Others, however, regarded themselves as the victims of the changes of the
nineteenth century, specifically the clergy, nobility, peasantry, and craftsmen.
The influence of the church had been eroded by the rise of secular culture.
The nobility had been diminished in stature by the liberal politics that elim-
inated corporate privileges. Craftsmen had been competed out of existence by
industrialization. Peasants had been uprooted by capitalistic and industrial-
ized agriculture. These groups regarded Jews not only as the embodiment of
all of these changes, but also as the principal beneficiaries and the agents of
these changes. Jews, especially in western and central Europe, they noted, had
been transformed from a predominantly poor, marginal, despised population
at the beginning of the nineteenth century into an upwardly mobile, well-
educated, urban population perched atop the triumphant world of capitalism.
Three developments fed this general discontent with the changes of the
nineteenth century. In 1864, Pope Pius IX issued a papal bull in which he
denounced the changes of the nineteenth century, especially secular culture.
This fortified socially conservative elements to reject these changes. In addi-
tion, the economic recessions of 1873, 1884, and 1895 revealed a dark side of
capitalism and industrialization, as laissez-faire economic policies did little or
nothing to aid the thousands who were unemployed. In an earlier age, such
individuals would have turned to the church or their lord for charity, but nei-
ther had sufficient means to care for the poor as effectively, while the welfare
state was still a generation away.
Finally, anti-Semitism emerged out of a disjunction between the rhetoric
of emancipation and the social reality of emancipated Jews – that is, out of a
growing sense that political emancipation was, at best, an incomplete means
of Jewish assimilation. By the end of the nineteenth century, there was a sense
that neither Jews nor the state had met their part of the bargain. The state,
while removing legal disabilities from Jews, was unable to eliminate social
discrimination against Jews. Thus, while Jews had the legal right to reside
anywhere and pursue any occupation, there were neighborhoods that contin-
ued to exclude Jews and occupations that were still closed to Jews.
Moreover, Jews had not met two conditions of emancipation. They had not
abandoned commerce for more productive occupations such as farming and
crafts. To be sure, this expectation had become ludicrous, as agriculture and
crafts were in sharp decline by the end of the nineteenth century. What is
more, while Jews in western and central Europe had enthusiastically embraced
the language and culture of the country where they lived, they had preserved a
strong sense of ethnic cohesiveness and thus were far from integrated. Vienna
Jewry was a case in point. The highly acculturated Jews of Vienna lived pre-
dominantly in the Leopoldstadt district, sent their children to the same
gymnasia, and attended the theater and the opera on the same nights. Even
Jews who converted to Christianity continued to socialize almost exclusively
with their Jewish friends or with other Jews who had converted.
180 Anti-Semitism and Jewish responses, 1870–1914