Americo 'elvish Periodical Carter
CLIFTON AVENUE
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CINCINNATI 20, OHIO
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Friday, March 1, 1946
DL:TROIT JEWISH CHRONICLE and The Legal Chronicle-
Book Review
By LEON SAUNDERS
“Echoes of Past and Present "
or
(Conclusion)
Rumshinsky came to America and soon found employment for his
special abilities. His book tells of the lives and activities of all the
mportant people on the Yiddish stage in which he himself played no
Mall role.
. Although he was familiar with good music, he had no illusions
*.i' bout his own abilities. Ha was out to give the public what it wanted
so he devoted himself to heart-throbbing songs, gags and melodramas
about mother love, the old country and Judaism.
I am not a musical pundit. In fact, I will fall asleep during any
Bach symphony. But to my musical taste, the stuff that is dished out
to the Yiddish public is beneath criticism.
It is an old truism that tastes vary. There has been endless dis-
cussion on whether one should give the public what it wants or edu-
cate it for the appreciation of better things.
Music is a terrific force. When combined with the proper words.
it has a double, force. Music can inspire a person, uplift him or de-
press him. It Is the folk songs that keep people separate, that keep
nationalism alive. Opposed to this, good music is cosmopolitan. The
works of the masters break down the barriers of nationalism more
than a score of tomes on propaganda.
Trunk, in his "Poland," tells of the famous Tzadik of Rusenitz
who was strolling in Carlsbad where he was taking the cure. Suddenly
he heard loud applause and, upon inquiry, learned that people were
applauding the music of a symphony orchestra.
"There are all kinds of crazy people," was his comment. To him,
there was only one kind of good music, chassidic music. What was
Beethoven to him?
Temporarily, I am willing to concede, music may have an en-
nobling effect. It may work on people's emotions for a bit. But hav-
ing no meaning, and here I invite thunder and brimstone on my bald
head, it cannot produce any change in anyone. It cannot influence
anybody or produce any feeling of lasting value.
Tso Chun, a pupil of Confucius, demanded that music have a
moral effect.
"The superior man," he said, "will not listen to lascivious or se-
ductive airs. A good man plays the lute to regulate his conduct and
NOT to delight his heart."
It is almost as though one were to expect a butterfly suddenly to
start gathering honey from flowers.
Tolstoy, in his "Kreitzer's Sonata," pictures the terrible effect
music can have on a person and demands that certain kinds of music
be forbidden. Perhaps on a person under extreme strain, a person
mentally unbalanced or shocked, a particular song might have a
strong effect. But no normal person is insany such danger.
In spite of all the claims of the musical pundits and theoreticians,
we refuse to believe that music can convey any idea or any meaning.
True, It can have a tremendous effect on the emotions while under the
influence. But, while a thought or an idea remains in one's mind, a
tune does not. Like the effect of good wine, if the tune is good, it lasts
a short time. Unlike good wine, it loses its effect the more one listens.
Rumshinsky Still Alive
So much for music. Rumshinsky is still alive and we hope he lives
a long time supplying nostalgic songs about mother love, Jewish
hearts, tilt Torah and "freilachs."
As long as he makes the weary souls of people forget their daily
worries and miseries, he is doing his share in lightening the heavy
burden which is life.
History of the Jews in Michigan
p
(Continued from Page Three)
2. The Secretary shall keep a record of all the transactions of the
Congregation.
1 Ile shall keep a list of all the members of tie Congregation.
4. He shall countersign all the orders and certificates of the Presi-
dent.
5. Also keep a record of all the interments in the burial ground of
the Congregation. By leaving office deliver papers, books, etc., to his
successor in office.
Article VII
CANDIDATES' ADMISSION
1. Israelites only can become members of this Congregation.
2. Candidates shall be elected by ballot.
3. Candidates for admission will have to make application to the
President, deposit $3.25 admission fee with the same, who will give
notice at the next meeting of such application, which will lay over for
action to a subsequent meeting, and if not more than one-fourth of
the votes are against him, he shall be admitted. Candidates for ad-
mission will have to sign the Constitution.
No member shall have a right to vote on the same meeting of his
admission,
Article VIII
Dues for members shall be according to By-Laws.
Article IX
EXPULSIONS
A member who is In arrears with his dues or offering for twelve
months shall be suspended for six months, and should, on the expira-
tion of that time, he not have settled such dues, be then expelled.
Article X
BURIAL
1. Every member secures a place of burial in the burying ground
of the Congregation.
2.
The wife of a member or unmarried son under twenty-one years
of age shall likewise have a free burial place secured.
3. For unmarried daughters of a member shall be the same privi-
leges.
4. Wife or children of a member that have not been raised in the
Jewish faith, neither adopted such, shall be excluded from the burial
ground of this Congregation.
Article XI
BURIAL OF STRANGERS
The fees for burial place for new members shall be determined by
the President and Trustees and shall be no less than five nor more
than twenty-five dollars.
The President and Trustees shalt have a right to grant at their
discretion
burial places for indigent persons without charge to their
families.
Article XII
SYNAGOGUE
If the Congregation secures a Synagogue or other building for
'ivine Service, such Services shall be held according to the German
:tont (Minhag), and not be changed as long as
the Congregation
exists under the name of Beth El.
Article XIII
The Congregation reserves for itself the right to enact such By-
Laws 'as the necessities of this Congregation require.
Three points in the above Articles of Incorporation should be es-
pecially noted at this time, although they will receive fuller treatment
in succeeding articles.
1.
That a school was an integral part of the Congregation from
its very beginning.
2.
That the Congregation had charge of the dispensation of charity
from the earliest days of its founding.
3. That the Congregation used an orthodox ritual of worship, the
Minhag Ashkenaz, popularly known as the "custom and usages of the
German and Polish Jews," which was prevalent among the majority
of the Jews e Europe.
(Next week's article tells of the coming to Detroit of Rabbi Liebman
Adler.)
So They Tell Me---
By LOUIS W. ENFIELD
For want of a shoe, the horse
was lost. For want of a horse, the
rider was lost. For want of the
rider, the battle was lost. So the
ancients told about how little
things grow Into big ones. This
is the story of two dollars.
J was a young man about town.
He went to affairs, earned a good
living and spent his money as fast
as he got it. He was a great fa-
vorite of the ladies, being a very
handsome gentleman. After he had
been working for about four
years, he saved enough money to
put a down payment on an Olds-
mobile.
The car was his great pride
and joy and he ,drove it contin-
uously. Ile became an even
greater favo. rite with the ladies.
He talked about his car and its
excellent performance constant-
ly. lie watched the balance
of what he owed go down stead-
ily until his total indebtedness
was only five hundred dollars.
One day, he missed making his
payment to the finance company.
When he came in the next day to
make the payment he was in-
formed that there was a late fee
and he would have to pay an ad-
ditional two dollars as a service
charge.
But J was not the sort on whom
something like that could be put
over. He refused to be held up.
He would not pay the two dollars.
The finance company refused to
accept the payment and, after
bandying words back and forth, J
told them they could go to the
devil and stalked off.
The finance company did go
to the devil in the person of
their attorney. This attorney
looked at the contract and found
there an acceleration clause
which provided that in the event
the payments were not made on
time, the company had the op-
tion of accepting late payments
or of declaring all the indebted-
ness due and payable at once.
This they elected to do.
However, they sent a letter to J
telling him that he had one more
opportunity, his last, of making
his payment and handing over the
two dollar service fee. J ignored
the whole proceeding. He had def-
initely decided he was not going
to pay the two dollars.
Next J was served with a sum-
mons to come to court. He reas-
oned sagely that if he did not
show up, no one could order him
to do anything. He reasoned in
error, however, for the court ren-
dered a default judgment and the
car belonged to the finance com-
pany,
One day, the sheriff came to J's
home and hauled the Oldsmobile
away. Then J was served with a
notice that on a certain day, the
car was to be sold at auction for
the debt he owed to the finance
company.
By now J's blood was really
up. lie would see the whole
thing through. But he was not
going to pay that two dollars.
No sill He went to the bank and
drew out one hundred and nine
ty-five dollars, all the money he
had in the world. With that, he
went down to the auction.
Those were the days when con-
stables and finance companies
worked in cahoots. The only ones
present at the auction which was
held in the back of a garage were
the sheriff, J, and a shifty-eyed
individual who bought the car for
two hundred and ten dollars cash.
J went back disgruntled. To his
friends, who hinted that he was a
dumbbell, he explained that he
was an American citizen and no-
body was going to get away with
any such thing on him. He was
not going to pay that two dollars.
Next J discovered that the fin-
ance company had gotten another
judgment against him for the dif-
ference between the amount the
car had brought and what he owed
the company. There were also
costs which swelled the total to
an alarming degree.
Not only had his nine-months-
old Oldsmobile for which he had
paid fourteen hundred dollars been
taken from him, but his bank
balance was garnisheed and he
lost all he had.
All his family and his friends
sneered at him. As a last straw,
his girl told him pointblank that
he was a downright fathead who
shouldn't be allowed to run
around loose.
This was the finish. He shook
the dust of Detroit from his feet
and departed for Washington.
And all the way, he took comfort
from one thing. He had not paid
the two dollars.
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Page Five
MAN OF 11 -11E WEEK
G
ENTLE, SCHOLARLY, lovable Dr. Leo M. Franklin, Rabbi Em-
eritus of Temple Beth El, is saluted on his seventy-sixth birthday
by the Chronicle as the Man of the Week. The Chronicle takes
this opportunity to congratulate Rabbi Franklin on his recovery from
a long and dangerous illness and to wish him many long, fruitful years
of health and happiness.
Dr. Franklin was born in Cambridge City, Indiana, in 1870. He
Kent to school there and worked his way through ho University of
Indiana. At the age of fourteen, he had started sMying at the He-
brew Union College and at the age of 22, he was ordained as a rabbi
from that institution.
Only Graduate
The graduation there was very interesting. Franklin was the
only graduate that year. Consequently, he was class valedictorian,
class salutatorian, and class prophet. Ile was every officer in the
class. He was also on all the committees that ran the affair and
the president of the Board of Governors who addressed the class
spoke to him alone.
Immediately on his ordination, he was called to Temple Israel ha
Omaha, Nebraska. During his seven-year-stay there, Franklin estab-
lished the first Normal School la
the State of Nebraska for the
training of religious school teach-
ers. He was also responsible for
the unification of the Associated
Jewish Charities. He organized the
Reform Congregation, Bnai Yesh-
urun, in Lincoln, Nebraska, and
the religious school there.
About this time, he was mar-
ried to Hattie M. Oberfelder of
Chicago. Three children were born
of this union and two of them,
Leo I. Franklin and Mrs. Stanley
Fleischaker, still survive.
Comes to Beth El
In 1898, Dr. Franklin was
called to Temple Beth El in
Detroit. At that time, the
Temple was a congregation of
136 members, with an annual
budget of $6,425 and a mort-
gage of long standing. It occu-
pied an old building at the
corner of Washington Ave.
(now Blvd.) and Clifford St.,
in use by the Congregation
DR. LEO M. FRANKLIN
since 1867.
Within six months, he had secured new quarters for the religious
school. He re-Introduced Friday evening services which had been dis-
continued. He helped organize the United Jewish Charities here which
in turn, in 1926, was reorganized, again with his help, into the present
Jewish Welfare Federation. Under the influence of his constant pleas,
the congregation, In 1900, decided to build a new Temple.
Organizes Sisterhood
In 1901, he organized the Women's Auxiliary Association of Tem-
ple Beth El, now the Sisterhood and reorganized the Temple Alumna
Association, now the Young People's Temple Club. He also started
the publication of the Temple Bulletin, one of the first of Its kind in
the country. This was discontinued when he became editor of tiro
Jewish American, the first Anglo-Jewish newspaper in Detroit and
the predecessor of the Detroit Jewish Chronicle on which Dr. Frank-
lin was also contributing editor.
Ile also organized the Citizen's Interdenominational Thanks-
giving Service, the first in the country to unite Catholics, Jews
and Protestants in prayers of Thanksgiving. This service received
national and iniernational press notice being commented on edi-
torially as faraway as in the London, England, Times. Ever since
then, Franklin has been working on Brotherhood and he has been
prominent in interfaith activities at all times, being one of the
founders of the Detroit Round Table of Catholics, Jews and Prot-
estants.
New Temple Completed
In 1903, the new Temple at Woodward and Elliot was completed.
Almost immediately, trouble started. Since 1850, the Temple has had
a system of assigned pews. Dr. Franklin insisted that this was un-
democratic. He demanded that rich and poor alike have the right to
worship' at ease. To this end, he demanded free, unassigned seating.
Seven families resigned from the congregation, claiming "vested rights
in their pews." Before many months, however, they all returned and
the new constitution of the Temple made no reference to assigned
pews. Hundreds of congregations all over the country have followed
the Temple's example in this regard.
In 1904, Franklin organized a Temple Course, one of the first con-
gregational forums in the country, which brought to Detroit for a
number of years some of the leading thinkers and speakers in Amer-
ica. In 1914, he established the Jewish Student Congregation at the
University of Michigan, the first Jewish student organization of s
religious nature in this country. This was the forerunner of the pres-
ent Hillel foundations which have spread to all the leading universities
and colleges.
President of Conference
For two successive terms, Dr. Franklin was elected president
of the Central Conference of Ainerican Rabbis, the highest honor
to be accorded to a reform rabbi. In 1919, he organized the pres-
ent Men's Club of the Temple and, in 1922, he had the pleasure of
seeing the Temple move to its present magnificent edifice on Wood-
ward and Gladstone. In that year, he was elected by the Congre-
gation to a life tenure. In 1923, the University of Detroit conferred
on him the honorary degree of Doctor of Laws, an event unique
in the annals of Roman Catholic Colleges.
In 1932, he was elected president of the Detroit Public Library, an
honored office which he held again in 1938 and 1944. He has been in
great demand as a lecturer all over the country and continues to be
interested in community activities to this day.
In 1941, he retired from the active ministry and was elected Rabb&
Emeritus. Dr. B. Benedict Glazer, present Rabbi of the Temple, was
his successor.
Appeal Will Succeed
Of the United Jewish Appeal. he said, "It will surely go through.
It will be a hard pull, but Jews arc emotionally aroused enough to dos
this job which needs so desperately to be done."
In a reflective mood, he looked back over a long life spent in min-
istering to Jewish needs and explained his philosophy of what Jews
should work for.
"We need more Jewish roots and not so much Jewish fruits," he
said. "We've got to go back and steep ourselves in Jewish culture and
education. We've got to become a nation which shows the whole
world a way of life that is better. We must not depart from the trust
that was handed down to us by our ancestors."
Speaking of the Community Council of Detroit, he said, "The
Council has great possibilities but because of the way it is neces-
sarily constituted, Its delegates overlap. Many of these delegates
represent half a dozen organizations. Democracy does not call for
the absolute equality of every man with every other man. It only
means that every man should accept his responsibilities with every
other man."
The Chronicle joins with all the many thousands of Dr.
friends in wishing him long life and success in his continued Franklin's
work.