by Ilana Rossoff, Reference Services Research Intern, Center for Jewish History This post is part of the Jews and Social Justice Series. To view all posts in the series, click here. At the same time that they were coordinating post-war refugee relief in Europe, Jewish Labor Committee members began to take an active role in supporting African-American-led efforts to advocate for civil rights legislation. According to…
In Memory of Frank Lautenbergby David P. Rosenberg, M.P.A., Reference Services Research Coordinator, Center for Jewish History Frank Lautenberg, the last World War II veteran in the United States Senate (he served from 1982-2001 and 2003-his death, today June 3, 2013), played an important role in allowing many Soviet Jews to come to America. His “Lautenberg Amendment” in 1990 relaxed certain standards for “refugee…
American Culture in Haggadahs from the Collectionsby David P. Rosenberg, M.P.A., Reference Services Research Coordinator, Center for Jewish History Last year I reflected on the vast variety and volume of Haggadahs in my blog post “Dayenu: A few Passover Haggadot would have been enough…really?” This year I took a closer look at a handful of Haggadahs in the library of the American Jewish Historical…
Refuseniks (отказники)by Anna Khomina, Research and Special Projects Intern, Center for Jewish History The refuseniks were Soviet Jews who sought and were denied permission to emigrate out of the USSR in the ‘60s and ’70s, and who organized protests (such as the ones pictured above) to call attention to their plight. Jews in the Soviet Union were systematically discriminated against and barred from certain…