A very stark contrast appears to be made between Stella Suberman’s The Jew Store regarding the relationship between African Americans and Jews after the Civil War, and how Rosen describes the same relationship in Jewish Confederates prior to the Civil War. In Jewish Confederates, Rosen asserts that Jews looked down upon African Americans and that many Jews also owned slaves. For example, Rosen claims that German Jewish immigrants favored slavery simply because many non-Jewish German immigrants opposed it. From this observation, it can be concluded that southern Jews saw slavery as a way to integrate into southern culture. Further, many Jews also supported the confederacy because it was a way to integrate into southern society. Additionally, Jewish tradition also influenced the Jewish support of slavery. Jewish tradition mandates loyalty to the lawful government, thus many Jews supported not only slavery but also the Confederacy. Further, Rosen states that there is no evidence for Jews supporting slavery out of intimidation. Rather, Jewish support was a result of freewill. However, in the “The Jew Store”, Stella Suberman discusses the relationship that her family (in particular, her father) had with African Americans in Concordia. The relationship described by Suberman is extremely different than the Jewish ideology described by Rosen. For example, during the time period discussed by Suberman, it was not very common for African Americans to be salesman and directly sell to Caucasian people. However, Suberman’s father hired an African American and allowed him to sell goods to Caucasians in his store in Concordia. Based on the relationship that Rosen describes prior to the Civil War, it would seem highly unlikely for African American and Jews to work collectively or interact. It would be interesting to further research this relationship after the Civil War.
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