For the past two nights I have been watching Grant, a documentary on the life of Union General and the 18th President of the United States Ulysses S. Grant which has been airing on The History Channel. The three part mini-series concludes tomorrow night.
Produced by Leonardo DiCaprio and based on Ron Chernow's 2017 biography of the same title, it is nice to see The History Channel actually airing programs about history instead of conspiracy theories about extraterrestrials.
The documentary is well produced and no expense was spared where it concerned its dramatization of Civil War battle recreations. It is clear to the viewer that if Ulysses S. Grant hadn't joined the Union Army the United States would have ceased to exist more than 150 years ago. It is also clear that Grant saw slavery as an anachronism. Although he married into a slave owning family, Grant worked alongside his slaves and in time saw fit to free them. Against this background, Grant is portrayed as man committed to the founding principle of all men being equal and a man who wanted the Union to live up to its principles.
But Grant was not always committed to this principle and issued the most anti-Semitic edict in the history of the United States of America. Tonight's episode began with a deep dive into the Vicksburg Campaign which followed the aftermath of the Battle of Shiloh. In December 1862, during the early days of the Vicksburg Campaign, General Grant issued General Order No. 11 which expelled Jews from the Department of Tennessee (which encompassed Tennessee, Mississippi and Kentucky). No mention was made of this order in tonight's episode. It is a curious omission given that Order No. 11 can be found on The History Channel's website. Meanwhile, Chernow has characterized Order No. 11 as a "self-inflicted wound" on Grant's part.
While ostensibly an anti-smuggling measure, Grant specifically singled out Jews as a class and ordered "that all of the class of people be furnished passes and required to leave." Mind you, Grant issued this order a fortnight before the Emancipation Proclamation. So while African-Americans were just being freed from the bondage of slavery, the Jews under Grant's rule were being ordered to leave the Department of Tennessee just as they had been expelled from much of Europe. Grant's order was profoundly unAmerican.
Because Grant's order applied to all Jews living in the Tennessee Authority it affected Jews who supported the Union cause including Cesar Kaskel of Paducah, Kentucky, the president of the local Union League club. Kaskel traveled to Washington, D.C. and sought counsel from a local Jewish businessman and philanthropist named Adolphus Solomons who arranged for Kaskel to have an audience with President Lincoln. After hearing Kaskel's pleas, Lincoln promptly countermanded Grant's order in January 1863.
Now it's possible General Order Number 11 might be mentioned in tomorrow night's conclusion in its treatment of the 1868 presidential election as the matter arose during the campaign. During the campaign, Grant claimed that a subordinate drafted the order and that he had signed it without looking at it. This is a dubious claim on Grant's part because Lt. Colonel John Rawlins, who was his attorney and later his Secretary of War, strongly objected to Order No. 11 because he did not believe Lincoln would abide by it. To which Grant replied, "Well, they can countermand this from Washington if they like, but we will issue it anyhow."
However, Grant managed to mitigate the damage when several prominent Jews publicly declared that he had seen the error of his ways on Order 11. Grant easily defeated Democrat Horatio Seymour, a former Governor of New York, in the general election. During Grant's two terms in office, he appointed many Jews to positions in the federal civil service and in 1876 became the first U.S. President to attend the dedication of a synagogue when he set foot in Adas Israel in Washington, D.C.
None of this takes away from Grant's significance as a military strategist in the survival of the Union and ensuring the end of slavery. But when watching Grant one is the left with the impression that his only flaw was his alcoholism. It is clear that Grant lost his sobriety (even if only for a brief period) where it concerned Jews for whom he was responsible governing. Grant's virtues should be extolled, but his shortcomings should be acknowledged as well.
UPDATE: The 1868 election was an afterthought in the final installment of Grant. In treating it as an afterthought there was no acknowledgement of the mistrust from the Jewish community as a result of Order No. 11 and how he overcame it. I am disappointed that DiCaprio and Chernow thought this did not warrant any mention during the course of this six hour documentary.
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