The fact that the persecution of the Jews in the case of Russia and Roumania amounts to a force of rejection has been widely recognized during the course of the emigration of the Jews from Eastern Europe. In England, where the number of Jewish immigrants increased rapidly, it found expression in the official reports, and in the United States, it became a subject of direct diplomatic correspondence in the formal protest to Russia in 1891 by President Harrison, and in 1902 in the circular note to the Powers by Secretary Hay, regarding Roumania's treatment of the Jews. A still more significant recognition of the exceptional forces behind the Jewish immigration was given by the Jews of Western Europe and the United States, living in a state of freedom, security and comparative wealth, to whom the oncoming of thousands of Jewish refugees at all the critical periods, and the steady stream of Jewish immigrants at other times has meant a taking-up of onerous burdens and a sharing of the hardships of the situation thus suddenly thrust upon them. The attempt to organize and regulate Jewish emigration from Eastern Europe was a task early undertaken by the _Alliance Israelite Universelle_. The Jewish Colonization Association was expressly founded by Baron de Hirsch to open up, in various countries, new paths for the Jewish emigrants. At all periods of exceptional emigration, national and international committees met to consider the problems of the immigrants thrown upon their responsibility. The vast majority of the emigrants made the United States their goal. In their movement and their economic and social characteristics we shall find a striking reflection of the impelling forces of their emigration. FOOTNOTES: [47] _Cf. Hersch_, chap. v. He gives to this factor far more importance than it deserves. For criticism of his method, _cf._ p. 92, note I. PART II JEWISH IMMIGRATION TO THE UNITED STATES A. ITS MOVEMENT CHAPTER I DETERMINATION OF NUMBER OF JEWISH IMMIGRANTS In a study of Jewish immigration to the United States the first problem is to determine the number of Jews who entered this country during the thirty years from 1881 to 1910, and their nationality, or their countries of nativity. The determination of these figures meets with the difficulty that prior to 1899, immigrants were classified in the official statistics by country of nativity or residence, and not by race or nationality. Thus the figures regarding Jewish immigration are obtainable from official sources only from 1899. Those relating to previous years have to be sought for elsewhere.