Law Commons^™

Presidential Memories: Lincoln's Relationship With The Jews - Remembered On President's Day, Kenneth Lasson

All Faculty Scholarship

This article examines the relationship President Abraham Lincoln had with members of the Jewish faith.

Ever since George Washington, U.S. presidents have made inclusive gestures toward Jewish-American citizens and soldiers, but only Abraham Lincoln, whose 291st birthday we celebrated last week, ever officially intervened on their behalf. He did it twice within the span of two years. During his political career Lincoln had many Jewish associates, advisers and supporters.

During the Civil War General Grant issued General Order No. 11, which is also discussed. This order was a result of Grant’s perception that Jews were participating in a black market …

The Gentleman From Hagerstown: How Maryland Jews Won The Right To Vote, Kenneth Lasson

All Faculty Scholarship

This article discusses the early history of Maryland in the context of religious discrimination, specifically in reference to discrimination against those of the Jewish faith, even though the state "was founded as a haven of religious liberty and beacon of toleration." It also highlights a member of the Maryland House of Delegates, Thomas Kennedy, a Christian, as being the leader of the movement to ultimately correct this injustice. Part of the problem were clauses in the state's constitution requiring officeholders to be Christians. Kennedy lost his seat in the House, but didn't give up the battle. Ha had tried several …

Holocaust Deniers Can't Be Ignored: History: As Victims And Witnesses Of World War Ii Die Off, Revisionist Views Of The Nazi Horrors Could Gain Broader Acceptance, Kenneth Lasson

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On trial in an English courtroom, where British historian David Irving has sued American professor Deborah Lipstadt for defamation, is not only the scholars' reputations but history itself. Irving claims that he was libeled by Lipstadt's 1993 book, "Denying the Holocaust: The Growing Assault on Truth and Memory," in which she called him "one of the most dangerous of the `revisionists'" because, "familiar with historical evidence, he bends it until it conforms with his ideological leanings and political agenda." But under British law, the burden of proof in defamation is squarely on the defendant, thus making it necessary for Lipstadt …

Twain's Admiration Of Jews Conflicted His Article Of 100 Years Ago Seems Less Flattering Today, Kenneth Lasson

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It's been exactly a hundred years since Mark Twain first revealed himself as an unmitigated admirer of Jewish people. "A marvelous race, by long odds the most marvelous that the world has produced, I suppose." he wrote in "Concerning the Jews," published in March of 1898 by Harper's magazine.

How different after all was Twain from H.L. Mencken, who (after the posthumous publication of his diaries) was attacked as an anti-Semite? As literary critic Joseph Epstein has pointed out, Mencken talked about Jews the way they talked about themselves: "But H.L. Mencken was no anti-Semite. For that he would have …

Passage Of Religious Freedom Act Necessary To Fulfill Maryland's National Leadership Role, Kenneth Lasson

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Three hundred sixty-four years ago this month, two tiny sailing ships arrived near what is now St. Mary's City with the first settlers in Maryland. The Ark and the Dove were sent to the New World by Cecil Calvert. Lord Baltimore had founded his small colony as a haven for those persecuted in England because of their religious beliefs.

On numerous occasions since then - from passage of the Act of Toleration in 1649 to the achievement of full civil liberties for Jews in 1825 to landmark Supreme Court decisions involving the state in the 1960s - Maryland has been …

Denial On The Campuses Demonstrably False Ideas Should Not Necessarily Be Protected By Bill Of Rights, Kenneth Lasson

All Faculty Scholarship

At Hopkins and elsewhere, the issue of granting historical revisionists equal access to curricula and classrooms is difficult enough, but it is complicated acutely when student editors become entangled in the black and nefarious thickets of Holocaust denial masquerading as "scholarship." The Johns Hopkins News-Letter is only the most recent university paper to succumb to the blandishments of a group calling itself the "Committee for Open Debate on the Holocaust," which promulgates claims that a plan to systematically rid Germany or Europe of Jews never existed, that no gas chambers ever operated and that the number of Jewish victims has …