Friday, March 19, 1948
The Southern Jewish Weekly
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Religion in The Public Schools Loses
■ WKT * fya. i
I -
used for inter-denominational instruction in which Protest
ants, Catholics and Jews alike participated is immaterial. It
is as wrong for the one sect as for the other, or for all three
in combination, to take advantage of publicly supported in
stitutions for the furtherance of their sectarian doctrines in
violation of the Ist and 14th Amendments of the Consti
tution.
It is about time that the highest tribunal in the land let
it be known once and for all time that Church and State in
this country must be kept separate. Their wedlock in the
old world was the cause of constant friction, injustice and
corruption. Certain sects in America have become increas
ingly bolder in their attempts, through all sorts of schemes,
to raid the public treasury for financial support of their
respective creeds. *
Among these schemes are “Release Time,” the transpor
tation of children in publicly supported buses to denomina
tional schools, sectarian hymns and prayers in public in
stitutions.
The ruling of the Supreme Court upholds the Constitu
tion and causes a halt to all these undemocratic practices.
To assume that this epochal decision shows the U. S. govern
ment to be hostile to religion is the sheerest nonsense. On
the contrary, history proves that the Church flourishes best
when it is free from political domination.
The place for sectarianism is the Church, the Synagogue
and the home. If religion is vital, as it unquestionably is, its
support must come from the various sects and sectarians
who profess faith in their respective doctrines. If their faith,
is strong and sincere enough they will find the financial
support they seek without calling on public funds or public
institutions which are the property of the people of all creeds
and not of any particular one.
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FLORIDA POWJMIW COfIPJKY
This publication has for many
years fought the encroachment of
religion in the public schools. We
were therefore gratified with the
decision of the United States Su
preme Court rejecting as unconsti
tutional the teaching of religion in
tax-supported schools.
It is difficult to see how the
court’s ruling could have been
plaint against the use of public
school property in Champaign, 111.,
for sectarian purposes. The fact
that the schools of that city were
THE SOUTHERN JEWISH WEEKLY
Governor Lehman
BY DAVID SCHWARTZ
(Copyright, 1948, Jewish Tele
graphic Agency, Inc.)
From Jefferson Davis, President
of the Confederacy, to Franklin D.
Roosevelt, President of the United
States! All of that I think is in
volved in the career of Governor
Herbert H. Lehman, whose seven
tieth birthday is now being mark
ed.
To be sure, Governor Lehman’s
contacts with Jefferson Davis
could only be vicarious. He was
born in the north, a good many
years after the Confederacy was
finished, but Meyer Lehman, Her
bert Lehman’s father, had been a
friend of Jefferson Davis and one
cannot really understand Herbert
Lehman without knowing some
thing of his father.
A little skit might be written
about Jefferson Davis and the
rabbi. It wouldn’t be 100 per cent
accurate, for Meyer Lehman never
actually functioned as a rabbi. He
had intended to become a rabbi,
however. He was a man of no
little Hebrew and Biblical scholar
ship. He had all the requirements
of a rabbi, from desire to be one
to the knowledge and the outlook
of one—but by one of the many
accidents which deflect a young
man from his original purpose,
instead of becoming a rabbi, Meyer
Lehman in the 1840’s joined that
great stream of German Jewish
1 refugees who saw the handwriting
on the wall in time and came to
America. He went South and set
tled in Montgomery, Ala.
Richmond was the eventual cap
ital of the Southern Confederacy,
but Montgomery was the first.
The South, of course, has had a
great race problem, and still has,
but at least, until fairly recently,
it has been not an unfriendly place
to the Jew. Why this is so, one
can only speculate. Perhaps it is
due to the fact that many of the
Sputhern Jewish settlements are
of a very early, origin. Perhaps
another explanation might be that
the South had little of that pot
pourri of many and diverse Euro
pean streams which poured into
the industrial areas of the north,
so that the Jew was something of
an attractive curiosity to the
Southerner.
Another Southern characteristic
was the intense pre-occupation
with politics and statecraft. Back
in the pre-Civil War period, John
Quincy Adams of Massachusetts
bemoaned the fact that all the
best orators in Congress were from
the South. The reason for this was
simply that in the industrial north,
far less of the people gave them
selves to politics. The South had
virtually no industry to attract its
more alert minds. The ambitious
young Southerner either went to
a military academy or entered
politics.
I think these two facts which I
have mentioned played their part
unconsciously even in the life of
Herbert Lehman. The number of
prominent American Jews of
Southern background is striking.
Judah P. Benjamin was Secretary
of State in the Southern Confed
eracy. 4 The quartermaster general
of the Confederate forces was a
Jew. The family of the late Jus
tice Brandeis hailed from Ken
tucky. Bernard Baruch’s father
came from South Carolina.
Meyer Lehman held no political
office in the South but he was des
ignated by Davis to handle some of
the commercial transactions of the
Confederacy. The political “germ”
was inherited by Herbert Lehman
from his father.
IT’S YOUR DUTY TO CARRY ON, SON -
Between You and Me . . .
BY BORIS SMOLAR
(Copyright, 1948, Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Inc.)
THE PALESTINE ISSUE
I II
major question is whether Arabs will be included in the Provisional
Jewish Cabinet, since they form a large proportion of the population
of the Jewish state . . . Other questions deal with the decision of
portfolios in the Cabinet ... It is also apparent that there is no
Minister for Defense in the list of Cabinet members . . . Jewish
Agency members blame the American Government for the increasing
confusion now developing over the Palestine question . . . They
accuse the United States of indirectly encouraging Arab resistance
to the U. N. partition decision by bringing in such confusion . . . And
they are determined to fight strongly any effort which the American
delegation at Lake Success may make in the direction of abandoning
partition for federalization . . . American Zionist leaders have in
dicated that they will reject any invitation to talks on federalization
. . . Their attitude remains the same —that the U. N. partition decision
must be implemented under all circumstances . . . Meanwhile all kinds
of rumors are being circulated in Washington.
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Work on Palestine at the U. N. Commissions
at Lake Success is reaching a point of paraly
sis .. . The behind-the-scenes manipulations of
the Big Powers, and especially of the United
States, are discouraging the members of the
Commissions from making speedy decisions even
on comparatively minor matters . . . The tent
ative list of the members of the Provisional
Jewish Government is being carefully studied
by U. N. members . . . There are some questions
being raised with regard to this list . . . The
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