Alternate Pale of Settlements

The Pale of Settlement was the act by Catherine the Great after the Second Partition of Poland, Russia inherited a huge Jewish population. Catherine didn't want them to be spread through the empire and forced Russian Jews to live inside the decree of the Pale of Settlement

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-g7rwaw4p6wc/TueyEc-DzQI/AAAAAAAAGF8/Q_ClENnKHp8/s1600/Map-Pale_of_Jewish_Settlement+copy.jpg

But what kind of Alternate Pale of Settlements could have been forged? And Alternate Pales of Settlements.

Some Ideas to discuss would be

1 If the Pale of Settlement never existed

2 If the Pale of Settlement was smaller

3 If the Pale of Settlement was larger

4 If the Pale of Settlement was in Alaska

TRY TO COME UP WITH MORE IF POSSIBLE
 
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Bigger Congress Kingdom (with Lithuania proper and Western Belarus?) could lead to smaller Pale in the long run-if, for example, zealot Tsar decide to expel all Catholics and Jews from parts of Ukraine and Belarus annexed directly by Russia into this bigger Congress Poland.
 
Larger and smaller, I'm not sure what it matters, though I guess it's a matter of "how large or small". Frankly, the Pale was already pretty big. I don't think Jews were ever more than about 10% of the population, and no one got resettled or anything (for the most part) - the Russians just decided to "quarantine" the Jews. The only really significant difference would be permitting Jews to settle in Moscow or St Petersburg, but since settling in cities was sometimes further restricted, even in the Pale, that seems like a non-starter.

Much smaller...well, we're probably looking at a lot of dead Jews. Russia in 1800 wasn't exactly equipped for wholesale relocation of hundreds of thousands or millions of people, and what probably would have happened was just letting cossacks run rough-shod over all Jews who didn't relocate when told to. If it's small enough, there will also be all sorts of fun problems with food supply and economy. It's possible that solidly majority-Jewish areas might lead to a significantly different Jewish culture as Jews are forced to fill all economic and social niches in culture, but I'm not sure.

Alaska is something I've thought about a lot, and my conclusion is basically - why? If Russia wants to claim new land, why would they do it with people who are almost certain to be disloyal to them?

The thing to remember, I think, is that the establishment of the Pale was lazy. It basically said, "All those places with lots of Jews? Yeah, you Jews stay there!" rather than any, uh, more sophisticated method of control and restriction.
 
Tsarist Russia already pushed Jews west-from Lithuania and Belarus to Russian Poland-two main waves emigrated after repressions after assassination of Alexander II and later after 1905 revolution.
 

Deleted member 97083

If it was just in Belarus, then Belarus could have become a majority Jewish kingdom/archduchy.
 
Alaska is something I've thought about a lot, and my conclusion is basically - why? If Russia wants to claim new land, why would they do it with people who are almost certain to be disloyal to them?

I was thinking that they think Slavs, and Russians should settle the new land in Eastern Europe, and decided to put all Jews into Alaska, and hope that they could control the province by a Jew loyal to the Russian Tsar in St.Petersburg, and by maybe manipulating the Jews, could convince many that Alaska was the place they were "destined to live" or something like that. It might benefit the colony having millions of citizens to do work in the Americas.

And if the Jews fight for independence in Alaska, and the revolution isn't put down, they still got what they wanted, an Eastern Europe settled by Russian Slavs.
 
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