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- [00:00]
Greg Jackson
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- [00:22]
Kristen Bell
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- [00:54]
Greg Jackson
History that Doesn't Suck is driven by a simple mission to make learning legit seriously researched history more accessible through entertaining stories. If you'd like to support the work we do and receive ad free episodes, bonus content and other exclusive perks, we invite you to join our membership program. Sign up today for a seven day free trial at htdspodcast.com membership or click the link in the episode notes. It's a Beautiful Saturday morning, May 13, 1939. We're in Hamburg, Germany at the city's port where 937 passengers are in the midst of boarding the Ms. St. Louis. Among them is Gisela Kneipple and what thoughts must be going through her young mind. Though only 15 years old, she remembers when, despite having one loving teacher who'd remind students that Gisela was no different from them, she had to transfer to an all Jewish school. She remembers when the SS man started standing in front of her parents grocery store to drive away business. Only the bravest, like their Catholic neighbor the baker, dared to push past him. She remembers when friends and family described last year's night of broken Glass, a night of terror for German Jews that she luckily did not experience personally. She remembers the day when two men ordered her Polish born father to pack a bag, grab his passport and go with them. Gisela will always remember making him those last sandwiches for his unknown journey, just as she'll never forget how her mother fought in the courts against their eviction so a German couple could take their apartment. A German couple? Are they not German? Gisela was born and raised here, but in recent years the blue eyed blond haired Jewish girl has seen that identity taken from her Systematically. Nonetheless, she's only 15. A 15 year old with wonderfully brave parents who've shielded her and her little sister from the worst of what's been going on. It's a task her mother has shouldered remarkably well since her father's deportation. But now her lonely mother knows that she must get these girls out of Nazi Germany. And so, clinging to her bags, Gisela walks up the gangway beside her mother and 12 year old sister to board the St. Louis, only semi aware of the horrors her family and nearly every one of the ship's passengers, all of whom save a handful are Jewish, have experienced in recent years. To her traveling to Cuba on this beautiful diesel powered luxury ocean liner, all while knowing that her father is coming later. Well, it is, as she'll later recall, really quite an adventure. The next two weeks at sea are amazing. Captain Gustav Schroeder is an amazing man who insists that the crew treat the almost exclusively Jewish passengers like any other paying customers. And with the St. Louis boasting a cinema, a swimming pool and a ballroom. Oh, Gisela's on cloud nine. The dances, the new friendships. For many, their fears slip deeper into the Atlantic. With every nautical mile clocked. They enjoy the ship's amenities, but only most. Gisela notices those with shaven heads released from camps at Dachau and Buchenwald on the condition that they leave Germany and never return. They remain tense. And as the St. Louis reaches Cuban waters, it turns out their tension is well founded. At 3am May 27, the St. Louis arrives in Havana harbor only to have most of its passengers denied entry. It seems that the Director General of Cuba's Office of Immigration, Manuel Benitez Gonzalez, has sold most of these passengers landing documents for $150 apiece. Peace that were less than legal or at least taking advantage of a legal loophole. And Cuban President Federico Laredo Bruz less than a month old. Decree 937 has put an end to that. Only four Spaniards, two Cubans and 22 Jews are allowed to disembark. Days pass as the U. S based Jewish Joint Distribution Committee negotiates with the Cuban president. But given his nation's anti immigrant sentiments, he stands by his new decree requiring refugees to pay a $500 bond to ensure they aren't a cost to the state. Well, the JDC doesn't have $453,500 for over 900 people. This is when Gisela's bubble bursts a little bit more. As talk of returning to Germany passes through the ship, she watches A shorn headed man bleeding from razor cuts charge across the deck, throw himself overboard, then in the water attempt to pull out his arteries. Incredibly, sailors still manage to save him. Forced to leave Cuba on June 2, the captain sets a course for nearby Miami, Florida. It makes sense. 743 of his 908 Jewish passengers only intended to pass through Cuba and already have American visas in the works. Surely something can be done. Alas, as we Learned in episode 118, the Immigration act of 1924 ended the Ellis island era with an even stricter immigration quota than its 1921 predecessor. Meanwhile, Congresswoman Edith Rogers and Senator Robert Wagner's recent bill that would welcome 20,000 Jewish children to the US as refugees has failed. Sympathetic editorials follow while direct pleas are sent to the Roosevelts. But it's all for naught. On June 4, the State Department says that these passengers must wait their quota turn. So no, nothing will be done. And on June 7th, our heavy hearted captain sets the St. Louis on a return course for Germany. As his passengers, these tired, poor huddled masses yearning to breathe free stand on the deck wretchedly watching Florida's shores disappear. Panic grips the ship. Suicide watches are put in place. Then finally, on June 13, the JDC sends word that Belgium, the Netherlands, France and Great Britain will divide the refugees among them. Gisela, her mother and her sister are sent to England. Messages from their father continue until they don't. They'll never see him again. Yet Gisela considers herself one of the lucky ones. Of the 532St. Louis passengers sent back to continental Europe and unable to emigrate before the impending Nazi invasion, nearly half of them will die as victims of the Holocaust. Welcome to history that doesn't suck. I'm your professor, Greg Jackson, and I'd like to tell you a story. In the course of our last two episodes, we've seen Benito Mussolini create fascism and rise as Italy's dictator or il Duce. And we've seen Adolf Hitler create his own brand of fascism, a German take built on a foundation of anti Semitism called Nazism, to become Germany's dictator or the Fuhrer. Well, considering what empowered Adolf will do in the name of that unadulterated hate, it's time we get to know those whom he is blaming for Germany's ills and targeting so mercilessly the Jewish people. But even with our tight focus of contextualizing Nazism's antisemitism, the this is a big lift about a 2000 year lift. So let's lay some framework ahead of our story. First, you'll hear me mention the so called Jewish question a lot. Essentially the question is how Jews fit into the social, political and cultural aspects of a non Jewish society. Many approach the Jewish question from an anti Semitic perspective, but many Jewish scholars tackle it too. And we'll get a taste of that, okay? Second, Judaism's origins aren't a religion per se. It's more theopolitical. That is a divine meets legal or simultaneously theological and political tradition. At its very core, living as a Jew means living according to the Jewish law, the 613 commandments. God is the highest authority. And as such, we'll find that the rise of the modern nation state puts Jews in a tricky spot between the secular state's leaders leader and maintaining allegiance to their God. This conflict morphs the tradition into what we'd refer to as a religion. And this religion does not make demands on its adherents that challenge the authority of the nation state. But even as modernity presses this faith tradition to turn the now a religion corner, we'll see the Jewish question follow right into the 1930s, if not beyond. Though that beyond is not our concern today. So with that framework laid, we'll now fly through 2000 years of Jewish history from the Roman Empire to the Third Reich, but with a focus on modern Europe, where we'll find the continent's nation state. Building west and old school monarchical east are creating distinctly different challenges and responses as Jews in both spheres battle antisemitism. With all of this understanding, we'll then go in close on 1930s Nazi Germany, where we'll find Adolf leaning on the continent's age old antisemitism as takes professions, homes and even citizenship from Germany's and Austria's combined 750,000 Jews, we'll follow this earliest stage of the Holocaust up to 1938's Kristallnacht or the Night of Broken Glass, leaving us just shy of when young Gisela boarded the St. Louis. But why didn't the United States welcome the St. Louis passengers? We'll go there too, finishing the episode with a look at the Jewish experience in America and the spread of Europe's antisemitism to the United States, particularly in the 1920s. 20s. We'll even see a full on Nazi rally in New York City. Some of this will be rough if you listen with your kids. Maybe give this one a listen through by yourself first. Otherwise let's turn the clock back 2000 years and get to it. Rewind. Zipping past the patriarchs, prophets, kings, and the Greek or Hellenistic period. Judaism hits a new phase after the 1st and 2nd century Jewish Roman wars. Now let's neither over nor understate these conflicts. The Roman Empire's secret sauce is its pluralism and letting the people they conquer do their thing. But the Romans can also insist rather brutally that the conquered get the youe're conquered memo. That two edged sword renders the Second Temple's destruction in 70 A.D. a ramped up Jewish Diaspora. And by the second century rabbinic Judaism no longer able to be tied to the Temple. Rabbinic Judaism allows this largely displaced people to adapt with the tradition in exile, but also keeps crucial continuity as the rabbis maintain a focus on Jewish law. These rabbis are not only studying and practicing oral and written Torah or law, but also interpreting it into something that can adapt to present and future diasporic conditions. This jives better with the Romans. But as Christianity survives Rome's fall to sweep over Europe, the distinctions between it and Judaism come to the fore. Differences range from interpretations of Scripture to the Messiah and vary from one particular sect to the next. But the key thing is that by the medieval period, an anti Jewish polemic becomes central to Christian Europe's identity. With Jews serving as the go to scapegoat for life's unexplainable ills. Has a child gone missing? The Jews are blamed, accused of killing the child for sacrifice under the false narrative of blood libel is the bubonic plague passing through again The Jews are blamed, charged with consorting with the devil and killing Christ. Meanwhile, Christian Europe bans Jews from many professions, leaving them to fill roles that Christians need and yet deem as sinful, like money lending or banking. That doesn't help with perceptions either. And medieval Europe's deeply false narratives and limitations on Jews will reverberate far down the road. As for day to day life, medieval European Jews live separately from Christians in what historians term semi autonomous corporate societies or kahilas. Simplified a kehila is a state of within a state. They function as individual groups with feudal charters. Rabbis run the community and provide basic social services like education and welfare. The entire rabbinic structure, performance of the law and Torah study can be maintained, allowing Jews to live theopolitically, that is theologically and politically by the virtue of Jewish law. This works for the most part. Christian Europe's rulers don't mind the Jews theo political situation. Not until the Enlightenment's concepts of the nation state and citizenship, that is. Indeed, modern Western Europe's Jews are facing a new challenge. Do they remain in their semi Autonomous corporate societies or assimilate into Christian Europe's church and state separating world? Can they balance Jewish identity or citizenship with say, a secularizing French citizenship? Do Jews even want emancipation, meaning full unencumbered citizenship in the nation in which they reside? Also, does that nation want to grant them emancipation? Well, it's complicated to start. Modern antisemitism echoes, yet is separate from the medieval Christian idea of anti Jewry. This antisemitism contains a few key ideas. One, nations require complete integration. Jews have their own culture and national ties that are at odds with their new nation state. Two, political platforms can be grounded in anti Semitism. Three, those who dislike modernity, especially capitalism, can blame its ills on the Jews. And four, race based language is successful in isolating Jews. This isn't to say Europe only sees barriers to Jewish emancipation. In 1781, Prussian politician Christian Wilhelm von Dom looks to the Enlightenment's ideals of universal natural rights to argue in its favor within the German states. He writes that more than anything else, a life of normal civil happiness in a well ordered state, enjoying the long withheld freedom would tend to do away with clannish religious opinions. The Jew is even more a man than Jew. And how would it be possible for him not to love a state where he could reach positions of honor and enjoy general esteem? Close quote. So Christian wants to emancipate Jews. But his statement the Jew is even more man than Jew still suggests that Jews are seen as subhuman. Furthermore, he is assuming that Jews want emancipation and will welcome the state, suppressing traditional theopolitical life. He doesn't get how this will force Jews to transform Judaism into a religion to gain acceptance in a Germanic state. From the Jewish perspective, this means placing the state in the position of highest authority and subordinating their God to said state. Meanwhile, Western Europe's emancipation talk doesn't mean that European Jews are guaranteed safe and comfortable lives. It's particularly bad in the East. Pogroms, that is violent attacks against local Jewish communities, generally condoned if not blessed by the state, are becoming widespread. Yes, I trust to recall from episode 118. These sometimes deadly attacks role in driving many Eastern European Jews to flee to Western Europe and America. The first pogrom we believe, happens in Odessa, Russia in 1821. Even beyond the severity of pogroms, Jewish life in Western and Eastern Europe is now structurally different. So much so that this will factor into the Nazi party's eventual final solution. But let's not get ahead of ourselves. That's a story for a later day, for now let's just absorb these consequential differences. While most Jews in Western Europe's nation states are beginning the emancipation process, moving to larger cities and perhaps assimilating into secular society, Eastern European Jews are living in shtetls. Shtetl is a Yiddish word roughly translating to small town, and it describes an insular, rural, predominantly Yiddish speaking, market based community where Jews lives center around religion, tradition and family. It's kind of like the medieval Kahila, but second gen or 2.0. Perhaps the best way to wrap our heads around late 19th century Eastern European Jewish life is by experiencing a fictionalized shtetl world created by Solomon Rabinovitch or Shalom Alaikum to use his better known Yiddish pseudonym, which he shares with us in his classic collection of tales, Tevye the Dairyman and the Railroad Stories. According to his biographer Jeremy Dawber, Shalom uses this work to ironically juxtapose the past in changing present and for good measure include doses of playfulness, disruption, along with the occasional self referential or autobiographical excursion. All that said, allow me to set the stage. Our protagonist, Tevye, or Rebe Tevye, to show him some proper respect, is in a tough situation. After his first daughter Shytel, rejects a wealthy arranged marriage for her true love, a poor tailor named Motel, and after his second daughter Huddle, leaves their shtetl to follow her revolutionary husband Perchyk to Siberia, Tevye's third daughter Chava, wants to marry a non Jewish man. Hmm, sound familiar? Fiddler on the Roof fans. Anyhow, this is a hard corner for the traditionalist father to turn, see him process that. It's an unspecified day in Tevye's world. He's just returned from a conversation with a local town priest where he was informed that Fedka, a non Jew, wishes to marry his daughter Chaba. And Tevye, well, to quote him, when I got home, oh, everything was topsy turvy. The children were lying with their faces bright, buried in pillows, weeping loudly. Golda was more dead than alive. I looked around for Chava. Where is Chava? No Hava laying down with his head buried in a pillow. Tevye laments, how have I sinned more than the rest of the world, that I am punished more than all the Jews. Distraught, Tevye turns to his wife Golda, asking, maybe you have some idea of what's to be done. Golda responds, woe is me.
- [20:55]
Kristen Bell
A child gets up in the morning, strong and healthy, gets dressed and embraces me and begins to kiss me, hug me and Bursts into tears but says nothing. I thought that she, God forbid, had lost her mind. So I ask her, what's the matter with you, daughter? She doesn't say a word and runs out into the yard to see the cows and disappears. I wait an hour. I wait two hours, three hours. Where is Chava? No Chava. So I tell the children to run over to the priest's house for a minute.
- [21:23]
Greg Jackson
Tevye is furious. How did you know, Golda, that she was there?
- [21:27]
Kristen Bell
Alas and alack, don't I have eyes? Or maybe I'm not her mother.
- [21:32]
Greg Jackson
If you have eyes and if you are her mother, then why didn't you say anything? Why didn't you tell me? A mother is not a father. A father can speak differently to a child. Just wait. Tomorrow, God willing, I'll see her. Unable to cope with the idea that his daughter would disobey his wishes to marry outside of her religion, Reb Tevye declares that Chava was never to be mentioned nor thought of. No more Chava blotted out for good. Again, this is a fictional account, but it captures well how Jews at the turn of the 20th century are struggling to balance their traditional adherence to Judaism with the demands of the modern world. World dilemmas like Tevye's are spreading throughout Europe, and both Jews and Goys, to use the Yiddish word for non Jews, have a lot to say about the potential for emancipation and assimilation. After Tsar Alexander II's assassination leads to a particularly violent series of pogroms in 1880s Russia. Jewish Russian Leon Pinsker suggests that the answer for Jews, particularly those in dangerous Eastern Europe, is auto emancipation. In an 1882 book titled Just Auto Emancipation, Leon argues that Jews in a non Jewish nation are a ghost nation. He explains that as neither a citizen nor a foreigner, a Jew is everywhere a guest and nowhere at home. Close quote. He compares this ghost nation of Jews to a sick patient, arguing that this view has given rise to the sociopathological response of Judeophobia. To quote him again, Judeophobia is a psychic aberration. As a psychic aberration, it is hereditary. As a disease transmitted for 2000 years, it is incurable. So what's the answer? To quote Leon, one last the auto emancipation of the Jewish people as a nation. In a word, he's describing Zionism. So what is Zionism? Well, it's a response to the nearly 2000 years of antisemitism and Judeophobia we just heard Leon reference. Basically, from the Second Temple's destruction and subsequent diaspora onward mixing with the 19th century's nationalism. It's Jewish nationalism. Leon is only a proto Zionist, though he tees up the idea. Sure, but someone else will take the hard swing. That someone is Theodore Herzl. A handsomely bearded Austro Hungarian. Theodore is terrified by the catastrophic uptick he sees in late 19th century Europe's antisemitism, and not just in the east, but the West. To him, the only solution is the restoration of the Jewish state. He first lays this out in his 1896 essay, A Solution to the Jewish Question, which argues that with the profound barbarism of antisemitism in Europe, the Continent's Jewish problem is a political one and therefore requires a political solution. He further develops this idea of a Jewish state in a subsequent pamphlet called the Jewish State, and is convinced that nations the world over will love the idea too. And why would Theodore think that nations would gladly part with their Jewish citizens, even their best and brightest? Well, it's hard not to think otherwise after witnessing one of the most traumatic incidents for newly emancipated Jews in the Western world. France's Dreyfus Affair. Let me give you a little background. Alfred Dreyfus was born on October 9, 1859, in a small town in the far eastern reaches of France known as Alsace. Descended from an observant Jewish family, Alfred was among the first to be fully immersed in French culture through school. But after their homeland was ceded to the German Empire at the Franco Prussian war's end in 1871, the Dreyfus family faced a Do they surrender their French nationality, the country that first emancipated Jews in 1791, or go over to Germany, only then completing the gradual emancipation process? They choose France. And in 1880, Alfred joins the French army. The family business was solid enough that Alfred could live well and travel back across the French German border to visit his loved ones. And his military career was similarly successful. In 1893, Alfred began working for the general Staff of the French French Army. It's quite the achievement. He's one of the first Jews to do so. But then, on Saturday, October 13, 1894, a summons arrives at his home, calling the young officer to appear before the Ministry of War that Monday and in civilian clothes. Huh. Nonetheless, Alfred doesn't think much of this. After all, he's a good, honest, respectable soldier. What is there to fear? It's nine o' clock on a cool, foggy morning. Monday, October 15, 1894. Dressed down, but still donning one of those thin mustaches so in vogue in Belle Epoque France Capitaine Alfred Dreyfus is at l' Hotel de Brienne on Rue Saint Dominique in Paris, the home of France's Ministry of War. He's shown into the office of the Chief of the General Staff where the wiry, mustachioed, uniformed Commandant Armand du Baty de Clam and a few others greet him. Now Commandant Du Paty makes an odd request of Alfred. The General is coming. While you are waiting, as I have a letter to write and a sore finger, will you kindly write it for me? Bizarre, but the 35 year old Captain Alfred sits down at the prepared desk and follows the instructions of his superior. Halfway through the disjointed letter. That quite frankly makes no sense. Le Kommandant exclaims at Alfred, you are trembling. Alfred isn't confused, but trying to be polite, he replies, my fingers are half frozen. Le Commandant interrupts again. Pay attention. It is a serious matter. Finally, the exercise comes to an end. Almost ceremoniously, Commandant Du Paty places his hand on Alfred's shoulder and cries out, in the name of the law, I arrest you. You are accused of the crime of high treason. Commandant Hubert Joseph Henry emerges from his hiding place behind the curtains of the office to take our confused accused to military prison in the old convent on Rue de Char. Bewildered, Alfred begs, mon Commandant, this is terrifying. I am accused of something horrible. I am not guilty. I understand that the ministry would not have acted if it didn't have proof. It must be convincing for them and devastating for me. But it is false. I don't understand any of it. I demand just justice. Capitaine afraid Dreyfus won't see justice for a very long time? See French politician Edouard Drumont's recent publication La France Juif Jewish France, which rehashes medieval dating anti Semitic claims. To assert that a cabal of French Jews are behind everything wrong with the world has helped create a spike in French antisemitism. Even Adolf Hitler later looks to the text for inspiration. It's against this background that evidence emerges of a spy in the office of the French Army General Staff. And who better to blame than the Jewish captain from German taken Alsace? Alfred was made to write the letter so that they could claim his handwriting matched the unnamed spy. Meanwhile, the narrative of Alfred's arrest, trial and supposed selling of French military secrets to Germany all confirm France's worst fears. Jews are conspiring to take the country down. After a quick and biased trial, Alfred is sentenced to life imprisonment on devil's island in 1894. Two years pass. Colonel Georges Piquant discovers that evidence against Alfred was forged and the real spy was likely Ferdinand. Well, son esterazie. But the army wants it covered up. Ferdinand is tried but quickly acquitted. Acclaimed author and journalist Emile Zola is livid. He publishes an open letter to the President of the French Republic entitled J'. Accuse. In it, he systematically tears apart the nightmare that was Alfred's trial and subsequent conviction. Emile calls Alfred the victim of the lurid imagination of Major du Patie de Colbe, the religious circle surrounding him and the dirty Jew obsession that that is the scourge of our time. After concluding the letter, Emile lists his eight direct accusations, calling out individuals and groups who allowed for this miscarriage of justice. Emile is sued for libel, but remains unshaken, seeing it as his duty as a Frenchman and human being to stand against such wrongs. His damning editorial whips the whole country into a debate over the captain's innocence or guilt. This is the dreyfus affairs. In 1906, our Jewish friend and France loyal captain is finally exonerated. Nonetheless, this horror show leaves the Jewish community shaken. Alfred was an emancipated Jew, a faithful soldier for his country even. Does that mean nothing? Theodore Herzl's political Zionism or call for a Jewish state free from anti Semitism is sounding like a great idea to choose a cross from France and the rest of Europe. As they wonder, could this happen again? Could their status as citizens ever be in jeopardy? Oh, it can. The coming Great War will clear a path to all their worst fears and more particularly one nation over in neighboring Germany.
- [31:46]
Kristen Bell
Hi, I'm Kristen Bell and if you know my husband Dax, then you also know he loves shopping for a car. Selling a car, not so much. We're really doing this, huh? Thankfully, Carvana makes it easy. Answer a few questions, put in your van or license and done. We sold ours in minutes this morning and they'll come pick it up and pay us this afternoon.
- [32:05]
Greg Jackson
Bye bye, Truckee.
- [32:07]
Kristen Bell
Of course, we kept the favorite.
- [32:10]
Greg Jackson
Hello, other Truckee.
- [32:12]
Kristen Bell
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- [33:28]
Greg Jackson
On September 16, 1919, less than a year since the Great War's end, and only a month since his first meeting with the German Workers Party, Adolf Hitler writes a letter explaining his position on the Jewish question. The Jews are definitely a race and not a religious community. Antisemitism, stemming from purely emotive reasons will always find its expression in the form of pogroms. But antisemitism based on reason must lead to the systematic legal combating and removal of the rights of the Jew. Its final aim, however, must be the uncompromising removal of the Jews altogether. Both are possible only under a government of national strength, never under a government of national impotence. Flash forward nearly 14 years to early 1933. As we know from our last episode, Adolfs used his brand of fascism, a German nationalism naming the Jews as the ultimate cause of all of Germany's problems, known as Nazism, to navigate his way to the position of Chancellor, a position he further empowers that march with the creation of the first concentration camp for political enemies on the 22nd and the legislative power stealing enabling act on the 23rd. With that new power, he also sets out immediately to live up to his 1919 letter, Systematically and legally removing the rights of Jews with the ultimate goal of the uncompromising removal of the Jews altogether. Five days after the Enabling Act's passage, March 28, Dr. Joseph Goebbels announces that in response to reports of American Jews boycotting German goods, there will be a one day boycott of Jewish businesses on April 1st. On that day, Jewish businesses are marked with the Star of David, while brown shirts, which have already taken to viciously attacking Jewish businesses, synagogues and civilians gladly enforced the boycott. This is the first outwardly anti Semitic Hitler endorsed policy of the Nazi regime. On April 4, Jewish newspaperman Robert Welch responds with his article Wear the Yellow Badge with pride. He encourages German Jews to answer this new persecution with inner strength. The article reads. April 1, 1933 can become the day of Jewish awakening and Jewish rebirth if the Jews will it so that the boycott committee ordered shields showing on a black background a yellow spot to be attached to the shops in question is a terrific symbol for this shield was supposed to brand us and to render us contemptible in people's eyes. Very well, we accept the shield and shall make it a badge of honor. They meant to dishonor us Jews. Take it upon yourselves, that shield of David, and honor it anew. Sounds like Robert still has confidence in the promise of the modern Western European nation state project. If only he knew what's coming. Three days later, April 7, the first anti Semitic law, the law for the restoration of a professional civil service is passed. Civil servants opposed to the Nazis or who were simply Jewish can now be terminated. Hundreds of Jewish lawyers, judges, teachers and other such professions are and similar laws follow. Jewish doctors are no longer allowed to work in state run health services and Jewish lawyers cannot enter the practice. German president Paul von Hindenburg is outraged. If they were worthy of fighting and bleeding for Germany, they must be considered worthy of of continuing to serve the Fatherland in their profession. He writes to his Chancellor. Adolf acquiesces and Jews who fought or whose father or son fought are allowed to remain in civil service jobs. But this is a short term victory. On May 10, 1933 quote unquote un German books, mostly the works of Jewish and left wing authors, are burned throughout the country by the year's end. Adolf's systematically and legally imposed 80 restrictions on the rights of German Jews. Fearing international boycotts, Adolf slows his anti Semitic role in 1934. That said, his Nazi government pushes anti Semitic newspapers and encourages Jewish emigration, particularly to the British Mandate for Palestine, which in line with Theodore Herzl's Zionist thinking and as detailed in episode 147, the British government supports serving as a homeland for the Jewish people. Meanwhile, the already enabled Chancellor uses Paul von Hindenburg's death on August 1st of that year to absorb the presidential powers too. As we learned in the last episode that makes him the Fuhrer. Outward displays of antisemitism ramp back up. In the spring spring of 1935, the newspaper Der Sturme publishes a series of articles on the dangers of Jewish Aryan intermarriage and sexual relations, often fabricating stories of abuse perpetrated by older Jewish men and young innocent German girls, and of ritual murder. Ah, sounds like the return of the age old blood libel claim. And soon the Fuhrer feels poised to continue legally stripping rights from his country's Jewish population. It's September 15, 1935. Deputies and other officials sit and chat awaiting the start of a special session of the Reichstag at The Culture association building in Nuremberg, Germany. Special indeed. The last time the Reichstag met outside of the Berlin was nearly four centuries ago in 1543. The location has been chosen because of the Bavarian city's deep National Socialist roots. And today, Adolf Hitler has a big announcement to make. Might it be, as rumored, a law about the status of Jews in the country? Well, Adolf's taking the stand. Now looks like it's time for this puppet legislature to find out. Deputies and men of the German Reichstag. Unfortunately, it appears that this international ferment in the world has aroused among the Jews of Germany the idea to manifestly oppose the national interests of Germans in Reich. We have no choice but to contain the problem through legislative measures. The government of the German Reich is guided in this by the idea that it may nonetheless be possible, through the agency of a definitively secular solution, to create a basis upon which the German people can have a tolerable relation with the Jews. Should this hope not be realized and Jewish incitement within Germany and outside Hussein borders continue, the situation will be reviewed. This law is an attempt to find a legislative solution to the Jewish problem. In the event that this attempt fails, it will be necessary to transfer the problem by law to the National Socialist Party for a final solution. I ask you to adopt these laws now. What are these laws? They're the Nuremberg Reis Laws. There are two first, the Reich Citizenship Law. This restricts German citizenship to those of German or related blood and states that the Reich citizen is the only holder of full political rights. Second is the Law for the Protection of German Blood and Honor. This bans intermarriage and sexual relations between so defined Germans and Jews, forbids Jews from employing German women under 45 in the home, and even prohibits Jews from displaying the Reich and national flag. In other words, German Jews are not German citizens. All of the progress that Jews had made towards citizenship through emancipation has just been stripped. Given the massive implication of these laws, Adolf clarifies what it means to be a Jew in first, anyone descended from three or more entirely Jewish grandparents is automatically Jewish. Second, Mischlings, or people with two Jewish grandparents are Jewish if A they are religiously Jewish, B they are married to or will marry a full Jew, C they are the offspring of a relationship from option B or D they are the offspring of an affair between a Gentile and a Jew. By 1936, Nazi persecution and violence against Jews has led to so many fleeing to the British Mandate for Palestine. Local Arabs revolt against the British administration. 1937 is no better In March 1938, Adolf Hitler's annexation of Austria a tell I will fully tell with the rest of his expansionism in a later episode, I assure you, makes Austrian Jews subject to Nazi race laws too. In fact, Austria is even worse. Overnight, Austrian Jews experience brutal violence with no intercession from the police, are forced to sell their businesses to Aryans and dismissed from civil service, government school, legal, medical and many other professions. Meanwhile, Adolf Eichmann, a soon to be confident of the Fuhrer and architect of the Holocaust, opens the central office for Jewish emigration in Vienna. By the end of 1938, these latest and harsh measures tested in Austria are implemented in Germany. Now Jews cannot leave the expanded Nazi Reich unless they pay an outrageously high atonement tax. They cannot practice law or medicine except for treating Jewish patients, teach, be a part of the civil service, attend university or travel as salesmen. Meanwhile, hundreds of Jewish patients businesses are shut down or become Aryan owned. Violence continues with countless Jews trying to flee the nightmare. Western leaders gather to discuss the Jewish refugee crisis at the evian Conference in July 1938. In short, these nations, including the United States, all agree it's a terrible situation, but won't change their immigration policies. Not in the current anti immigrant climate. After the munich Agreement of September 1938 allowing Germany to annex the Sudetenland, Germany's Polish born Jews are shipped back to the Polish border to live in makeshift camps. And yes, if you're thinking back to young Gisela from this episode's opening, this is what happened to her father. Meanwhile, another Jewish teenager of Polish descent, former German citizenship and separated from his refugee family, Herschel Grynjpan is furious. On his own in Paris, France, the 17 year old gets his hands on a revolver and heads to the German embassy on November 7, 1938. He's trying to find the German ambassador to France, Johann von Welchick. Instead he's directed to a junior diplomat, Ernst von Rath. Herschel fires five times, hitting Ernst twice, declaring you are filthy. And here in the name of 12,000 persecuted Jews is your document. Upon his arrest, Herschel declares Being a Jew is not a crime. I am not a dog, I have a right to live. And the Jewish people have a right to live on this earth. But the young diplomat Ernst doesn't live. Two days later, at 4:30pm on the 9th, he dies. And now it's the German people who are furious. Dr. Joseph Goebbels informs Adolf Hitler of the situation around 9pm Adolf approves of their rage. Dr. Goebbels will later note in his diary that the Fuhrer decides to let the demonstrations continue. Withdraw the police. For once, the Jews should feel the rage of the people. Dr. Goebbels approves too. Later that night he gives a speech endorsing violence against Jews. In his book on the Jews and their lies, 16th century reformer Martin Luther encouraged the synagogues be set on fire and whatever does not burn up should be covered or spread over with dirt so that no one may be able to see a cinder stone of it. And this ought to be done for the honor of God. Four centuries later, Martin's call to action isn't far off from the actual events of November 9 and 10, 1938. It's a night of organized, targeted violence and systematic cruelty against the Jewish population across Nazi controlled territory. It's the largest pogrom any country has ever seen. It's nighttime, November 9, 1938. We're in Berlin, Germany and 10 year old Miriam Lichtke is terrified. Living in a first floor apartment in a building that she describes as shaped like the Hebrew letter Chet, kind of like an upside down U. She has a clear view of the structure's courtyard, in the middle of which are other buildings including her synagogue or shul, Beth Zion. And right this minute it's being desecrated. Peering through their blanketed, blacked out windows, Miriam, her mother and brother can only watch helplessly as neighbors turned Nazis, to quote Miriam's later recollection, threw the contents of the synagogue into the courtyard. The benches, Torah, scrolls, prayer books, etc. Were all piled up on the ground. We could hear the Nazis speaking to each other, yelling, shouting. We heard the old there are still Jews living up there. We were afraid they would come up and hurt us. However they left after doing their destruction, they likely would have set Beth Zion ablaze too. But with a chemical factory nearby, the Nazi minded Berliners don't take this step. The following morning, November 10, Miriam is asked by her uncle Gershon Faucher to visit his first furniture store on Castonian Alley, Chestnut Boulevard, allegedly to see that the employees don't steal. Reflecting decades down the road, Miriam will note her later realization that he and his adult sons would be targets if they go thus, as she tells us, they sent me a fair skinned, light haired, blue eyed girl with pigtails. Miriam watches the quote unquote show as the crowd enjoys enjoys looting Jewish businesses done in part by Hitler Youth. But as she looks on, Miriam overhears a lady whisper to a friend. This is a Jewish child. Frightened little Miriam turns around and scurries back home. The damage done on this single night or 24 hour period of November 9th and 10th, 1938. Frankly, words fail, but we'll try. Miriam's story is but one of countless of vandalized storefronts, burglarized homes, desecrated sacred objects, incinerated synagogues, as well as violence against and arrests of Jewish people themselves. To be specific, roughly 1,000 synagogues were set on fire of which some 270 are completely destroyed. Nothing but cinders and ash. Thousands of Jewish owned shops are vandalized essentially beyond repair. 91 Jews are killed. Contributing to the media coverage, sharing this horror with the world, Daily Telegraph correspondent Hugh Green writes that I have seen several anti Semitic Jewish outbreaks in Germany during the last five years, but never anything as nauseating as this. Eugene Lehman writes to his son in Britain lamenting. It is now 6:30 and I can hardly think clearly. What happens to us Jews in Germany since 4:30 this morning is indescribable. In the whole of Germany there exists no synagogue that is not burnt or still burning. There are no more store windows that are not broken. It's true. Between stores, synagogues and homes there is so much broken glass. And that's why this night is known as Kristallnacht or crystal. The Night of Broken Glass. After Kristallnacht, many remaining German Jews are realizing that this isn't the typical anti Semitism that they've endured in Europe for two millennia. This is worse than medieval blood libel. This is worse than the Dreyfus affair. Nazism is something far more sinister, something that they can't wait out. Something so terrifying that as we saw in this episode's opening, it will push 15 year old Gisela's mother to do whatever it takes to save her children, even if it means leaving her husband behind and getting rejected by Cuba and the United States. And speaking of the United States, why doesn't President Franklin Delano Roosevelt or Congress do more in the face of this Jewish refugee crisis? Why does the US hold to its quotas like so many other nations, even as the news reports on the horrors of Kristallnacht? Well, seeing as this is an American history podcast, let's hit pause on the tale of the Holocaust and save it for future episodes so that we can get those answers. But of course that means a little background. And you know what that means. Rewind.
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Greg Jackson
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Kristen Bell
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- [53:29]
Greg Jackson
By the time of the Revolution, Jews are a part of the American experiment. Between the Constitution's sixth article and First Amendment promises on religious freedom, American Jews simply are not in the same boat as their Eastern or even their Western European counterparts. These constitutional promises make it far less threatening for them to reduce their Judaism to a religion and embrace Americanism. Nonetheless, the federal Constitution can't force complete societal acceptance, as evidenced by some early state laws on religion that, though not constitutional in the eyes of later interpretations of the First Amendment, are permitted in the early republic. So a social or popular tension remains, a tension that we can even see in George Washington's August 18, 1790 letter to the Jewish community of Rhode island after his recent visit as he assures them that the United States gives to bigotry no sanction, yet also notes that those who enjoy these protections, to quote again, should demean themselves as good citizens. In other words, specifically the words of American Jewish historian Jonathan Sarna, Jews realized they could win equal equality in popular eyes only by demonstrating that being Jewish in no way conflicted with being American. And so Jewish Americans move forward, using their American political freedom to respond to their precarious social state. They celebrate America, but always look over their shoulder. A paradox exists for Jewish political engagement. They have opportunities, yet they use them to secure societal acceptance and shore up anxiety More than to comfortably contribute to the American project. Continuing through the 19th century, the idea of a Jewish race is playing out quite differently in the United States and Europe. And this isn't just an intriguing note. It's important for us to get because as we know the Nazis will obsess over race. In 19th century Europe's nation states, Jews are told they are a separate race, one that maybe can emancipate to citizenship. Race is about othering Jews. But in the United States, Jews actually turn to the idea out of an anxiety over assimilation. They see it as a way to preserve a distinctiveness or sense of group identity. Thus Professor Eric Goldstein at Emory University's Tam Institute for Jewish Studies argues that that 19th century American Jews turn to race as their closest approximation for a sense of nation or peoplehood. He goes on to point out that this actually shows how comfortable American Jews are becoming as it's safe enough for them to be visible as a race. Not that this means everything is rosy, particularly as the American concept of race has its myriad of problems and complexities. But it's 180 degrees from the experience of European Jews. In short, the majority of non Jewish 19th century Americans do not see Jews as a threat to American society simply because they are Jewish. But that changes as we enter the 20th century. For one thing, some small town Americans dislike the increasing visibility of Jews in popular media. They worry that Jews are destroying core aspects of what they see as American Christian civilization. This thinking is what leads a resurgent Ku Klux Klan to add Jews to their literal hit list, as we saw in episode 152. Likewise, many organizations begin subtly and not so subtly, barring Jews from entry. Hospitals refuse to allow Jewish doctors to treat patients. Law firms avoid hiring Jewish attorneys, and universities work to limit the number of Jewish professors and students. Meanwhile, Europe's brand of antisemitism is traveling across the Atlantic. As American Jewish historian Hasia Diner puts it, there's an influx of European inspired race theory which understood the Jews as a separate race whose distinctive phenotype they associated with certain inherent depravities. And so Americans begin to question the position of Jews in society. Ah, this European concept of a Jewish race is supplanting America's more benign concept. And how is this European inspired race theory getting around the nation? Well, few fan this flame more efficiently than the Detroit based car tycoon Henry Ford. Ah yes, Henry Ford. I trust to recall him from a few episodes, particularly the story of his Model T and mass production innovations in episode 121. Well, as we touched on in that same episode, Henry acquires his hometown newspaper, the Dearborn Independent, and uses it to promote antisemitism. On May 20, 1920, the newspaper runs its first of a 91 series of articles on Jews called the International Jew. The Independent claims to make no attack on the Jews as Jews, implying that it is not attacking the Jewish faith, but rather criticizing the Jewish race, people, nation, etc. For their monumental shadowing, money making conspiracies and so on. In short, the newspaper acknowledges its antisemitism while downplaying it, which only makes its antisemitism more effective. Perhaps the most damning contribution of the Independent is its publication of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. First seen in a Russian newspaper back in 1903. The hateful text spread the world over and pretends to be the minutes from a meeting of a cabal of Jews, the elders making their plans for worldwide domination. There was no such meeting, of course. The Protocols is a forgery, a hoax, no more real than Nosferatu up on the silver screen. In a word, it's fiction. But the average reader doesn't get that. And Henry Ford's mass dissemination of the Protocols introduces the European version of the Jewish question to the American public, effectively importing this version of antisemitism that had not crossed the Atlantic to America. And oh, does it take root. I mean, the great Henry Ford published it. For many starstruck Americans, his greatness gives this European antisemitism legitimacy. Now, Henry eventually repudiates the International Jew after the Anti Defamation League sues for libel. That is, he does so in 1927 and receives praise from many American Jews for doing so. One New York rabbi writes, I am happy that the feelings of my brethren will henceforth cease toward a man who has done so much for a country by beloved by all of us. But the damage can't all be undone. Damage so extensive that over in Weimar Germany, Heinrich Himmler describes Henry as one of our most valuable, important and witty fighters. And so it's hard not to see a connection in the following decade as the Third Reich presents the famed Michigander with the birthday present of a lifetime. It's the afternoon of July 30, 1938, Henry Ford's 75th birthday, and we're in Dearborn, Michigan, in the septuagenarian birthday boy's private office of his engineering laboratory for his Ford Motor Company. Wearing a white suit, Henry stands in between two representatives of Adolf Hitler's government, Fritz Heiler and Karl Kapp. Fritz opens A red leather box illuminating the gold Maltese cross with four white swastikas nestled in between the prongs. Karl carefully lays a red satin sash across Henry's right side and pins the medal to his left breast pocket. Carl then reads a proclamation to the small group assembled in this office. Signed by the Fuhrer himself. It declares that Henry is receiving this award because of his humanitarian ideals and loyalty through many years to the cause of peace. Like their Fuhrer and Chancellor has done. Henry is officially the first American to receive the Grand Cross of the German Eagle, the highest honor for Nazi allies abroad. Benito Mussolini himself was presented with the cross just last year. A few days later, Jewish war veterans of the US Publicly call for Henry to renounce the award, saying this act on your part can only be interpreted as an endorsement by you of the barbarous, indecent and irreligious Nazi program and philosophy. Henry doesn't. He keeps the Nazi medal. Henry Ford isn't the only American embracing Nazification. This same year, another American hero we just met met in episode 181. Charles Lindbergh receives the Service Cross of the German Eagle for his aviation feats. It's awarded by none other than Herman Goring. Also this same year, Reverend Charles E. Coughlin republishes the Protocols of the Elders of Zion in his weekly periodical. Regretfully, late 1930s America's anti Semitism is only getting stronger. And that combined with the general anti imperial immigration attitude in the midst of the Great Depression is all part of why Congresswoman Edith Rogers and Senator Robert Wagner won't succeed with their bill to accept 20,000 Jewish children as refugees. And why the US government will send the Ms. St. Louis back to Europe where hundreds of its passengers will later die in the Holocaust. Ah, we're back to our starting point. I guess you could say we've come full circle. That's no small feat. We've traced Jewish history from the Roman Empire to modern Europe to the rise of the Third Reich. We've witnessed the violence, persecution and stripping of rights from Jews that mark the start of what you and I will know as the Holocaust. And yet, we've only scratched that evil surface. Unfortunately, we have much systematic death and genocide yet to come. And of course, we've looked across the Atlantic to see America's reaction in real time. Regretfully, it isn't everything we might want it to be. In fact, we'll close our story today with the tale of a Nazi Allied organization in the United States organized by German World War I veteran Fritz Kuhn. This is the German American Bund. Fritz is its leader or Bundeswehrer. And by the late 1930s it boasts nearly 25,000 dues paying members from nearly every state, all of whom have sworn that they have no Jewish or black ancestors. Basically this Bund is ideologically aligned with Nazi Germany, but with an American twist. Kind of like the book TV show Man in the High Castle. Except this isn't fiction. They're vehemently anti Semitic and partner with other like minded organizations across the country, one of which is run by Reverend Charles Coughlin. And they're holding a rally in NYC to prove to America once and for all that Nazism is supported here. Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia reluctantly allows them to organize. After all, as much as we might disagree with the hatred they espouse, they are protected by free speech. It's just after 8pm Feb. 20, 1939, just two days shy of George Washington's birthday. We're in New York city's Madison Square Garden 3 on 8th Avenue between 49 9th and 50th streets. 17,000 or more policemen are corralling the hundred thousand people gathered outside. Some here to protest, others wishing they could get into the sold out rally. Inside nearly 20,000 people are packed into the venue, waiting for the rally to start. Looking toward the speaker's platform they see an impressive 30 foot banner depicting the nation's first president, flank by American flags and next to the stars and stripes swastika banners. Huh. Now the leaders of tonight's rally had previously agreed not to display any blatantly anti Semitic paraphernalia. Seems they've broken that promise. I wonder what else is in store then. Finally the rally begins. Men in black slacks, brown shirts, military military style belts and garrison caps strut down the aisle. They're followed by a drum line with flags, American and swastika flags. A few speakers give remarks. One of them, James Wheeler Hill, says that our soon to be birthday boy George Washington would be a friend of Adolf Hitler, just as he was of Frederick the Great. How, huh? I'll let you think on that one. Anyhow, the crowd isn't here for these mid level speakers. No, they're waiting on Fritz Kuhn. It's now just about 9:30. Standing at the front of the platform in his dress uniform, the Bundesfuhrer himself, Fritz faces the roaring Nazi saluting crowd. With a slight German accent, Fritz begins. Ladies and gentlemen, fellow Americans, American patriots, I am sure I do not come before you tonight as a complete stranger. You will have heard of me through all the Jewish controlled press as a creature with horns, a cloven hoof and a long tail. The crowd laughs, clearly approving of this anti Semitic joke. He continues on After a particularly horrific statement about Jews. A blue suited 26 year old former merchant marine and current plumber's assistant from Brooklyn named Isidore Greenbaum isn't having it. He charges toward Fritz yelling Down with Hitler. The microphones on stage amplify his voice in quick footsteps. Remembering the incident later, Isadore will say that he did it because they talked about so much against my religion and there was so much persecution. I lost my head and felt it was my duty to talk. Within moments, brown shirted guards are upon him. They rip his pants from his legs. But thankfully this is New York, not Berlin. The police are able to save the brave young man from these SA wannabes and yet here was an honest to God Nazi attack on a Jewish man in New York City in Madison Square Garden and it doesn't stop the rally. Fritz finishes his speech as the crowd roars in unison Free America. Free America. With their arms outstretched and the Nazi salute. History that Doesn't Suck is created and hosted by me, Greg Jackson Episode we researched and written by Greg Jackson and Riley Nadauer Production by Ayrsham Sound design by Molly Vaughn Theme music composed by Greg Jackson Arrangement and additional composition by Lindsey Graham of Ayrsham For a bibliography of all primary and secondary sources consulted providing this episode, visit htdspodcast.com HTBS is supported by fans@htbspodcast.com Membership My gratitude to you kind souls provide funding to help us keep going. Thank you and special thanks to our patrons whose monthly gift puts them at producer status. Ahmad Chapman Andrew Neeson Andy Thompson Anthony Pope Hart Lane Bob Stimmon Brad Davidson Brian Goodson Bronwyn Cohen Bruce Hibbert Carissa Sedlak Harry Bigold Charles Clandenden Charlie Mages Chloe Tripp Christopher Merchant Christopher Pullman Colleen Martin Dan G, David D. 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Sedla, Reece Humphries, Wadsworth, Rick Brown, Robert Drazovich Rock Day Sal Asante, Sarah Trewitt, Saren Thiessen, Sean Baines, Stacy Ritter, Steve Williams, Creepy Girl Thomas Churchill, Thomas Saba, Cam and Sarah Turner, Tom Mustafica, Zach Green and Zach Jackson join me in two weeks where I'd like to tell you a story. Martha listens to her favorite band all the time. In the car, gym, even sleeping. So when they finally went on tour, Martha bundled her flight and hotel on Expedia to see them live. She saved so much, she got her seat close enough to actually see and hear them. Sort of. You were made to scream from the front row. We were made to quietly save you more Expedia made to travel Savings vary and subject to availability. Flight inclusive packages are atoll protected.