RECENT JEWISH IMMIGRATION. 339 



From old Poland the Jews spread north, east and south. In 1880 

 they were found to have penetrated the prohibited Kussian territory 

 to the east. In southern Eussia they have added another failure to 

 the efforts of their race to succeed as agriculturists. A considerable 

 migration found its way to Eoumania, and to a lesser extent to the 

 Turkish empire. Since the western migration began numbers have 

 gone into Palestine, though not always to remain, and the resources 

 of the Baron de Hirsch fund have been used liberally in efforts to 

 encourage and sustain a migration to South America, but to judge 

 from the reports of the colonists who may be found coming to the 

 United States by every South American ship, the movement has not 

 yet proved a success. 



The migration to Eoumania went to increase an existing and prac- 

 tically Eoumanized Jewish population of Spagnuoli and more ancient 

 Hebrew stock and served to revive troubles that were believed to be 

 past. At the bottom of the present anti-Jewish agitation in Eoumania 

 is an economic problem similar to that in Eussia, likewise aggravated 

 by a more or less improvident and shiftless indigenous population, 

 but made still worse by the fact that the bearing of the Jew on the 

 economic ills of the country has become a sort of political issue. Com- 

 plicating the situation are also certain other elements entirely wanting 

 in Eussia. 



Eoumanian territory in the past has constituted a barrier to west- 

 ward advance of the Mohammedan Turk, and the keynote of its his- 

 tory is resistance to racial religious aggression. As a dependency of 

 Turkey the treaties and conventions which have determined its auton- 

 omy have repeatedly emphasized and affirmed a principle of religious 

 inequality, the propriety of withholding full civil rights from a person 

 of non-christian faith and of making a distinction between nationality 

 and citizenship. 



When, therefore, the powers in 1878 recognized the independence 

 of Eoumania, they overturned all local precedents in prescribing the 

 principle of religious equality within the new kingdom. Subsequent 

 events proved unfavorable to the popular reception of such a revolu- 

 tionary idea. Stimulated by anti- Jewish agitation in adjoining for- 

 eign countries, an abnormal Jewish immigration poured into Eoumania, 

 and the alarm and resentment which this movement caused has been 

 intensified by the new national spirit which independence has awakened 

 among the Eoumanians themselves. 



Still regarded in accordance with old ideas as aliens whose rights 

 were largely a matter for legislative action, the Jews have been de- 

 prived even of privileges which they formerly enjoyed, as have Ger- 

 man settlers, Italian workmen, and other foreigners as well. 



