A long succession of meetings of this august body was taken up with the perplexing problem how to attract big Jewish capital into the central governments and at the same time safeguard the latter against the excessive influx of Jews, who, for the sake of settling there, would register in the first guild and, under the disguise of relatives, would bring with them, as one of the members of the Council put it, "the whole tribe of Israel." After protracted discussions, a resolution was adopted which was in substance as follows:
The Jewish merchants who have belonged to the first guild for not less than two years prior to the issuance of the present law shall be permitted to settle permanently in the interior governments, accompanied by their families and a limited number of servants and clerks. These merchants shall be entitled to live and trade on equal terms with the Russian merchants, with the proviso that, after the settlement, they shall continue their membership in the first guild as well as their payment of the appertaining membership dues for no less than ten years, failing which they shall be sent back into the Pale. Big Jewish merchants and bankers from abroad, "noted for their social position," shall be allowed to trade in Russia under a special permit to be secured in each case from the Ministers of the Interior and of Finance.
The resolution of the Council of State was sanctioned by the Tzar on
March 16, 1859, and thus became law.
In this manner the way was opened for big Jewish capital to enter the two Russian capitals and the tabooed interior. The advent of the big capitalists was followed by the influx of their less fortunate brethren, who, driven by material want from the Pale, were forced to seek new domiciles, and in the shape of first guild dues paid for many years a heavy toll for their right of residence and commerce. The position of these merchants offers numerous points of contact with the status of the "tolerated" Jewish merchants in Vienna and Lower Austria prior to 1848.
Toleration having been granted to the Jews with a proper financial status, the Government proceeded to extend the same treatment to persons with educational qualifications. The latter class was the subject of protracted debates in the Jewish Committee as well as in the Ministries and in the Council of State. As early as in 1857 the Minister of Public Instruction Norov had submitted a memorandum to the Jewish Committee in which he argued that "religious fanaticism and prejudice among the Jews" could only be exterminated by inducing the Jewish youth to enter the general educational establishments, "which end can only be obtained by enlarging their civil rights and by offering them material advantages." Accordingly, Norov suggested that the right of residence in the whole Russian Empire should be granted to the graduates of the higher and secondary educational institutions. [1] Those Jews who should have failed to attend school were to be restricted in their right of entering the mercantile guilds. The Jewish Committee refused to limit the rights of those who did not attend the general schools, and proposed, instead, as a bait for the Jews who shunned secular education, to confer special privileges in the discharge of military service upon those Jews who had attended the gymnazia [2] or even the Russian district schools, [3] or the Jewish Crown schools, [4] more exactly, to grant them the right of buying themselves off from conscription by the payment of one hundred to two hundred rubles (1859). But the Military Department vetoed this proposal on the ground that education would thus bestow privileges upon Jews which were denied even to Christians. The suggestion, relating to military privileges was therefore abandoned, and the promotion of education among Jews reduced itself to an extension of the right of residence.
[Footnote 1: The latter category comprises primarily the gymnazia (see next note) in which the classic languages are taught, and the so-called real gymnazia in which emphasis is laid on science. The higher educational institutions, or the institutions of higher learning, are the universities and the professional schools, on which see next page, n. 4.]
[Footnote 2: The name applies on the European continent to secondary schools. A Russian gymnazia (and similarly a German gymnazium) has an eight years' course. Its curriculum corresponds roughly to a combined high school and college course in America.]
[Footnote 3: i.e., schools found in the capitals of districts (or counties), preparatory to the gymnazia.]
[Footnote 4: See above, p.58 and below, p.174.]
In this connection the Jewish Committee warmly debated the question as to whether the right of residence outside the Pale should be accorded to graduates of the higher and secondary educational institutions, or only to those of the higher. The Ministers of the Interior and Public Instruction (Lanskoy and Kovalevski) advocated the former more liberal interpretation. But the majority of the Committee members, acting "in the interests of a graduated emancipation," rejected the idea of bestowing the universal right of residence upon the graduates of gymnazia, and lyceums and even upon those of universities and other institutions of higher learning, [1] with the exception of those who had received a learned degree, Doctor, Magister, or Candidate. [2] The Committee was willing, on the other hand, to permit the possessors of a learned degree not only to settle in the interior but also to enter the civil service. The Jewish university graduate was thus expected to submit a scholarly paper or even a doctor dissertation for two purposes, for procuring the right of residence in some Siberian locality and for the right of serving the State. Particular "circumspection" was recommended by the Committee with reference to Jewish medical men: a Jewish physician, without the degree of M.D., was not to be permitted to pass beyond the Pale.