Could America have a state that is as Jewish as Utah is Mormon>?
If that happened might settlement in Palestine have been different
If that happened might settlement in Palestine have been different
A Jewish State in the US
- Thread starter Derek Jackson
- Start date
Keenir
Banned
early on, there were plans for a Jewish island between the US and Canada...late 1700s, early 1800s or so.
Rather a horrible thought, but you need to bring the Holocaust, or something like it, forward to the mid 19C. That would trigger a huge exodus to America.
Main trouble, as I understand it, is that most Jewish immigrants preferred to settle in the cities rather than getting onto "wagons west". One possibility - when NY was dragging its feet about ratifying the Constitution, there was some talk of NYC seceding from the state and entering the Union separately. Had this happened, the resulting city-state might at some point have become majority-Jewish.
Main trouble, as I understand it, is that most Jewish immigrants preferred to settle in the cities rather than getting onto "wagons west". One possibility - when NY was dragging its feet about ratifying the Constitution, there was some talk of NYC seceding from the state and entering the Union separately. Had this happened, the resulting city-state might at some point have become majority-Jewish.
birdboy2000
Banned
I'm thinking a Jewish-majority state would have to be somewhere other than New York, because New York is so populous. And I don't see Jews going west mormon-style either. I'd think somewhere like Rhode Island, Connecticut, New Jersey or Delaware would be the best bet.
In addition, you need more Jews and earlier, so they can establish themselves first and the population has more time to grow. One of the reasons Irish ancestry is so pronounced in the Northeast is that they were one of the earliest ethnic groups to immigrate; the potato famine was decades before the later major immigration waves. If you get a wave of persecution earlier, it'd probably help push them to the US - maybe the Jews get more caught up in liberal revolutions, and the Concert of Europe retaliates?
In addition, you need more Jews and earlier, so they can establish themselves first and the population has more time to grow. One of the reasons Irish ancestry is so pronounced in the Northeast is that they were one of the earliest ethnic groups to immigrate; the potato famine was decades before the later major immigration waves. If you get a wave of persecution earlier, it'd probably help push them to the US - maybe the Jews get more caught up in liberal revolutions, and the Concert of Europe retaliates?
It doesn't have to be a real jewish state, it could be like the soviet Jewish oblast, that the largest amount of jews to ever live there with under a third of the population.
Between 1907 and 1914, ten thousand Jews passed through Galveston, Texas, due to the efforts of the wealthy Jacob Schiff (a third as many as went to Palestine). Imagine instead that the late 1860s proposal to divide Texas into three states is accepted. One state is Carancahua, whose border runs roughly from Del Rio to Galveston. Schiff begins his settlement program, and it's just as popular as OTL. Because Galveston is an even more important city, being the main port of the state, more Jews stay there. With the Uganda programme collapsing, the Jewish Territorialist Organization cottons to the idea, and passes a resolution supporting it. While reading a newspaper item on the growing number of Jews in Carancahua, Arthur Balfour slips on a spot of spilled tea and tumbles to his death. With no promises relating to Palestine, more Jews strike out for other areas.
As intensely anti-Semitic governments rise in Stalin's USSR and Rohm's Germany (Hitler was killed by a Jewish Carancahuan's bullet during the Great War), many more Jews flee their European homes. Palestine High Commissioner Bevin is no friend of the chosen people, so that doesn't pan out. Frankly, the US isn't a big fan either, but Roosevelt is working hard to pry Carancahua out of its traditional Republicanism. A opt-in refugee bill is passed, and Carancahua opens its gates to thousands. Jews still form only a plurality of the voters, so a set number of refugees is fixed as a legislative compromise, but is blatantly disregarded by a number of refugee aid organizations, some of which even resort to offloading refugees in Mexico and smuggling them over the border.
Today, Carancahua is a thriving state. After 1950s radicalism finally drove most Jews from the Republicans (good job, Baruch Goldwasser and Alisa Rosenbaum), the state remains solidly Democratic, and recently elected Richard Friedman to his third term as governor. With its fine beaches and warm weather, many elderly from the East Coast choose to retire in the state. There are tensions, however, between the 60% Jewish population, mostly in the north, and the more heavily Mexican regions in the south. Carancahuan congressmen were strong supporters of "Operation Wetback" in the early 1950s, which deported many Mexicans, some of whom were actually US citizens. And today, Carancahua is one of the most vocal supporters of the border wall, the 8-meter tall concrete barrier which now divides the state from Mexico.
As intensely anti-Semitic governments rise in Stalin's USSR and Rohm's Germany (Hitler was killed by a Jewish Carancahuan's bullet during the Great War), many more Jews flee their European homes. Palestine High Commissioner Bevin is no friend of the chosen people, so that doesn't pan out. Frankly, the US isn't a big fan either, but Roosevelt is working hard to pry Carancahua out of its traditional Republicanism. A opt-in refugee bill is passed, and Carancahua opens its gates to thousands. Jews still form only a plurality of the voters, so a set number of refugees is fixed as a legislative compromise, but is blatantly disregarded by a number of refugee aid organizations, some of which even resort to offloading refugees in Mexico and smuggling them over the border.
Today, Carancahua is a thriving state. After 1950s radicalism finally drove most Jews from the Republicans (good job, Baruch Goldwasser and Alisa Rosenbaum), the state remains solidly Democratic, and recently elected Richard Friedman to his third term as governor. With its fine beaches and warm weather, many elderly from the East Coast choose to retire in the state. There are tensions, however, between the 60% Jewish population, mostly in the north, and the more heavily Mexican regions in the south. Carancahuan congressmen were strong supporters of "Operation Wetback" in the early 1950s, which deported many Mexicans, some of whom were actually US citizens. And today, Carancahua is one of the most vocal supporters of the border wall, the 8-meter tall concrete barrier which now divides the state from Mexico.
NothingNow
Banned
I could get behind that. Mass Jewish settlement around Jacksonville, Tampa Bay, or the Palm beach metro starting in the early 1900's, maybe if the Film studios set up here instead of Out West, leading to massive Jewish settlements, More Tarzan and Tarzan knock-offs, Cracker-Westerns and movies about Pirates, and a state that's even more culturally divided then OTL, leading to a Less than really amicable split in the early sixties.So Florida? It's where we banish Jews who are too old to work.
Of course, this scenario might also include mass immigration of Refugees from Europe post-war (assuming some things aren't butterflied,) or a whole lot of Kibbutz being built out in the Swamps and on the Savannas.
There'd definitely be people complaining about how much Bok tower, Paynes Prairie, The Scrub, and the Castillo de San Marcos/Fort Marion show up in film.
NothingNow
Banned
Yeah. That's a good portion of my Family and the history of my Congregation right there. Of course, long term, Assimilationist groups tend to disappear into the larger community, like what they described in the article.
Of course, the Large black population did help, mostly as a scape goat that the jews of the age would've been otherwise.
Zioneer
Banned
You're using FreeRepublic as a credible source? Really?
Even if it's correct, FreeRepublic is not where you want to end your search for info.
As for the actual topic of the thread, what about a Mormon-Jewish hybrid majority state? Say Brigham Young encourages and advertises Utah as a pro-Jewish state? We Mormons have always been (or at least tried to be) friendly towards Jews, so it wouldn't be out of character. Heck, we (as in Utah Mormons) had a beloved Jewish Governor at one point!
There are many excellent & enlightening articles detailing the presence of Jews in the American West and their contribution to its settlement on the internet. I took a look at several awhile back while writing portions of the 1840s & 50s section of my Course of Human Events TL. In CoHE I did take a significant number of Jewish settlers west, west to the shores of a great salty lake, which they named Lake Melah (Hebrew for salt) and made a Covenant of Salt between themselves and the Lord.
Zioneer
Banned
Oooh, I'd steal that for my own TL, but you've already written it, so I can't take something from a fellow AH writer.
Same stuff is posted elsewhere.You're using FreeRepublic as a credible source? Really?
Even if it's correct, FreeRepublic is not where you want to end your search for info.
As for the actual topic of the thread, what about a Mormon-Jewish hybrid majority state? Say Brigham Young encourages and advertises Utah as a pro-Jewish state? We Mormons have always been (or at least tried to be) friendly towards Jews, so it wouldn't be out of character. Heck, we (as in Utah Mormons) had a beloved Jewish Governor at one point!
Ohio? Or, I'll just go really wacky and suggest we make Georgia Jewish. Huh, huh?
NothingNow
Banned
Har de har har. Really, I think OP wants a State that is about 50-60% Jewish. Florida's about 4% Jewish. The largest percentage of Jews of any state is New York, and that's barely 9%. Per captia, the most Jewish area in the US, is the Miami metro, which barely hits 10%.
In short, this is pretty hard, if not entirely Impossible to achieve. Unless of course, it would be possible for said state to put voting and residency restrictions and/or establish discriminatory language laws to keep the percentage up.