efforts at fighting crime and mediating labor disputes, Schiff shored up his
leadership of the new immigrants. As one Yiddish newspaper put it, “He
who picks up the bill has the final say.”^84
Schiff had shown an interest in the problems of the needle trades as early as
1897, and in cooperation with the kehillah he continued to work for indus-
trial peace. His largely benevolent opinions on organized labor as dis-
cussed above applied here too, but in the case of the clothing industry,
where Jews predominated as manufacturers, workers, and union leaders,
he had an additional reason for involvement. Always sensitive to the public
image that his fellow Jews projected, he sought to avoid the spectacle of
class warfare within the Jewish community. Furthermore, divisiveness of
any sort threatened his larger goal of a unified American Jewry. The
chances of mediation and arbitration in the garment industry looked good;
all parties shared a common ethnic background and a tradition of arbitra-
tion. As members of a vulnerable minority they too were concerned about
public opinion, and they too preferred not to sully the Jewish image by ex-
posés of deplorable working conditions.
Schiff and other influential Jews had interceded in 1910 to bring an end
to the “Great Revolt,” a strike of over fifty thousand workers in the cloak-
making industry. The famous Protocol of Peace that followed labor’s vic-
tory set new guidelines for the needle trades, but it failed to prevent recur-
rent unrest.^85 When in 1915 the manufacturers abrogated the protocol,
another major strike loomed. The National Civic Federation, an organiza-
tion that stood for the peaceful resolution of industrial strife, urged Schiff’s
intervention. Since he was agreeable to both capital and labor, he was the
logical choice for working out a settlement. Relying on the advice of
Magnes and Lillian Wald, the banker agreed to intercede. He refused,
however, to become a member of the kehillah’s Committee on Industrial
Relations; he thought it wiser to appear as a neutral and thus avoid the
charge that the “moneybags” (his term) controlled the kehillah. Along with
Magnes and three other friends in the AJC, Schiff publicly called the man-
ufacturers to a meeting in his office. While the war raged in Europe, the
stewards said, it was imperative to avoid “an appalling economic and moral
waste to the entire community.” The manufacturers yielded to the pres-
sure, and for the time being a strike was averted.^86
Schiff used the opportunity to mend his fences with downtown. At a
time when the AJC’s fight against Louis Brandeis and his followers over an
American Jewish Congress was heating up, the banker suggested to
Magnes that Brandeis be asked to serve as “final arbitrator.” The popular
Zionist leader was fully knowledgeable about conditions in the needle
trades, and in no way should he think that the AJC planned to “crowd” him
The New Immigrants 115