At the turn of the century,
the Russian Czar’s secret police forged
a document, The Protocols
of the Elders of Zion, which purported
to outline a plan for Jewish world domination.
The Russians claimed that the radical Jewish
intelligentsia gathered in 1897 at the First
Zionist Congress in Basle, Switzerland
wrote the Protocols. The document “showed” how
a Jewish cabal was fomenting terror, causing
famine and promoting war. Publication of
the Protocols sparked anti-Jewish pogroms
in Kiev and Kishineff.
While the Protocols were
whispered about in anti-Semitic circles
in the United States, they did not reach
American shores in English translation until
1917. A Russian monarchist émigré,
Boris Brasol, translated the Protocols into
English and passed a copy to the State Department,
hoping to persuade the United States government
to withhold recognition of the Soviet regime.
He was convinced that the Bolsheviks were
in the pay of American Jewish bankers of
German background -- Jacob
Schiff and Felix Warburg in particular – who
had financed the Czar's overthrow to advance
German interests in World War I.
An American Army Intelligence
officer in Brooklyn, Harris Ayres Houghton,
MD, obtained Brasol’s translation of
the Protocols and became convinced of their
authenticity. An ardent anti-Semite and anticommunist,
Houghton had the authority to act on his
fantasies. According to historian Robert
Singerman, writing in the journal of the
American Jewish Historical Society,* Houghton “ordered
one of his subordinates ‘to investigate
any Jew as long as he was prominent’” for
signs of subversion. In 1918, Houghton passed
a copy of the Protocols to Chief Justice
Charles Evans Hughes, chair of a government
committee investigating a scandal in American
wartime aircraft manufacture. Houghton was
certain that “Jewish International Bankers” had
caused the manufacturing problems, but Justice
Hughes scoffed at the idea and denied the
authenticity of the Protocols.
At first, the American
Jewish community made no formal response
to the typescript versions of the Protocols
in circulation. They believed it best not
to give them publicity. In 1920, however,
a version was published in England and both
Brasol and Houghton planned to bring out
annotated versions in the United States.
Brasol found a respectable company named
Small, Maynard to publish his version. Putnam
and Son publishers agreed to publish Houghton’s.
When the American Jewish
Committee learned of Putnam’s plans,
its president, Louis Marshall, contacted
General George H. Putnam directly to discuss
the publication project. Putnam defended
it on the grounds of free speech, but Marshall
countered that free speech is only protected
if its is not libelous. Since there was ample
proof that the Protocols were forgeries written
to stir up violence against Jews, it would
be irresponsible for Putnam to publish it
without clearly labeling it a fraud. Putnam
agreed, and withdrew from the project. Undaunted,
Houghton found a financial sponsor, purchased
the plates from Putnam’s, and published
the work privately under the pseudonym of
Peter Beckwith. The book sold poorly, however.
When Small, Maynard published
Brasol’s edition, bookstores refused
to carry it. Sales were robust by mail order,
but Brasol’s hopes of reaching masses
of Americans to convince them that communism
was an outgrowth of Zionism were dashed,
at least temporarily. Resilient in his efforts,
Brasol sent a copy of the Protocols to automobile
manufacturer Henry Ford, who was convinced
that they were authentic. For the next two
years, Ford gave the Protocols wide circulation
in his newspaper, the Dearborn Independent.
Nothing did more to poison
the atmosphere against American Jewry in
the years between 1920 and 1922 than Ford’s
publication of the Protocols. Apparently
at Ford’s urging, the editor of the
Dearborn Independent, William Cameron, reworked
the Protocols into a series of articles, “The
International Jew.” Cameron described
the Protocols as “the most comprehensive
program for world subjugation that has ever
come to public knowledge.” Cameron believed
the Protocols probably did not originate
with the Basle Congress, but “may have
come to them as part of their ancient Jewish
inheritance.” The Zionists probably
reported to a modern Sanhedrin presided over
by a direct descendant of King David. Cameron
believed that, at that point, the United
States was “very largely in the hands
of, or under the influence of, Jewish interests.” Liberalism,
jazz and the decline in Christian virtue
were all signs, for Cameron, that the Jewish
conspiracy was on its way to success. According
to the blueprint, Jews would cause more wars,
famines and revolutions -- of which the Bolshevik
was only the first -- as a means to world
domination.
The “International
Jew” series stopped running in 1922,
but it was widely quoted. It was not until
1927, after a libel suit and Jewish boycott
of Ford products that Henry Ford recanted.
In a letter to Louis Marshall, Ford claimed
not to have paid any “personal attention” to
the series. Ford professed to being “deeply
mortified” to learn that the Protocols
were forgeries and that his newspaper had
offended Jewish sensibilities.
Nazi Germany adopted the
Protocols as a pretext for its war to exterminate
European Jewry. The Protocols still circulate
in print and on the Internet, inspiring radical
fringe groups in their deranged beliefs in
Jewish conspiracies. Sadly, each generation
must relearn that the Protocols are one of
the grossest and most damaging libels in
history.