[Illustration: _HORACE MEYER KALLEN (born in Silesia, Germany, in
1882, came to America in 1887), studied at Harvard (A. B., Ph.D.),
Princeton, Oxford, and Paris. He has been assistant and lecturer in
philosophy at Harvard, instructor in logic at Clark University, and
since 1911 of the faculty of philosophy at the University of
Wisconsin. At the request of the late William James, he edited his
unfinished book on "Some Problems of Modern Philosophy." Besides
contributing to philosophical and general periodicals, Dr. Kallen is
the author of a recently published book on "William James and Henri
Bergson." Dr. Kallen was one of the founders of the Harvard Menorah
Society, and has rendered signal service, both by tongue and pen, to
the Menorah movement._]
The United States of America are at peace with all the world. Our
government is not taking sides in the great war; officially we are the
friends of all the embattled powers. And yet--we have but to take up
any newspaper, anywhere in America, to find violent praise of one
side, violent blame of the other. The sentiment of our country is
divided. On all sides, our diverse populations are emphasizing afresh
their European origins and background. The German in German-American,
the Slav in Slavic-American, the Briton in British-American, have
awakened, have become demonstrative and emphatic. The President,
observing this, has declared his official and personal boredom with
the "hyphenated American," and the conception expressed in this phrase
has become an issue in the written and spoken discourse of our
country.
Why, in an officially neutral country, has this come to pass? When we
look closely to the ground and principle of the division of sentiment
in our population, we discover this significant fact: the division is
not truly determined by the merits of the European issue; it is
determined by the lines of our population's European origin and
ancestral allegiance. The Americans of German and Austrian and Magyar
ancestry are pro-German; those of French or British or Russian
ancestry favor the Allies. Only the Jews seem to be an exception to
this rule. Being mainly from Russia, their favor should go to the
Russians, but their newspapers, almost without exception, favor the
Germans. The case of the Jews, however, is an exception that proves
the rule. Although the majority of them came from Russia, they have
had no part in the Russian polity; they have been oppressed,
persecuted, terrorized, as their brethren still are in Russian
territory. As Americans, what portion and what hope have they in
Russia that they should desire Russian victory? None. But they are not
for this reason in favor of Germany. The headlines of their newspapers
do not celebrate German victories, but Russian defeats. The Ghetto's
partiality to Germany is a consequence of its loyalty to Jewry.
Kinship of blood and race, ancestral allegiance, determine with the
Jewish masses in America also, what side they take in this war.
Although they have no political background in Europe, and their civil
allegiance is absolutely American, they too are hyphenated in
sentiment--Jewish-Americans.
Such is the fact. Its significance lies in what it reveals, and what
it reveals is a force much deeper and more radical, distinctly more
primitive and original, than anything else in the structure of
society. It hyphenates English and Germans and Austrians and Russians
and Turks no less than it hyphenates Americans, and, in the failure of
the external socio-political organization of Europe to give it free
play, it is the chief, almost the only, cause of the present
unendurable European tragedy. Its name is nationality.
_Two Mosaics of Nationalities: A Contrast_
Nationality is not nationhood, although it is the most important
constituent of nationhood. Many nationalities may compose a nation
(such is the case of the British, Russian, Austro-Hungarian and
Turkish Empires, of the Swiss Republic, of our own Union), and then
the relation between the nationalities will determine the strength or
the weakness of the nation. Again, a single nationality may be divided
among many nations (such is the case of the Poles, of the Serbs and
other Slavs, of the Jews), and then the stability of the nations will
be largely determined by their effect on the nationalities divided
among them.
The Swiss Republic, for example, is a nation composed of three
nationalities, two of which belong to powers at war with each other.
These are the French and the German; the third is the Italian. Yet the
nationhood of Switzerland is the most integral and unified in Europe
to-day, because Switzerland is as complete and thorough a democracy as
exists in the civilized world, and the efficacious safeguard of
nationhood is democracy not only of individuals but of nationalities.
The German, French and Italian citizens of the Swiss Republic are
to-day under arms to defend the neutrality of their nation from
possible violation by German, French or Italian belligerents, and in
defending their nation, they are defending also the autonomy of each
other's nationality. In Switzerland, nationhood, being democratic, is
the safeguard and insurance of nationality.
Contrast Swiss nationhood with Austro-Hungarian nationhood.
Austria-Hungary is the immediate and direct occasion of the great war
by reason of the fact that, although she is a mosaic of nationalities
like Switzerland, her government, instead of being a democracy, has
in the long run been directed toward the control and exploitation of
many nationalities by one or two. Hungary contains a population of
seven million Magyars among twelve million Slavs; yet the Hungarians,
having the economic and political upper hand, have sought to Magyarize
by force and trickery this almost doubly greater and culturally equal
population. They have tried to compel Magyar forms and standards in
language, in literature, in history, the arts, the sciences, religion,
law, in every intimate or remote concern of the daily life and
national genius of their Slavic subjects. The result has been the
steady disintegration of the Austro-Hungarian mosaic, the increasing
use of force to hold it together, the corresponding increase of
restlessness among the subject-peoples, plot and counterplot, the
assassination of the Archduke, and the attack on Serbia, which
precipitated the war. In this war Austria has come off worst of all
the combatants, and for the same reason: the attempt to maintain the
unity of a nation of nationalities by the force of one of them instead
of by the democratic coöperation of all. In Austria-Hungary,
nationality, having been exploited and suppressed, has been the enemy
and destroyer of nationhood.
_America A Commonwealth of Nationalities_
In this country the whole spirit of those institutions which
constitute American nationhood makes for the liberation and harmonious
coöperation of nationalities. This spirit is also a part of the
Hebraic spirit, a part of the explicit program of our prophets, those
champions and vindicators of social justice and international
righteousness and peace; and this, significantly, is the spirit that
literally inspired the democracy of our America.
For the democracy of America had its first articulate voicing in the
Pilgrim Fathers and the Puritans of New England. These men and women,
devoted to the literature of the Old Testament, and upheld by the
ancestral memories of the Jews, were moved to undertake their great
American adventure by the ideal of nationality. It was not because of
an overwhelming oppression of body and soul that the Pilgrims
adventured to America. It was not "freedom to worship God" that they
sought. They had that in Holland. They sought freedom to be
themselves, to realize their national genius in their own individual
way. Their English manners, English speech, English history, and
English loyalty were, in fact, more important to them than their
Hebrew Bible. They used that as the spiritual pabulum which nourished
their English corporate life. Their Calvinism was a reinterpretation
of its prophetic nationalism expressed in the doctrine of the "chosen
people"; their political institutions were a modification of the ideal
political order it was supposed to reveal. As Cotton Mather narrates,
his grandfather, John Cotton, found, on his arrival in New England,
that the population was much exercised over the framing of a "civil
constitution." They turned to him for help, begging "that he would,
from the laws wherewith God governed his ancient people, form an
abstract of such as were of a moral and lasting equity." So "he
propounded unto them an endeavor after a theocracy, as near as might
be to that which was the glory of Israel." Out of this beginning the
democratic mood of America surges; in such conceptions the ideals
which express the mood have their origins. These ideals are the
conservation of nationality, and the equality of men before the
inconceivable supremacy of their God. Hebraism and English
nationality--these are the spiritual background of the American
commonwealth.
Political freedom in America has tended to generate self-expression of
each national group, and our country is to-day, broadly speaking, a
great coöperative commonwealth of nationalities, British, French,
German, Slavic, Jewish, each freely developing, in so far as it is
self-conscious, its national genius, its language, literature and art
in its own characteristic way as its best contribution to the
civilization of America as a whole,[C] realizing in this way the ideal
of the democracy of nationalities, of international comity and
coöperation which our prophets were the first to formulate.
American nationhood, thus, is in the way of becoming what Swiss
nationhood fully is, the liberator and protector of nationality; its
democracy is its strength, and its democracy is "hyphenation."
"Hyphenation" may, it is true, become perverse. As an expression of
the coöperation of nationality with nationality in the life of the
State, it is inevitable and good; as an attempt to subordinate all
nationalities to one, to use all for the advantage of one, it is
partial, undemocratic, disloyal. Our nation is a democracy of
nationalities having for its aim the equal growth and free development
of all. It can take no sides. To require it to take sides, German or
Anglo-Saxon, Slavic or Jewish, is to be untrue to its spirit and to
pervert its ideal.
_The Renaissance of Nationality in the Past Century_
It is the attempt of one nationality to dominate and to impose its
character, culture and ideals upon others that has been the basis of
all the great wars in Europe, of all international injustice from the
beginning of history.
The movement in modern history which we call progressive has been a
movement toward democracy in both the internal affairs and external
relationships of nations. Men did not realize its entire significance
until the nineteenth century; only then did it come to full
consciousness in fact and idea, urged equally in Greece, in Germany,
in Ireland, in Italy. Its great voice is the Italian thinker and
patriot, Mazzini. In a marvelous essay entitled "Europe, Its Condition
and Its Prospects," he wrote, at a time when the hope of social and
international democracy seemed extinguished: "They struggled, they
still struggle, for country and liberty; for a word inscribed upon a
banner, proclaiming to the world that they also live, think, love and
labor for the benefit of all. They speak the same language, they bear
about them the impress of consanguinity, they kneel beside the same
tombs, they glory in the same tradition; and they demand to associate
freely, without obstacles, without foreign domination, in order to
elaborate and express their idea, to contribute their stone also to
the great pyramid of history. It is something moral which they are
seeking; and this moral something is in fact, politically speaking,
the most important question in the present state of things. It is the
organization of the European task. In principle, nationality ought to
be to humanity that which division of labor is in a workshop--the
recognized symbol of association; the assertion of the individuality
of a human group called by its geographical position, its traditions
and its language, to fulfill a special function in the European work
of civilization."
Modern Europe saw the overthrow of the Holy Roman Empire, of the
imperial aspirations of Louis XIV, and of Napoleon before it realized
the natural fact and moral principle which underlay these overthrows,
and which finally so successfully asserted themselves as to unify
Italy and cast off the Austrian dominion, to liberate Greece,
Bulgaria, Roumania and the other Balkan States from the Turk, to unify
and create contemporary Germany. The last quarter of the nineteenth
century saw the renaissance, often in the face of overwhelming
suppression, of the language and cultures of Czechs, Bohemians, Poles,
Irish and Jews. It saw the rise of nationalism in the Oriental
dependencies of Great Britain. It saw the beginning of an
acknowledgment of the full rights of nationalities by both Austria and
Great Britain, the grant of local autonomy to the various
nationalities in the Austrian Empire, of progressive home rule to
India and South Africa and Ireland. The twentieth century seemed to be
moving peacefully toward the fulness of democracy--when came the war.
_The Present War: Nationality vs. Imperialism_
Let no one be deceived into believing that this war is a struggle for
the economic domination of the world, springing from commercial
rivalry and industrial intrigue. No. Nothing is so international as
economic life--we in America know that now to our own cost also--and
if commercial interests and capitalistic counsels had had their say,
there would have been no war. England was Germany's best customer,
France her great creditor, Russia supplied her with unskilled labor.
The socialist international was against war, the peace party was
against it, the intelligence of the world was against it. When it
came, it shattered all these international organizations into national
units, it smashed the solidarity of even science and art, which are
the most international enterprises in the world. And why? Because its
cause was something deeper than economic interest or the other
secondary interests. Here is the question that the war is to decide:
Is the whole of mankind to be dominated in body and in spirit, without
its consent, by a portion of it, and to be compelled "to elaborate and
express the idea" of the portion? or is the whole of mankind to be
self-governed, in a coöperative commonwealth, each part of which, by
elaborating and expressing its own idea, contributes its best to the
whole?
This is the issue between the warring powers and each claims that it
is defending itself against the aggression of its opponents. Each
claims to be fighting for democracy. In the face of these claims,
history has the deciding voice. Now, historically, England, more than
any other power, has stood for the democratic and coöperative idea.
Her colonies have autonomy, her more backward dependencies are
encouraged toward autonomy. Since the Boer war, when imperialism
passed away, she has moved toward the position of Switzerland. Even
Ireland has obtained home rule. "We are a great world-wide,
peace-loving partnership," said Mr. Asquith,[D] has reiterated again
and again the principle for which all the Allies are fighting:
believing that "the preservation of local and national ties, of the
genius of a people which has a history of its own, is not only not
hostile to or inconsistent with, but on the contrary, fosters and
strengthens and stimulates the spirit of a common purpose, of a
corporate brotherhood," the Allies seek to defend public right, to
find and to keep "room for the independent existence and free
development of the smaller nationalities, each with a corporate
consciousness of its own . . . and, perhaps, by a slow and gradual
process, the substitution for force, for the clash of competing
ambitions, for groupings and alliances and a precarious equipoise, of
a real European partnership, based on equal right and enforced by a
common will."[E]
It is hard to believe that Russia can be fighting for such an end.
Fear of Russian barbarism is what brought Germany into the lists, the
Germans declare, to defend western ideals and western democracy. Yet
Russian government is Prussian in its organization, and it is on the
side of the ideal of western democracy that she is explicitly aligned.
The contradiction is striking, and it is still more striking when we
recall that in her armies are over a quarter of a million of Jews, and
that in the other armies there are half as many more. For the Jews the
war is more than civil; it is fratricide. On the face of it they have
no inevitable personal or political stake in the war's fortune.
England has acknowledged their "corporate consciousness" and given
them maximal opportunity for "free self-development"; so has France.
Russia has oppressed and horribly exploited them; Germany, though
infinitely better than Russia, has set them conditions in which "free
development" is synonymous with complete Germanization. Austria and
Turkey have dealt with them somewhat after the manner of England and
France. The contradiction of the Jewish position outdistances that of
the Russian. But both contradictions are resolved in the fact that the
ideal in question concerns not Russia alone, nor England alone, nor
the Jews alone, but the whole of Europe, the whole world. What is at
stake is not something local, personal, political, but a universal
principle, the goal toward which mankind has been so slowly and
deviously crawling from the beginnings of modern history--the
principle of democracy in nationality and nationality in democracy.
It is for this that our brethren in the armies are fighting; it is for
this that they are undergoing crucifixion in the Pale, for this that
our people have suffered and died from the beginnings of our history.
Our whole recorded biography is the narrative of a struggle for social
justice against the exploitation of class by class within our polity,
for nationality against imperialism without. Our statesmen and leaders
were the first to formulate the ideal of the coöperative harmony of
nationality, and the ideal of international peace.[F] Mr. Asquith is
echoing our prophets, and our embattled brethren are engaged in the
defence of a principle which is the constituent of the genius of their
own nationality.
_The Service of Jewish Nationality to Civilization_
The genius of their own nationality! That with all its implications is
an issue in the war not only as a principle but as a fact. The Jewish
people are the great historic incarnation of the _casus belli_. In
fortune and in disaster, through difficult and terrible centuries,
they have cherished their language, their history, their culture, have
sustained their "corporate consciousness" and in terms of it have
served civilization in all the institutions of civilization. Not
freely, not by free development; not because of conditions, but in
spite of them. The Bible, whose moral vision inspires the world, we
gave the world only as we had or yearned for "independent existence"
and "free development." Our best, like the best of every people, has
been a function of this "independent existence and free development."
We also, scattered among the nations, tortured and oppressed by the
mighty and the weak among them, are among "the smaller nationalities"
for whose sake the war is being fought. With Serbia, with Belgium,
with Poland, we claim our public right and our national security, and
we claim it not merely for ourselves, but for the service of all
mankind. For as we have had a rôle "in the organization of the
European task," so we still have a rôle, and in that division of the
labor of civilization in terms of nationality we have our task to
accomplish, our service to render. This task, this service, is the
expression of the Jewish idea, the flowering and fruitage of the
Hebraic spirit, which, rooted in our historic past, planted on our
national soil, shall realize in modern terms, in social organization,
in religion, in the arts and the sciences, a national future that by
its inward excellence will truly make Israel "a light unto the
nations."
The indispensable condition for such a realization is autonomous
nationality; not nationhood, necessarily, but autonomy. This, more
than civil rights among other nationalities, is our stake in this
great war. In the last analysis, the Hebraic culture and ideals which
our Menorah Societies study, can be _advanced_, can be a _living_
force in civilization, only as a national force. Our duty to America,
inspired by the Hebraic tradition,--our service to the world, in
whatever occupation,--both these are conditioned, in so far as we are
Jews, upon the conservation of Jewish nationality. That is the potent
reality in each of us, our selfhood, and service is the giving of the
living self. Let us so serve mankind; as Jews, aware of our great
heritage, through it and in it strong to live and labor for mankind's
good.
[Illustration: Signature: H. M. Kallen]
_I think I see in your Society a recognition of the
real spirit of our country's motto_, e pluribus unum.
_That does not mean a sinking of the differences
between us all into absolute uniformity, but rather
the harmony that can result from the recognition of
these differences and developing our own
individualities so that we shall have variety in
unity.--From an Address before the Yale Menorah
Society by Professor Benjamin W. Bacon of Yale
University._