Brackenridge's Rede über gleiche Rechte der Juden mit den Christen [Brackenridge's speech on equal rights of Jews with Christians]. Berlin: Ernst Siegfried Mittler, 1820. German.
German translation of the foundational speech of American jurist and politician Henry Marie Brackenridge (1786-1871). The speech was delivered in the Maryland House of Delegates, in the course of the struggle to pass the Jew Bill, relaxing the requirement of a Christian oath as a precondition to holding public office – an obligation that effectively barred the state's Jews from full political and civil integration.
Brackenridge, a member of the House of Delegates from Baltimore, argued in his 1818 speech that a country founded on the principle of freedom should not deny civil rights to its citizens on the basis of their faith. The struggle bore fruit with the passing of the bill in 1826.
This speech was of interest in Europe, even before the bill was passed, when it was published in Berlin, in issues 17-20 of the periodical Amerika, dargestellt durch sich Selbst, which aimed at bringing the American arguments into the contemporary European debate on emancipation.
Due to great demand, the speech was also reprinted in the present offprint, with a short introduction by Leopold Zunz, the founder of the Wissenschaft des Judentums approach to Judaic studies, and a key figure in the Jewish intelligentsia of Berlin.
32 pages. Fair-good condition. Stains and wear. Creases and tears to margins and title page. Inscriptions and stamps to title page.
Not documented in Singerman's catalogue.
