Page 97

in Berlin, from which we quote the following: "We will no longer allow our Christian tolerance to provide a path for the influx and advance of the Jews. We will no longer let the Jews climb to the summit of leadership and influence. From the minister recently converted to Christianity to the Polish peddler, a chain of thorns is being laid in our path. We have reached a time in which it is very easy to insult the emperor's chancellor without insulting a Jew. If you look askance at a Jew, a cry soon resounds from the farthest north to the farthest south: 'Israel is in danger.'"

Many publications followed, and the movement played an important role in German politics. Adolf Stoecker, the court preacher in Berlin, attacked Jews for entering Christianity and for their outward conversion. In 1878 he founded the Christian Social Party. Parliamentary deputies became members of the association for combating Judaism in Germany and Austria as well. He submitted a petition bearing 255,000 signatures, demanding an end to Jewish immigration into the country, the closing of public offices to Jews and a prohibition on their teaching in the people's schools.

The movement to combat the Jews also spread in Austria and was led by a parliamentary front, but under the banner of Catholicism. Many Catholic priests joined it.