Volume II Part 12 (2/2)

will help to realize the consummation of the Government ”that the sharply marked traits which distinguish the Jews from the native Russians should be levelled, and that the Jews should in their way of thinking and acting become akin to the latter.” Once placed outside their secluded ”Pale,” the Jews ”will succeed in adopting from the genuine Russians the praise-worthy qualities, by which they are distinguished, and the striving for culture and useful endeavor will become universal.”

[Footnote 1: On the emanc.i.p.ation of the Karaites see Vol. I, p. 318.]

The pet.i.tion reflects the humiliating att.i.tude of men who were standing on the boundary line between slavery and freedom, whose cast of mind had been formed under the regime of oppression and caprice. Pointing to the example of the West where the bestowal of equal rights had contributed to the success of Jewish a.s.similation, the St. Petersburg pet.i.tioners were not even courageous enough to demand equal rights as the price of a.s.similation, and professed, perhaps from diplomatic considerations, to content themselves with miserable crumbs of rights and privileges for ”the best among us.” They failed to realize the meanness of their suggestion to divide a nation into best and worst, into those worthy of a human existence and those unworthy of it.

3. THE EXTENSION OF THE RIGHT OF RESIDENCE

After some wavering, the Government decided to adopt the method of ”picking” the best. The intention of the authorities was to apply the gradual relaxation of Jewish rightlessness not to groups of restrictions, but to groups of persons. The Government entered upon the scheme of abolis.h.i.+ng or alleviating certain restrictions not for the whole Jewish population but merely for a few ”useful” sections within it. Three such sections were marked off from the rest: merchants of the first guild, university graduates, and incorporated artisans.

The resuscitated ”Committee for the Amelioration of the Jews” [1]

displayed an intense activity during that period (1856-1863). For fully two years (1857-1859) the question of granting the right of permanent residence in the interior governments to merchants of the first guild occupied the attention of that Committee and of the Council of State.

The Committee had originally proposed to restrict this privilege by imposing a series of exceedingly onerous conditions. Thus, the merchants intending to settle in the Russian interior were to be required to have belonged to the first guild within the Pale for ten years previously, and they were to be allowed to leave the Pale only after securing in each case a permit from the Ministers of the Interior and of Finance.

But the Council of State found that, circ.u.mscribed in this manner, the privilege would benefit only a negligible fraction of the Jewish merchant cla.s.s--there were altogether one hundred and eight Jewish first-guild merchants within the Pale--and, therefore, considered it necessary to reduce the requirements for settling in the interior.

[Footnote 1: Compare above, p. 49.]

A long succession of meetings of this august body was taken up with the perplexing problem how to attract big Jewish capital into the central governments and at the same time safeguard the latter against the excessive influx of Jews, who, for the sake of settling there, would register in the first guild and, under the disguise of relatives, would bring with them, as one of the members of the Council put it, ”the whole tribe of Israel.” After protracted discussions, a resolution was adopted which was in substance as follows:

The Jewish merchants who have belonged to the first guild for not less than two years prior to the issuance of the present law shall be permitted to settle permanently in the interior governments, accompanied by their families and a limited number of servants and clerks. These merchants shall be ent.i.tled to live and trade on equal terms with the Russian merchants, with the proviso that, after the settlement, they shall continue their members.h.i.+p in the first guild as well as their payment of the appertaining members.h.i.+p dues for no less than ten years, failing which they shall be sent back into the Pale. Big Jewish merchants and bankers from abroad, ”noted for their social position,” shall be allowed to trade in Russia under a special permit to be secured in each case from the Ministers of the Interior and of Finance.

The resolution of the Council of State was sanctioned by the Tzar on March 16, 1859, and thus became law.

In this manner the way was opened for big Jewish capital to enter the two Russian capitals and the tabooed interior. The advent of the big capitalists was followed by the influx of their less fortunate brethren, who, driven by material want from the Pale, were forced to seek new domiciles, and in the shape of first guild dues paid for many years a heavy toll for their right of residence and commerce. The position of these merchants offers numerous points of contact with the status of the ”tolerated” Jewish merchants in Vienna and Lower Austria prior to 1848.

Toleration having been granted to the Jews with a proper financial status, the Government proceeded to extend the same treatment to persons with educational qualifications. The latter cla.s.s was the subject of protracted debates in the Jewish Committee as well as in the Ministries and in the Council of State. As early as in 1857 the Minister of Public Instruction Norov had submitted a memorandum to the Jewish Committee in which he argued that ”religious fanaticism and prejudice among the Jews”

could only be exterminated by inducing the Jewish youth to enter the general educational establishments, ”which end can only be obtained by enlarging their civil rights and by offering them material advantages.”

Accordingly, Norov suggested that the right of residence in the whole Russian Empire should be granted to the graduates of the higher and secondary educational inst.i.tutions. [1] Those Jews who should have failed to attend school were to be restricted in their right of entering the mercantile guilds. The Jewish Committee refused to limit the rights of those who did not attend the general schools, and proposed, instead, as a bait for the Jews who shunned secular education, to confer special privileges in the discharge of military service upon those Jews who had attended the _gymn.a.z.ia_ [2] or even the Russian district schools, [3] or the Jewish Crown schools, [4] more exactly, to grant them the right of buying themselves off from conscription by the payment of one hundred to two hundred rubles (1859). But the Military Department vetoed this proposal on the ground that education would thus bestow privileges upon Jews which were denied even to Christians. The suggestion, relating to military privileges was therefore abandoned, and the promotion of education among Jews reduced itself to an extension of the right of residence.

[Footnote 1: The latter category comprises primarily the _gymn.a.z.ia_ (see next note) in which the cla.s.sic languages are taught, and the so-called _real gymn.a.z.ia_ in which emphasis is laid on science. The higher educational inst.i.tutions, or the inst.i.tutions of higher learning, are the universities and the professional schools, on which see next page, n. 4.]

[Footnote 2: The name applies on the European continent to secondary schools. A Russian _gymn.a.z.ia_ (and similarly a German _gymn.a.z.ium_) has an eight years' course. Its curriculum corresponds roughly to a combined high school and college course in America.]

[Footnote 3: _i.e._, schools found in the capitals of districts (or counties), preparatory to the _gymn.a.z.ia._]

[Footnote 4: See above, p.58 and below, p.174.]

In this connection the Jewish Committee warmly debated the question as to whether the right of residence outside the Pale should be accorded to graduates of the higher and secondary educational inst.i.tutions, or only to those of the higher. The Ministers of the Interior and Public Instruction (Lanskoy and Kovalevski) advocated the former more liberal interpretation. But the majority of the Committee members, acting ”in the interests of a graduated emanc.i.p.ation,” rejected the idea of bestowing the universal right of residence upon the graduates of _gymn.a.z.ia_, and _lyceums_ and even upon those of universities and other inst.i.tutions of higher learning, [1] with the exception of those who had received a learned degree, Doctor, Magister, or Candidate. [2] The Committee was willing, on the other hand, to permit the possessors of a learned degree not only to settle in the interior but also to enter the civil service. The Jewish university graduate was thus expected to submit a scholarly paper or even a doctor dissertation for two purposes, for procuring the right of residence in some Siberian locality and for the right of serving the State. Particular ”circ.u.mspection” was recommended by the Committee with reference to Jewish medical men: a Jewish physician, without the degree of M.D., was not to be permitted to pa.s.s beyond the Pale.

[Footnote 1: Such as technological, veterinary, dental, and other professional schools, which are independent of the universities.]

[Footnote 2: _Magister_ in Russia corresponds roughly to the same t.i.tle in England and America. It is inferior to the doctor degree and precedes it. _Candidate_ is a t.i.tle, now mostly abolished, given to the best university students who have completed their course and have presented a scholarly paper, without having pa.s.sed the full examination.]

In this shape the question was submitted to the Council of State in 1861. Here opinions were evenly divided. Twenty members advocated the necessity of ”bestowing” the right of residence not only on graduates of universities but also of _gymn.a.z.ia_, advancing the argument that even in the case of a Jewish _gymn.a.z.ist_ [1] ”it is in all likelihood to be presumed that the gross superst.i.tions and prejudices which hinder the a.s.sociation of the Jews with the original population of the Empire will be, if not entirely eradicated, at least considerably weakened, and a further sojourn among Christians will contribute toward the ultimate extermination of these sinister prejudices which stand in the way of every moral improvement.”

[Footnote 1: _i.e._, the pupil of a _gymn.a.z.ium_.]

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