Anti-Semitism in Mid-Nineteenth-Century New York?

Quick question but how widespread was anti-semitism in mid-nineteenth century in New York? I was reading a history of the Rothschilds a little while ago and it mentioned that in hindsight one of their major mistakes was never setting up a house in New York, instead leaving local affairs to either a local bank or, after they had gone bankrupt in the crisis of 1837, a clerk of theirs who effectively talked his was into the position without prior approval. I was just wondering if they had sent a relative to set up a US branch how much hostility - overt or covert, in business or socially - they might have faced.
 
Depends on your definition of mid-nineteenth century.

Pre- American Civil War, most of the US Anti-Semitism can be described as lukewarm or mild, and a lot of that had to do with a concerted lack of distinct and separatist Jewish identity in United States and very small numbers of Jews present in United States. I am sure learned books have been written as to the cause and effect on this, but for the most part Jews intermarried with non-Jews and generally tended to avoid the us vs. them tribalism, unless they included themselves in the "us" of the majority targeting another minority. Thus, the Jews of New Orleans would see themselves as proud citizens of New Orleans first, then Louisianians, then Southerners and then Jews and would happily denounce damnyankee from New York, even if said New Yorkers were Jews. For the most part.

It must also be said that for the large part, the Jews that were immigrating to United States at this point were from Britain, France or Germany, and tended to be lumped in with the Christian immigrants from those nations when being discussed. Pre-ACW, there were discussions of German immigration, but not German-Jewish immigration as being distinct. For the most part.

Then came ACW. The Civil War unleashed a lot of things, as people were looking for scapegoats and "traitors" and etc. The Jews were not alone in this, in terms of being a minority targeted by mistrustful majority society experiencing an upheaval. But what is curious at how both the North and the South saw in Jews the enemy-within not-doing-their-share. The most infamous example of this is Gen. Grant's Order 11, which earns its black mark in US history as the only official Federal anti-Jewish government act. It was quickly rescinded once Lincoln found out about it, but the fact that it could have be issued in the first place should tell you a little about the mood of the times. Once again, this Anti-Semitism was still tepid by European standard, never mind an Eastern European one, but still, it was there. But even that must be set by against the quickness with which Lincoln moved to rescind and the reactions of Confederate generals to Jewish soldiers in their ranks, which for the most part were positive.

For the truly ugly and mass scale 19th century anti-Semitism we must turn after ACW, when Jewish immigration came from the Pale of Settlement. Rather than the largely urbane Jewish immigrants from Germany, Britain and France, this wave included people who were not to put to fine a point on it - peasants and other sort of rural people (e.g., small time artisan). They were also more likely to be self-defined and have a distinct identity. If a German Jew coming into United States in the 1840s was likely to think of himself as a German first and a Jew second, the 1890s Jewish immigrant from Ukraine thought of himself as a Jew, because he was reminded of being a Jew every day of his life by his fellow non-Jews back home and not reminded of it in kind terms. They were more likely to be insular to avoid attacks from outsiders and this insularity in terms bred contempt and distrust from the greater society making a vicious circles. Once again, this is not a unique experience per se, when weighed against Polish or Italian immigrants coming to United States at the same time, or other Eastern European peoples, but that is where it gets really ugly. Then it mutates into something uglier still, but that's later.

I do not think Rothschilds in the 1850s would have experienced any more prejudice than other German concerns in United States and there were, if memory serves, some German-Jewish financial bankers in United States at the time. The word "banker" was not a wide spread understood dog whistle word for "Jew" in United States until the 1880s, or even the 1890s. In my uniformed view.
 
Anti-Semitism certainly did exist in the US in the 1850's, yet it is striking how little there was compared to anti-Catholicism. In particular, the Know Nothings distinguished between Catholics and Jews:

"The importance of republicanism to the Know Nothings is reflected not only in their anti-Catholicism but in their treatment of American Jews as well. Contrary to what one might expect, and in stark contrast to future American nativists, Know Nothings did not condemn Jews or Judaism. To some extent, of course, this reflected the minute size of the antebellum Jewish-American population. But the Know Nothings also refused to denounce Not because, unlike Catholics, Jews never allowed "their religious feelings to interfere with their political views." In fact, Know Nothings believed that Jews could make fine American citizens, because "however repugnant their religion may bc, their religion is Republican. . . Indeed, the Jews were the first Republican People in the world." Know Nothings contended that because of their republican propensities, evident in the democratic administration of their congregations, Jewish immigrants would never pose a threat commensurate to that of Catholicism." https://books.google.com/books?id=HBZxbQRA0JkC&pg=PA120
 
Interesting, thanks for both of your replies. I had originally assumed that any new house would, in the beginning at least, branch out from N. M. Rothschild of London, however the clerk I mentioned was employed by the Frankfurt branch, travelling on behalf of the Paris and London branches, originally on his way to Havana so it makes things wide open. Will have to have a quick trawl of the family trees and see if there are any obvious candidates to be sent over.
 
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