular. This preponderance of the literary side of the movement had the results which were to be expected: it produced better writers than labor leaders, more talented literary artists than organizers or disciplinarians. And while most of the radical periodicals also succumbed sooner or later, they had a more lasting effect on the development of the immigrant than the extremist labor organizations. This is also a reflex of Russian conditions, where the labor movement is entirely in the hands of the “intelligencia” or learned classes, though for an entirely different reason, the laborers themselves being mostly illiterate. Here every Jewish labor leader is a journalist or an author, often both; and they belong more properly to the chapters treating of Jewish literature in America.

The agitator among the immigrants has also rendered other highly useful service, besides the impetus which he gave to the development and popularization of the Yiddish press. The average laborer immigrant from Russia knew very little of newspapers, although practically every one of them could read his mother tongue――Judeo-German or Yiddish. But the Russian government did not permit at that time the publication of popular newspapers, and we find, for instance, in the year 1886, three daily papers in Russia in the old Hebrew language, which is understood by the more educated classes, and not one in Yiddish. But little as the immigrant knew about newspapers, he knew less, or actually nothing at all, about politics. The explanation of the aims of the one party for which the agitator wanted to win him had to be preceded by introductory explanations of the nature and functions of parties generally, of their utility as a means of inaugurating reforms, and their power to carry them out when a successful campaign places the government in their hands. The Socialist agitator was thus the first teacher of civics, and he was a very active worker for the cause of naturalization. He was anxious that the immigrant workingman should become a citizen and build up with his vote the Socialist party which the native laborer was so slow to recognize.

But the large majority of the Jewish laborers had enough of Socialism by the time they were entitled to citizenship; the number of voters of that party increased very slowly, and, like the above-mentioned case of the unions, they were not the same from year to year. While the Jewish population was increasing rapidly in some parts of New York and other large cities, and the number of non-Jewish, or rather non-immigrant, voters in some districts became very small or practically disappeared, the number of Socialist votes was fluctuating, and never became a majority or even a plurality in a district. While the leaders were preaching that all opportunities were now gone and all avenues of advancement were closed for the poor man, every individual among their followers was struggling to raise himself above his surroundings. Americanization meant the abandonment of extreme views on all subjects, and the naturalized immigrant, even when he remained a manual worker, was soon voting for one of the two great American parties. He still retained a leaning towards radical reform, for the Russian mind is much inclined to theorizing; but he would now seldom go further than support an American reformer or join one of the movements instituted by the better elements for the purpose of purifying city governments. But as the reform element usually signalizes its accession to power by a severe enforcement of Sunday-closing laws and other interferences with personal liberty which smack of persecution, the immigrant Jew usually joins the other disappointed classes to turn the reformers out of office at the next election.

There was a slow and steady turning away from the dry and monotonous radical literature of that period, which was a counterpart of the turning away from extreme politics. In one respect the change in literary tastes or requirements amounted to a revulsion――one might almost say, to a revolution. The first attempt to publish in Yiddish a sensational novel in weekly or semi-weekly installments, popularly known as “Heften,” which was made in New York about 1890, met with extraordinary success. The number of such ventures soon multiplied, and the sales were large in other cities as well as in the place of publication. The Yiddish periodical press became endangered, but it saved――and revenged――itself by beginning to publish one, two and sometimes as much as three serial stories in daily installments, a practice which in a short time ruined the business of the “Heften.”

It was also about this time that the “Maskilim” or half-Germanized Hebrew scholars, who were forced to the background by the domination of the radicals at the beginning of the “Russian period,” began to forge to the front again. The number of Jews who could read Hebrew was fast increasing, the proportion of intelligent and well-educated men being much larger among those who were forced to emigrate than among the earlier immigrants. Well known Hebrew scholars who arrived in that period began the publication of Hebrew periodicals, and while none of the publications survived, some of them existed for a number of years and exerted a certain influence; besides contributing to develop the talents of new writers and to lay the foundation for a Neo-Hebrew literature in America, which is progressing slowly but surely.

One of the first of the Hebrew editors of the new period was Ephraim Deinard (b. in Courland, 1846; a. 1888), the author and traveler. He established the weekly “Ha-Leomi” (Nationalist) in New York in 1889, and it existed for about two years. Another traveler and author, Wolf (or William) Schur (b. in Utian, Russia, 1844; d. in Chicago, 1910), established his weekly “Ha-Pisgah” (The Summit), which appeared in New York and Baltimore in the years 1890–94 and in Chicago in 1897–1900. The “ha-Ibri” (The Hebrew), also a weekly, was founded by K. H. Sarasohn and edited by Gerson Rosenzweig (b. in Karatchin, in the government of Grodno, Russia, 1861; a. 1888) during the time of its existence, from 1892 to 1898. Of the Hebrew monthlies of that period only the “Ner he-Maarabi” (Western Light), which appeared in 1895–97, edited first by Abraham H. Rosenberg (b. in Pinsk, 1838; a. 1891) and afterwards by Samuel B. Schwarzberg, deserves to be mentioned.

In one respect the Hebrew and the Yiddish writers were struggling with the same difficulty――that of making themselves understood to the largest possible number of readers. The method prevailing in Russia, of writing as hard or using as high a language as possible so that the highly intelligent reader――the title to which every reader of a newspaper there at that time laid claim――should take pride in being able to understand the contents, would not attract readers here as it does where scarcity of printed matter makes the public accept with eagerness whatever is offered. But the Hebrew writer came here with a style that may be termed aristocratic, and the Yiddish writer, who had to begin everything anew, had hardly any style. It was all easy as far as the work of the agitator was concerned; denunciations and accusations are always easily understood, and this alone is one of the reasons of their popularity. But when it came to the parts where the writer wanted to describe or to explain, especially in the scientific or semi-scientific articles which a public that had no systematic schooling so eagerly devoured, the language of most of the writers was inadequate and not easily understood.

Thus it comes that, although most of the Yiddish periodicals of that time were advocating, some of them with great vehemence, certain principles, or leading certain movements, the earliest reputations were made by stylists who were not identified with particular movements. The highest popularity among the reading masses was attained by Abner Tannenbaum (b. in Shirwint, Russia, 1848; a. 1887), whose perspicuous writing, whether as the author of the “Heften,” which he inaugurated, or on his favorite subject, popular science, simply could not be misunderstood. George Selikovich (b. in Retovo, government of Kovno, Russia, in 1863; a. 1887), a linguist and a good Hebrew stylist, is another writer whom everybody could easily understand, and who acquired popularity with the public to whom Yiddish periodical literature was brought down here, for the first time in its history. Nahum Meir Schaikewitz (Shomer, b. in Nesvizh, government of Minsk, Russia, 1849; a. 1888; d. in New York, 1905), the novelist and playwright, also appealed to the masses with his easy flowing style, and was a favorite here with the same classes which used to read his works and see his plays in the old country.

The recognition accorded to these writers, none of whom were agitators or even party men, proves that even in the time when it seemed that the “ghetti” or neighborhoods of the Jewish immigrants were seething with movements and agitations, the great masses were not much interested in them; though the curious crowded the largest meeting rooms, and many who were not yet sure of their newly found freedom were inclined to test it by participating in a march or some other form of demonstration which was forbidden in their old home. Some writers, on the other hand, who followed the Russian usage of subordinating their art to the cause which they were advocating, were extolled by their partisans as great geniuses, but had a much smaller public than the above-mentioned literati.

The writers of Hebrew, who by reason of their training and inclination held more aloof even from their own public, have not yet solved the great question of style; which partly accounts for the remarkable fact that their periodical literature has actually vanished in the two decades in which the possible number of their readers has increased almost tenfold. Some of the best known Hebrew literati from the Old World came here since the establishment of the Neo-Hebrew periodicals which were mentioned above: men like the poet Menahem Mendel Dolitzki (b. in Byelostok, 1856; a. 1892); the exegete Abraham Baer Dobsevage (b. in Pinsk, 1843; a. 1891; d. in New York, 1900); the philosopher Joseph Loeb ♦Sossnitz (b. in Birz, 1837; a. 1891; d. in New York, 1910); the grammarian Moses Reicherson (b. in Wilna, 1827; a. 1890; d. in New York, 1903), and the knight-errant of Hebrew literature, Naphtali Hirz Imber (b. in Zloczow, Galicia, 1856; a. 1892(?); d. in New York, 1909). But neither they nor others less known, who could perhaps be more productive under more favorable circumstances, could accomplish much even in those branches of literary journalism where Yiddish has not penetrated. They were not entirely idle, and some of the results of their literary labor will be mentioned in the proper place in a following part of this work. But they have not influenced the Jewish spirit and have contributed little to the general intellectual development of the community. The traditional war for progress which they waged in their old homes, where they were often the only learned or enlightened men in the community, had no place in a world where general education is so easily accessible; and they could not feel at home in the ranks of the conservatives, where they belong in this country. Most of them floundered until the rise of the Zionist movement, which they joined half-heartedly. Many took to teaching of Hebrew, and are still waiting for the expected revival of interest in Hebrew literature which the new nationalism is supposed to produce.

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