p. 68 | Untitled article

Pacific Press Publishing Company · New York · March 3, 1892

FromThe American Sentinel, Vol. 7, No. 9

Method in Their Madness.

“If the Russian policy of persecution towards the Jews is deemed madness,” remarks the Observer, “there is apparently some method in the madness. According to the Vienna correspondent of the London Standard, M. Pobedonostzeff was asked by M. Poliakoff, a well known Russian Jewish banker in St. Petersburg, whether it was true that the recent expulsion of Russian Jews was due to his initiative. Minister Pobedonostzeff replied that it was, and then went on to say: ‘I addressed a memorandum to the Czar, and that was the origin of the orders you refer to. In that memorandum it was pointed out how useful it would be to Russia if a considerable number, at least some thousands, of Jewish families could be converted to the Orthodox faith, and thereby assimilated to or absorbed in the Russian race. The best way to this end, it was urged, would be to enforce the old decrees against the Jews, because the classes most wanted, like landed proprietors, manufacturers, first-class merchants, doctors, lawyers, and so forth, would rather be converted than to be driven out of their homes, and forced to reside within the Jewish pale. We Russians want new blood in our race, and none better could be found than that of the Jews, whose thrift, industry, soberness, domestic tastes, thirst for learning, and self-culture, whose instinct for trade, money making and money saving are just the qualities which we require, and which would come into our race by the infusion of Jewish blood. We can not amalgamate with the lower classes of Jews. But I can not observe any bad qualities in the better class of Jews, like you, M. Poliakoff, and we hope to retain them by conversion, if we only leave them expulsion as an alternative. All this was in my memorandum, and in an audience I had of the Czar, his Majesty directly expressed the hope that tens of thousands of the better class of Jews would embrace the Orthodox faith, and thereby become Russians.’ The scheme is certainly a bold one and the statesman who would thus boldly announce it is almost an anomaly. The views of M. Poliakoff on the subject would be interesting.”