Ashkenazic Jewish Leaders Petition France’s National Assembly

Pétition des Juifs établis en France, adressée à l'Assemblée nationale, le 28 janvier 1790, sur l'ajournement du 24 décembre 1789 (Paris, Imprimerie de Prault, 1790).

We shall begin with the principles that demand elevating the Jews to the rank of citizens.

A first principle is that all men residing in an empire, living as subjects of that empire, must have, without distinction, the same title and enjoy the same rights. They must all have the title of and possess the rights of citizens.

By residence, in fact, and by being subjects, they contract an obligation to serve the country; they do serve it in reality. They contribute to the upkeep of law enforcement, and law enforcement owes equal protection and an equal share of benefits to all who contribute to it. It would be an extreme injustice if it did not give to all in the same proportion as it receives from all, and if some were favored by it to the detriment of others. These ideas do not need to be explained at length; their truth is immediately evident to everyone.

There is only one thing now to examine: are the Jews who live in France—or are they not—residents? And do they or do they not live as subjects of France?

Certainly no one would consider them foreigners, either because it would be utterly impossible to assign them to another nation, or because they are born, are established, and raise their families in France—in some cities, they even have separate quarters named for them, or finally, because they pay all the taxes to which the French are subjected, independent of the other taxes that they have been made to pay as well.

Jews are not foreigners in France. They are subjects of this empire. Consequently, they are and must be citizens. Since, in a state, whichever it may be, only two classes of men are recognized—citizens and foreigners—those who are not in the second class must be in the first. The Jews, to repeat, thus are and must be citizens.

Admittedly, they are of a religion rejected by that which dominates in France. But the time is past that one would say that [being of] the sole dominant religion should give one the right to the advantages, the prerogatives, or the lucrative and respectable jobs of a society. For a long time, this principle, worthy of the Inquisition, has been wielded against the Protestants—and the Protestants had no civil status in France. Today they have been reestablished in the possession of this status; they are assimilated among Catholics in all respects. The intolerant principle that we have just described can no longer be opposed to them. Why do we still make the argument against Jews? 

In general, civil rights are entirely independent from religious principles. And all men, of whichever religion they might be [ . . . ] being all equally able to serve the country, defend her interests, and contribute to her splendor, they should all, equally, have the title and the rights of citizens.

What would happen under an opposite system, according to which it would be the sole dominant religion and other religions whose dogmas approached more or less those [of that religion], that would confer this title and these rights? 

The result would be that this would establish the principle that force would prevail over weakness, the greatest number over the least—but societal rights should not be calculated and measured except by justice.

The result would be that, in those countries where it is not the Catholic religion that is the dominant religion, Catholics would legally be subjected to all the injustices under which the Jews are now crushed. [ . . . ]

Also, the word tolerance, which after so many centuries and acts of intolerance, is seemingly a word of humanity and reason, no longer suits a nation that wishes to predicate its rights on the eternal basis of justice. Even America, to which politics owes so many useful lessons, has rejected it from its code, as a term which leads to compromising individual liberty and to sacrificing certain classes of men to other classes.

Tolerating, in effect, is suffering that which one has the right of preventing; and the dominant religion that, perhaps uniquely among religions, must have ministers recognized by the nation and a worship paid for by it, does not have the right to prevent another religion from raising itself humbly by its side. The necessary consequence of this principle is that different religions should all have equal rights; it would be contradictory for there to be one that gives a right of preeminence for another, with respect to the functions of citizens. [ . . . ]

Thus, two irrefutable principles assure the Jews the right of citizens.

First, their quality of being subjects of the kingdom alone gives them this right; we have proven it.

Their particular religion cannot take it away; we have just established this.

It thus necessarily follows from true principles that they be declared citizens; and it is impossible that they not be declared such. [ . . . ]

True, the Jews are no longer exposed to all the odious treatments under which they previously groaned. 

They are no longer told, as under the reign of Dagobert I and Leo the lsaurien, that they must choose between baptism and death.

Their young children are not taken from them, as they were in other times, to be raised in the principles of the Catholic religion.

No more is there the atrocious and absurd barbarity, begun under the feudal system, of first forcing Jews to convert and then confiscating their goods, after they converted, so that this confiscation becomes a kind of compensation for the enormous poll taxes that they used to have to pay for the sole reason of being Jews.

They are no longer burned, they are no longer massacred legally; they are no longer subject, on certain days of the year, to ceremonies that were as cruel as they were humiliating.

But . . . they are treated like slaves, and with even greater contempt.

But . . . in certain cities, they are relegated to separate areas, where they must live in narrow and unhealthy houses.

But . . . they are crushed with arbitrary taxes. They are made to pay for a right of protection, on the one hand; a right of habitation, on the other; a right of reception. And all these rights exist still—and are at this very moment being claimed.

But . . . finally, with the exception of some of them who have received particular privileges from the government, or who have, in their favor, some letters-patent, all are deprived of the ability to practice an art, to engage in a profession, to acquire and possess a piece of land. If some of them, in Alsace, acquire shelter, soon appears a Catholic who, without any kinship rights, but through the sole right of oppression, takes out against him a restraint, called a restraint of preference. Finally, all without exception, all, and everywhere, are deprived of the ability to be eligible for jobs and offices in the society of which they are members.

And it is when such a situation still exists; it is when so many injustices are still joined against them, that some dare to say that the national assembly has adjourned indefinitely the question of their lot. It is when this assembly attacks all [other] prejudices, destroys all abuses, determines the rights of men, and arranges at the same time their duties; it is, finally, when it regenerates the entire kingdom; it is in the middle of all these circumstances and following the impetus that it has itself produced, that some want it to stop, in light of the prejudices and abuses that are denounced to it; some want it to misconstrue the rights of a class of men, release other men from their duties, and condemn to eternal misery fifty thousand individuals, when it is in their power this moment to break their irons!