AMERICAN ZIONISM 1890-1940

Hoveve Zion (Lovers of Zion) was the international predecessor of the Zionist movement.  In America,  they published periodicals in the 1890s in Boston, Baltimore, and elsewhere.  They advocated a Jewish state as a buffer between Ottoman Turkey and Egypt.  The American Zionist Federation (AZF) was founded in 1898 but had very little "money, prestige, and political influence".  Hadassah, founded in 1912, was its women's membership organization and, under the leadership of Henrietta Szold, became the largest group in AZF.

Louis Brandeis took over the presidency of AZF in 1914 and, by doing so, became the leader of Jewish America.  Many of us were opposed to the Zionist requirement of "making Aliyah" because we had just arrived in America.  When Brandeis took over, he said that if we supported a Jewish state in Palestine it would be enough.  He reorganized AZF into the Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) in 1917.

Jacob Schiff and Luis Marshall were the previous leaders of Jewish America.  Although they worked with Brandeis to end the Cloakmakers strike of 1910, they retaliated against him by talking Woodrow Wilson out of appointing him as Secretary of the Interior.  Wilson appointed him later to a seat on the United States Supreme Court.

The Balfour Declaration of 1917, which established Palestine as a Jewish homeland, was instrumental in reducing Jewish America's opposition to Zionism.  The Biltmore Conference of 1942 united American Zionists on the issue of establishing a Jewish state in Palestine following the Holocaust.  They felt that the continuation of our homelessness would lead only to future Holocausts and, therefore, would not put their efforts or limited funds into rescuing Jewish Europe.

The primary Jewish organization in America advocating rescue of Jewish Europe was Agudas Yisroel.  In the face of the overall Jewish fear of offending the British, Agudas Yisroel was the only organization to continue to send food to Poland.

After World War 2, ZOA became the leader of the international Zionist movement.  The issue of whether to choose armed resistance or "patient  constructivism" as the method for achieving Israel's independence was so divisive that Stephen Wise stepped down as ZOA president.  Among the American advocates of armed resistance were Peter Bergson and Ben Hecht, who campaigned for a Jewish army.