The Presidents of the United States and the Jews When the Ledger set out to commemorate President's Day by highlighting the connection between the Jews and our nation's presidents we were overwhelmed by the tidal wave of anecdotes and information included in the foremost book on the subject: The Presidents of the United States and The Jews by David G. Dalin and Alfred J. Kolatch (Jonathan David, 2000). What follows is just a small sampling of a fascinating segment of presidential - and Jewish - history as chronicled and excerpted in Dalin's and Kolatch's rich book (written before the presidencies of George W. Bush and Barack Obama).
President James Madison In 1810, Mordecai Manuel Noah, an ambitious man active in Democratic politics, applied to the Madison Administration for a consular appointment saying that it would encourage "members of the Jewish nation" to immigrate to the United States. In 1813, Secretary of State James Monroe appointed Noah as consul to Tunis in North Africa, making this the first diplomatic post awarded to a Jew. In 1815, following two years in Tunis, James Monroe recalled him. At the time of Naoh's appointment, said Monroe, the Department of State had not been informed of "the faith which you profess and that this would prove a diplomatic obstacle in a Moslem community." Noah attacked Madison...and Madison was forced to spend time placating and explaining his position to Jewish supporters.
President William Henry Harrison William Henry Harrison died on Sunday morning, April 4, 1841. His untimely death occasioned the publication of a pamphlet, Commemoration of the Life and Death of William Henry Harrison, by Isaac Leeser, which was the first published eulogy for an American president by a Jewish clergyman. Leeser was spiritual leader of Philadelphia's Mikveh Israel Congregation and editor of the Occident, the first English-language Jewish newspaper in America.
President Millard Fillmore Fillmore has the distinction of being the first president to offer a seat on the U.S. Supreme Court to a Jew. Judah P. Benjamin, then a U.S. Senator from Louisiana, was born into an old Sephardic family in the British West Indies in 1811 and moved with his family to North Carolina two years later. After attending Yale University, one of the first Jews to do so, he settled in New Orleans. Fillmore offered him the seat in 1852. Benjamin, however, declined Fillmore's appointment, preferring to remain in the Senate, where he soon established a reputation as one of the chamber's greatest orators. When Louisiana seceded from the Union in Feb. 1861, Benjamin, a passionate Southerner, resigned his seat and joined Jefferson Davis's Cabinet, as, successively, attorney general, secretary of war, and secretary of state of the Confederacy. Besides being the greatest nineteenth-century American Jewish statesmen, Benjamin enjoys another historic distinction: He is the only American Jew who appears on a piece of currency: the Confederate two-dollar bill.
President Franklin Pierce Pierce has the unique distinction of being the only president whose name appears on the charter of a synagogue. Until 1856 the laws of the District of Columbia discriminated against the establishment of Jewish houses of worship. To put an end to this, Congress, which had sole jurisdiction over the District of Columbia, enacted legislation proclaiming that "all the rights, privileges and immunities heretofore granted by law to the Christian churches in the City of Washington, be, and the same hereby are, extended to the Hebrew Congregation of said city." When President Pierce put his signature on this bill, he made possible the establishment of the first synagogue, Washington Hebrew Congregation, in the nation's capital. Franklin Pierce also appointed August Belmont, the influential Jewish financier, to the post of U.S. Minister to The Hague. Belmont was the first Jew to hold this rank in the American diplomatic service. Although Belmont did not deny that he was Jewish, he disassociated himself from the Jewish commuity and permitted his children to be baptized in the church.
President Abraham Lincoln During Lincoln's years in office, he cultivated many Jewish friends who supported him while he endured difficult and trying times. Those friends included Adolphus Simeon Solomons, a prominent Washington businessman. Solomons took an active part in planning the inauguration of every president from Abraham Lincoln to William Taft. His influence with Lincoln and with the Republican leadership in Congress was profound. He arranged for Rabbi Morris J. Raphall of Congregation B'nai Jeshurun in New York City, to be the first rabbi to deliver an invocation at a morning session of Congress. Lincoln was also instrumental in having rabbis officially recognized as chaplains in the armed forces. While army chaplains of the Christian faith had been serving in the armed forces of the U.S. as far back as the revolutionary war, it was not until the civil war that sufficient influence was brought to bear to grant Jewish chaplains the right to serve. In 1962 changes to the chaplaincy law allowing Jewish clergy to serve was submitted by Lincoln to Congress and passed. Upon the recommendation of the board of ministers of the Hebrew Congregation of Philadelphia, Lincoln then appointed the Reverend Jacob Frankel of Rodeph Shalom Congregation to serve as the first Jewish military chaplain. Lincoln's also revoked General Ulysses S. Grant's Order N. 11, issued on Dec. 17, 1862, which read: "The Jews, as a class, violating every regulation of trade established by the Treasury Department and also departmental orders, are hereby expelled from the department (of the Tennessee) within twenty-four hours." With Tennessee Jews falsely accused of bribing officers to allow them to smuggle cotton, a scarce commodity, from the South to the North, Jewish businessmen strongly protested Grant's order.
President Ulysses S. Grant Not all Jews forgave Grant 's lack of sensitivity to the Jewish population. Among those who urged his defeat were Reform leader Rabbi Isaac Mayer Wise and Herman Hellman, founder of the Merchants National Bank. Others, however, considered him fair and forthcoming. Actually, Grant appointed more Jews to public office than any president before him.
President Theodore Roosevelt In 1906, Teddy Roosevelt appointed Oscar Straus, founder of Macy's Department Store, as secretary of commerce and labor - thus making him the first Jew ever to occupy a Cabinet post. Among his reasons, "I want to show Russia and some other countries what we think of Jews in this country," said Roosevelt.
President Woodrow Wilson Perhaps more than any other president, Woodrow Wilson had the utmost respect and admiration for the Jewish people. He once remarked: "Here is a great body of our Jewish citizens from whom have sprung men of genius in every walk of our varied life; men who have conceived of its ideals with singular clarity; and led enterprises with spirit and sagacity..." Without doubt, the greatest Jewish influence in Wilson's life was Louis D. Brandeis, whom he nominated to the Supreme Court in 1916, sending Washington and Wall Street into convulsions. Brandeis was accused of being "a Jew with a reformist bent."
President Franklin Roosevelt Outstanding among the members of Roosevelt's Brain Trust was Felix Frankfurter, who Fortune magazine once characterized as "the most influential single individual in the United States." When Eleanor Roosevelt met Frankfurter for the first time, she said: "An interesting little man, but very Jewish." In 1939, followng the death of Supreme Court Justice Benjamin Cardozo, Roosevelt appointed Frankfurter to fill the so-called "Jewish seat" on the Supreme Court. He served until 1962. During the Holocaust, the majority of American Jews had faith in Roosevelt's leadership, as evidenced by the overwhelming number of Jews who supported him during each of his four races for the presidency. In later years, however, the serious questions raised by studies of his actions - or inactions - during the Holocaust transformed the attitudes of many American Jews, forcing them to reassess their once uncritical view of the president as a hero and thus the greatest friend of the Jewish people.
President Ronald Reagan Although Reagan was the first president in several decades not to have appointed a Jew to his cabinet, he relied heavily on the advice of Milton Friedman and other Jewish economists in shaping his economic policy, and he appointed several Jews to other important positions in his administration.
President William Jefferson Clinton Seven of the Cabinet members chosen to lead the executive departments during Clinton's terms in office were Jews, including Robert E. Rubin, Lawrence Summers, William S. Cohen, Daniel Glickman, Mickey Kantor, Robert Reich and Madeleine K. Albright. Cabinet-level rank was also accorded to Jacob J. Lew, director of the office of management and budget, Richard Holbrooke, ambassador to the United Nations, and Charlene Barshefsky.
About David Dalin Dr. David Dalin, an ordained rabbi and a widely-published scholar of American Jewish history, is the author or co-author of ten books, including Making a Life, Building a Community: A History of the Jews of Hartford (co-authored with Jonathan Rosenbaum) and The Presidents of the United States and the Jews. His articles and book reviews have appeared in a variety of publications, including American Jewish History, Commentary, Conservative Judaism and the American Jewish Year Book. Dalin received his M.A. and Ph.D. from Brandeis University, and his Rabbinical Ordination from the Jewish Theological Seminary.