Lincoln and the Jews By EMANUEL HERTZ. Delivered over WRNY — Hotel Roosevelt, Sept. 2, 1928 LINCOLN ROOM UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS LIBRARY MEMORIAL the Class of 1901 founded by HARLAN HOYT HORNER and HENRIETTA CALHOUN HORNER Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2012 with funding from University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign http://www.archive.org/details/lincolnjewsOOhert ABRAHAM LINCOLN LINCOLN AND THE TEWS An appreciation of the work of the late Isaac Markens By EMANUEL HERTZ ITH the passing of Isaac Markens the other day, one of the closest students of the life of Abraham Lincoln disappeared from the stage. He it was who took upon him- self the task of delving into the contemporary newspaper comments and official archives and to bring to light as many of the contacts of Abraham Lincoln with the Jewish people as could be recovered and reclaimed from the old magazines, newspapers, conversations, interviews and documents, all of which, together with the still surviving actors of the time, were quickly disappearing. Had it not been for his valuable brochure on "Lincoln and the Jews" in which he enumerates Lincoln's Jewish friends some of the most valuable leads in that most neglected phase of Lincoln's life would have been forever lost. Surely the people who contributed so full a measure of men and means, of money and of Union preachers and propagandists deserved a better fate. Still no one spoke a word until Markens took up the task and demonstrated that we, the Jewish people, too, stood by the Union — when that last great hope of government by the people was on trial. Until Markens came the only prominent Jewish Civil War name known was that of Judah P. Benjamin, the Senator from Louisiana — sometimes called the brains of the Con- federate Cabinet — and he was with the enemies of the Union. Markens compiled some of the more important events, when the Jewish soldier or private citizen came in contact with Lincoln — and demonstrated once again that Lincoln knew no distinction betwen creeds or classes — he was indeed Father Abraham to all who made up the great country whose destinies were in his strong but weary hands. Markens was particularly fortunate in listing and bringing from obscurity and quoting the Jewish friends and spokesmen of Lincoln in 1864 and 1865. He has garnered almost a complete list of funeral sermons delivered in the Synagogues throughout the land on April 16th and June 1st 1865, and quotations from a number now completely lost ; and in the forty years of his work he gathered information about Lincoln from nooks and corners and crannies, from thousands of newspaper clippings — carefully arranged and preserved — which were generally overlooked by those who prefer to evolve a Lincoln of their own rather than go to the fundamental facts which made up that great career. His instinct for novel facts was almost uncanny — and his proof is always authentic and complete. And so it was that toward the end of his life he prepared from his endless investigations, a formidable volume, in some thirty chapters, new incidents and recollections, minor details and hitherto unrecorded events which the ordinary author never tumbled upon — but which are indispensable in the col- lections of everything new about Lincoln. It was my good fortune to have read the manuscript but I fear that his death may interfere with its publication, for age had somewhat interfered with the diction and sequence of events in this his last effort, and he had no opportunity to put it in final shape for publication. He did not belong to that class of historical writers who have their work briefed for them as did one of the notable biographers of Abraham Lincoln, whose book has now gone 6 into many editions. Isaac Markens went to the newspaper files, wrote to the people themselves who were the actors at the time of the great storm and stress period of our counry, and in this manner procured his information from the original sources. His pamphlet on the Gettysburg Address — "Lincoln's Masterpiece" as he called it — is as complete a piece of historical research as can be found anywhere within the wide realms of Lincolniana. The article on the case of John Y. Beal is also a very valuable production, definitely recording what was undoubtedly a miscarriage of justice in an embattled country — one of the few instances where Lincoln refused to interfere with the decision of military tribunals, in this case presided over by General John A. Dix. But probably his best work was the gradual evolution of the picture of Abraham Lincoln as interpreted and painted by his own son, Robert T. Lincoln, with whom he was in constant correspondence and whose complete confidence he had, and whom he knew so well that he was never refused any information asked for, nor access to documents which were refused and denied to others, who arrogantly demanded to be permitted to pry into the family secrets of the Lincoln family. In this manner Markens found more genuine Lincoln material and really started the work of some future historian, whose work ought to be entitled "Abraham Lincoln As Interpreted By His Son" — a work not even dreamed of by so-called definitive historians. A work which must be done by some one. Markens was a true lover of the great Emancipator. Lincoln was his passion, he was his hobby, he was his cloud by day and pillar of fire by night which guided that industrious newspaper man who wrote for prac- tically every leading newspaper of the day, and who read more newspapers in his search for Lincoln material than any other man I ever met or heard of. The paramount lesson of Markens' life which might well be heeded by the future historians is this: Jefferson Davis, the great opponent of Abraham Lincoln and the embodiment of the spirit of secession, has found at the hands of a prominent scholar and historian, Dr. Dunbar Rowland, his reward in a definitive edition of his life, his addresses, his speeches and his letters, as complete as human effort can make it, in ten volumes comprising about six thousand pages, indeed, a colossal under- taking. It is from that source that every life of Jefferson Davis will hereafter have to be drawn. It is from that source that every important problem of the South, in reference to secession, will have to be elucidated and explained — it is in this encyclopaedic compilation that epoch making decisions ot Jefferson Davis are explained and in this great work Jefferson Davis is as nearly vindicated as he ever can hope to be. Is it not time that at least the same thing be done for the man of the ages, the man who saved our Union, the man who liberated fowr million people, the man who has become the model of all succeeding Presidents, the household divinity of millions of people, both in this country and abroad? Is it not time that Lincoln be similarly documented, his epoch making decisions explained and many of his most important achieve- ments revealed? Only in this manner can we thoroughly appreciate how he successfully struggled with supermen like Lee and Jackson and Joseph E. Johnston and Jefferson Davis, and prevailed. Must we from this Southern encyclopaedia ot Jefferson Davis lore draw our explanations how the frontier farmer statesman out-generalled the heroic leaders of the South, at the head of the most perfectly organized military engine of the century? Must we go to the enemies of the Union to explain the success of Union arms, Union diplomacy and Union statesmanship? We ask for no comment. We ask for the facts, for the documents, for the letters, for the pardons, for the cards he wrote — those will constitute the best monument of our War President, for his monuments of bronze and marble may crumble — his spoken and written word — never. Is it not time, I submit, that a similar definitive collection of speeches, works and utterances should be collected and that all documents be called from their hiding places, that all patriotic men and women who have such documents — and there are many outstanding — be asked to contribute to the common foundations of a definitive collection of the life, the works, the letters, particularly the letters, where his soul was portrayed from so many different angles and which disclose so many different phases — that all of these be collected, be published, so that all may have them at a nominal price? Congress prints thousands of volumes on almost every topic including the flora, the fauna, the geodesic conditions of the country in which the few are interested. Why not this, marvelous career, the epic of America, the hero of every young man who knows adversity, who struggled to overcome the trials and tribulations of the ages, a work in which not only the whole world is interested — but in which generations yet unborn will find guidance and solace and strength to do right? Why thus discriminate against the savior of the Union and the preserver of our heritage? A Congressional appropriation by Congress of $100,000 would start the work with such momentum as to bring it to a successful completion within ten years. Is it not time that this work be begun now ? Must it wait for a day when the paper writings will fade, when the letters will be lost, when the newspaper pages will fall apart, as they are now doing — and the volumes lost and mislaid? Must we wait for a time when rumor and surmise, guess and suggestions will be the only methods of writing a definitive life of Abraham Lincoln and the false charges and impressions become ossified ? Is this but a repetition of the shameful treatment received by his grief stricken wife when begging for a pension ? Is Lincoln ever really to come into his own? Will he ever stop to hide and repress his utterances by voice and pen? Will the sons of War governors and War senators and cabinet members ever release those treasures? Or are they hiding some much deserved reproof from the patient man in the White House? Isaac Markens was one of the men who started this work in his own modest, unostentatious, quiet way and his life work is a reminder to us of the duty we owe in bringing together in one common fund, in one common place, accesible to all, of all that remains throughout the length and breadth of this land, of the utterances, the opinions, the heart throbs, as confided by the pen of that immortal soul, to paper or parchment, where- from shall appear the majestic proportions of the man of the ages — Abraham Lincoln ! 10 f T &/*