As a 7th generation Louisianian, my initial read was "what in the world is this guy talking about?" .... what sort of violence do you mean? and please come up with some incidents supporting your position? Huey was bombastic, loved Ramos Gin Fizzes, LSU football (and the university) and could be authoritarian, but using violence to attain his goals....hmm
Would the Jews have been persecuted if Huey Long was elected in 1936?
- Thread starter WildBoulder
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As a 7th generation Louisianian, my initial read was "what in the world is this guy talking about?" .... what sort of violence do you mean? and please come up with some incidents supporting your position? Huey was bombastic, loved Ramos Gin Fizzes, LSU football (and the university) and could be authoritarian, but using violence to attain his goals....hmm
Very well, change violence to "threats of violence." How else do you suppress dissent with a state police?
There was also the kidnapping episode:
To be fair, it all worked out for the best.
To be fair, it all worked out for the best.
I think that in political arenas similar to Long‘s, you are an ally until you’re not. In other words, you are not an obstacle/problem until times change. For example Jews were important integral parts of the Soviet leadership under Lenin. Not so much under Stalin.
As for antisemitism in America, it was greatly overshadowed by racism against blacks, as Jews were usually white. However I remember a story my uncle (Irish) told me once. He worked on the NYC docks in the late 30s when it was controlled by the mob. He said Irish and Jews who showed up for work were usually let on the docks, but when their names were called, were often turned away at the the boats as “not needed today”. However blacks rarely got on the docks at all.
ric350
As for antisemitism in America, it was greatly overshadowed by racism against blacks, as Jews were usually white. However I remember a story my uncle (Irish) told me once. He worked on the NYC docks in the late 30s when it was controlled by the mob. He said Irish and Jews who showed up for work were usually let on the docks, but when their names were called, were often turned away at the the boats as “not needed today”. However blacks rarely got on the docks at all.
ric350
Long was talking primarily about J. P. Morgan, and claimed that Parker Gilbert https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seymour_Parker_Gilbert and Russell Cornell Leffingwell https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell_Cornell_Leffingwell were still "running the thing" under Roosevelt. https://books.google.com/books?id=mGtYEAAAQBAJ&pg=PA219 Not a Jew among them!
RuneGloves
Banned
Leo Frank was a case of a man abusing and murdering a little girl, even tried to blame it on an innocent black janitor.
It was not anti-Semitism. A white man, who wasn't Jewish would've just been as likely to get lynched for such an horrific act.
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It is foolish and inaccurate, to simply pretend Frank being Jewish had nothing to do with the fact he was lynched.
RuneGloves
Banned
His horrific abuse and killing of a little girl had everything to do with the lynching.
You could make a reasonable comparison at least in style and program between Long and, say, Juan Peron, another figure often accuser (erroneously IMO) of being a fascist. Long himself was most certainly as you lay out not one himself
His problem with the Klan was more that they were a power base independent of his own, no?
Things can be two things.
A historian commented-
"Stating that it is impossible to determine the extent to which antisemitism affected his image, he concluded that "[Frank was seen as] a representative of Yankee capitalism in a southern city, with row upon row of southern women, often the daughters and wives of ruined farmers, 'at his mercy' – a rich, punctilious, northern Jew lording it over vulnerable and impoverished working women."
Another-
"Historian John Higham writes that "economic resentment, frustrated progressivism, and race consciousness combined to produce a classic case of lynch law. ... Hatred of organized wealth reaching into Georgia from outside became a hatred of Jewish wealth."
Tom Watson editor of the Jeffersonian, said this- "Watson also questioned whether Frank expected "extraordinary favors and immunities because of his race"[192] and questioned the wisdom of Jews to "risk the good name ... of the whole race" to save "the decadent offshoot of a great people."
RuneGloves
Banned
My understanding of establishment hate or dislike of the Klan is that they were a competing power structure, not ideology.
RuneGloves
Banned
Do you think a non-jewish white man would've avoided being lynched for what Frank did?
If Frank wasn't Jewish, we wouldn't even know his name. Historians, nor the ADL would have cared in the slightest.
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I can't prove a negative but if you don't think him being Jewish had anything to do with it, I have a bridge to sell you.
RuneGloves
Banned
Regardless of faith, in that community, if a man did such horrific actions, a lynching (vigilantism) would have happened.
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