This Government has found occasion to express in a friendly spirit, but with much earnestness, to the Government of the Czar its serious concern because of the harsh measures now being enforced against the Hebrews in Russia.  By the revival of anti-Semitic laws, long in abeyance, great numbers of those unfortunate people have been constrained to abandon their homes and leave the Empire by reason of the impossibility of finding subsistence within the Pale to which it is sought to confine them.  The immigration of these people to the United States—­many other countries being closed to them—­is largely increasing, and is likely to assume proportions which may make it difficult to find homes and employment for them here and to seriously affect the labor market.  It is estimated that over 1,000,000 will be forced from Russia within a few years.  The Hebrew is never a beggar; he has always kept the law—­life by toil—­often under severe and oppressive restrictions.  It is also true that no race, sect, or class has more fully cared for its own than the Hebrew race.  But the sudden transfer of such a multitude under conditions that tend to strip them of their small accumulations and to depress their energies and courage is neither good for them nor for us.

The banishment, whether by direct decree or by not less certain indirect methods, of so large a number of men and women is not a local question.  A decree to leave one country is in the nature of things an order to enter another—­some other.  This consideration, as well as the suggestion of humanity, furnishes ample ground for the remonstrances which we have presented to Russia; while our historic friendship for that Government cannot fail to give assurance that our representations are those of a sincere well-wisher.[1]

[Footnote 1:  Third Annual Message to Congress by President Harrison, December 9, 1891, Messages and Papers of the Presidents, Vol.  IX,
    p. 188.]

The sentiments of the American people were voiced less guardedly in a resolution which was passed by the House of Representatives on July 21, 1892: 

Resolved, That the American people, through their Senators and Representatives in Congress assembled, do hereby express sympathy for the Russian Hebrews in their present condition, and the hope that the Government of Russia, a power with which the United States has always been on terms of amity and good will, will mitigate as far as possible the severity of the laws and decrees issued respecting them, and the President is requested to use his good offices to notify the Government of Russia to mitigate the said laws and decrees. [1]

[Footnote 1:  Congressional Record, Vol. 23, p. 6533.]

The highly-placed Jew-baiters of St. Petersburg were filled with rage, The Novoye Vremya emptied its invectives upon the Zhydovski financiers, referring to the refusal of Alphonse de Rothschild to participate in the Russian loan.  Nevertheless, the Government found itself compelled to stem the tide of oppression for a short while.