Jewish Americans Political Participation: A Reference Handbook [Hardcover]

This handbook addresses how the Jewish American community emerged from obscurity to play a role in behind-the-scenes power politics and finally appeared center stage.

Jewish Americans and Political Participationexplores the rise of the Jewish people from hardscrabble immigrants to the highest echelons of political power. The book provides an overview of American Jewish life, including the impact of immigration, domestic antisemitism, the Holocaust, and U.SIsrael relations. A chapter is devoted to protest politics, covering such events as President Grant's Order #11 (expulsion edict), tenants and shirtwaist-makers strikes, the 1943 rabbis march on Washington, and Jewish responses to the Rosenberg case.

The book also covers participation in social movements such as abolition, Jewish defense organizations, and the New Left. A chapter is devoted to Jewish participation in electoral politics, from Jewish interest in early socialism to Jewish advisers and the emergence of Jewish conservatism. There are also biographies of Jewish American officials and political officeholders.

This book is well written and provides a compact and easily accessible history of American Jewish political life . . . this book serves as an important complement to some of the previous volumes in the series covering African Americans, Asian Americans, and Native Americans. Booklist

[A] recommended purchase for public and high school libraries. VOYA

It is a useful resource for academic and public library collections. American Reference Books Annual

This volume belongs in any library that claims to have some intelligent scope of materials on Jews and politics in the U.S. Essential. All levels. Choice