Mikhail Bernatzky

“ I believe it to be the duty I owe Your Imperial Majesty to express my firm, clear, and profound conviction that economic prosperity of the people even when coupled with a somewhat imperfect military organisation will be more useful in case of war than the most complete military preparedness combined with economic weakness. ”

“ Consequently, if any real danger at all threatens the aboriginal Russian population, it is precisely the cheap labour of the congested Jewish masses, and the more the Jews will be oppressed the worse it will be for the Russian workman! For the employer will always give preference to cheaper labour. It is evident, therefore, that the present treatment of the Jews is really not dictated by the native Russian population, and that the democratic argument is but a false pretext. ”

“ As a matter of fact, the Jews constitute more than one third, thirty-five per cent., of the commercial class in Russia. If we believe our country's prosperity to be bound up with the process of its progressive industrialisation, we must admit that the part the Jews play in Russia's commercial life is tremendous, that to a considerable degree they handle her entire commerce. All that hinders the untrammelled manifestation of the Jewish economic energies is harmful to Russia's economic organism. ”

“ It is the war, evidently, that has driven this truth home to us: namely that the ultimate success of the conflict depends not only on the activity of the armies, but also on the economic stability of the belligerent nations. The economic difficulties which are being experienced by Germany, strengthen our faith in our final victory. ”

“ Of course, formal justification can be found for every act, and every evil-doer endeavours to convince himself of the justice of his evil deeds. So it is in this case, too: the intentional shutting-off of the Jewish masses from education is motivated by the desire to keep them from becoming superior to the Russian population, which, it is said, is intellectually inferior to the Jews. This argument is an outright insult flung in the face of the Russian people. It shows that the official guardians of the nation do not know its rich natural powers. ”

“ What has been said so far demonstrates with sufficient clearness that the anti-Semitic economic policy is detrimental to the economic organism of Russia as a whole. The true interests of our country demand that Jewish labour and Jewish means should be given complete freedom of application. Russia will only gain from such a change of policy toward the Jews. Anti-Semitism, from the economic standpoint, is nothing but a tremendous waste of the country's productive powers. ”

“ But this argument cannot obscure the essential nature of Jewish disabilities as an intentional neglect of that productive power which is represented by a portion of the Russian subjects. Our economic organism does not get all the benefits to which it may rightfully lay claim.
Let us turn to those characteristic social and economic conditions under which the Jews exist in our country. Nearly all of them, upward of five millions, live within the Pale of Settlement, which comprises fifteen governments and Poland, and only six per cent, live outside of this territory. ”

“ In the economic life of the country the Jews play the part of middlemen, placed between the producer and the consumer of goods. In the Northwestern, Southern, and Southwestern provinces this function is almost exclusively that of the Jews. To isolate under such conditions, the commercial and industrial population of a considerable section of the country from the centre of its manufacturing districts is equivalent to inflicting a tremendous loss not only on the Jewish merchant class but also on the many millions of the non-Jewish population. ”

“ It is painful to touch upon many aching and essentially clear questions, but life constantly and severely demands that they should be brought before our minds, and life awaits an answer to them from the thought and conscience of Russian society. ”

“ To isolate the village from the town, the towns of the West and South from the towns and villages of the Centre and the East, is to disturb intentionally the economic life of the country, to undermine credit and depreciate the people's labour. ”

“ It is not our intention to discuss the necessity for the removal of Jewish disabilities from the humanitarian standpoint. However majestic may be those "elementary principles of law and morality," which have been achieved by mankind on its long historic road and which are now the very basis of civilisation, in the eyes of many they are still little more than "fine words," stylistic embellishments of high-brow talk. ”

“ The Jewish people has grown to be a living part of Russia's economic organism, and the blows which are directed against the Jews affect in an equal, if not a greater, degree the mass of the aboriginal Russian population. ”

“ The reader is well aware of the fact that in these days nothing has been discussed more vividly than the necessity of developing Russia's productive powers. The intimate connection between the general prosperity of our country and its economic progress has penetrated into the consciousness of people at large. ”

“ Whether the Jews as a race are to one's liking or not, is a question of individual taste, the solution of which cannot be allowed to influence the sane economic policy of a state. This must be guided by objective data. ”

“ It is characteristic of the part the Jews play in Russia's economic life that nearly seventy-three and eight hundredths per cent. of them are forced to seek employment in the country's commerce and industry. Of the entire Jewish population throughout the Empire, only two and four tenths per cent. are engaged in agriculture, four and seven tenths per cent. in liberal professions, eleven and five tenths per cent. ”

“ On the other hand, the Jews lower "the standards of living" by offering their services often at a very low price. Thus a peculiar "social anti-Semitism" comes into being, in Russia as well as in the countries of Jewish immigration,—a phenomenon not unlike the movement against "yellow labour" in the United States and in the Australian Federation. ”

“ It is precisely in this profit that both the Exchequer and the higher classes, and—what is most important—the people at large, are greatly interested. The basic productive force of a country is the living work of its population. The body politic of Russia contains about six millions of gifted and undoubtedly industrious Jews. ”

“ Well aware of the real needs of the country, and unwilling to sacrifice their commercial interests to anti-humanitarian mottoes, they expressed their fear that the actions of the administration would hinder the realisation of the harvest and that the "stocks of goods would find neither consumers nor buyers nor energetic middlemen to the extent to which they otherwise would have." ”

“ If there were no Jews now in Russia, it would be necessary to invite them, in the interests of both the commercial and industrial development of the country, just as they were more than once invited for the same purposes in the past. ”

“ Of the emigrants who reach the shores of America the Jews are the poorest. A Scotch emigrant coming to the United States brings on the average $41.50, an Englishman $38.70, a Frenchman $37.80, a German $28.50, while a Jew brings the sum of $8.70, the smallest of all, far below the general average, which is $15.00. ”

“ In the same way works the artificial congestion of the Jews in the cities: only eighteen per cent, live in the villages of the Pale of Settlement, while the rest—more than four-fifths—toil in the towns and townlets. ”

“ In the latter case, the people, however eager they may be to sacrifice both their life and property, can bring to the altar of the fatherland their life only, but they will be unable to furnish the necessary financial means for the State. ”