I imagine that Governments will, either voluntarily or under pressure
from the Anti-Semites, pay certain attention to this scheme, and they
may perhaps actually receive it here and there with a sympathy which
they will also show to the Society of Jews.
For the emigration which I suggest will not create any economic
crises. Such crises as would follow everywhere in consequence of
Jew-baiting would rather be prevented by the carrying out of my plan.
A great period of prosperity would commence in countries which are
now Anti-Semitic. For there will be, as I have repeatedly said, an
internal migration of Christian citizens into the positions slowly and
systematically evacuated by the Jews. If we are not merely suffered,
but actually assisted to do this, the movement will have a generally
beneficial effect. That is a narrow view, from which one should free
oneself, which sees in the departure of many Jews a consequent
impoverishment of countries. It is different from a departure which is
a result of persecution, for then property is indeed destroyed, as it
is ruined in the confusion of war. Different again is the peaceable
voluntary departure of colonists, wherein everything is carried out
with due consideration for acquired rights, and with absolute
conformity to law, openly and by light of day, under the eyes of the
authorities and the control of public opinion. The emigration of
Christian proletarians to different parts of the world would be
brought to a standstill by the Jewish movement.
The States would have a further advantage in the enormous increase of
their export trade; for, since the emigrant Jews "over there" would
depend for a long time to come on European productions, they would
necessarily have to import them. The local groups would keep up a just
balance, and the customary needs would have to be supplied for a long
time at the accustomed places.
Another, and perhaps one of the greatest advantages, would be the
ensuing social relief. Social dissatisfaction would be appeased during
the twenty or more years which the emigration of the Jews would
occupy, and would in any case be set at rest during the whole
transition period.
The shape which the social question may take depends entirely on the
development of our technical resources. Steampower concentrated men in
factories about machinery where they were overcrowded, and where they
made one another miserable by overcrowding. Our present enormous,
injudicious, and unsystematic rate of production is the cause of
continual severe crises which ruin both employers and employees. Steam
crowded men together; electricity will probably scatter them again,
and may perhaps bring about a more prosperous condition of the labor
market. In any case our technical inventors, who are the true
benefactors of humanity, will continue their labors after the
commencement of the emigration of the Jews, and they will discover
things as marvellous as those we have already seen, or indeed more
wonderful even than these.
The word "impossible" has ceased to exist in the vocabulary of
technical science. Were a man who lived in the last century to return
to the earth, he would find the life of today full of incomprehensible
magic. Wherever the moderns appear with our inventions, we transform
the desert into a garden. To build a city takes in our time as many
years as it formerly required centuries; America offers endless
examples of this. Distance has ceased to be an obstacle. The spirit of
our age has gathered fabulous treasures into its storehouse. Every day
this wealth increases. A hundred thousand heads are occupied with
speculations and research at every point of the globe, and what any
one discovers belongs the next moment to the whole world. We ourselves
will use and carry on every new attempt in our Jewish land; and just
as we shall introduce the seven-hour day as an experiment for the good
of humanity, so we shall proceed in everything else in the same humane
spirit, making of the new land a land of experiments and a model
State.
After the departure of the Jews the undertakings which they have
created will remain where they originally were found. And the Jewish
spirit of enterprise will not even fail where people welcome it. For
Jewish capitalists will be glad to invest their funds where they are
familiar with surrounding conditions. And whereas Jewish money is now
sent out of countries on account of existing persecutions, and is sunk
in most distant foreign undertakings, it will flow back again in
consequence of this peaceable solution, and will contribute to the
further progress of the countries which the Jews have left.