I have no idea who put this together, but it's a remarkable
document.
GEORGE WASHINGTON was the first President to write to
a synagogue. In 1790 he addressed separate letters to
the Touro Synagogue in Newport, RI, and to Mikveh
Israel Congregation in Savannah, GA, and a joint
letter to Congregation Beth Shalom, Richmond, VA,
Mikveh Israel Philadelphia, Beth Elohim, Charleston,
S. C., and Shearith Israel, New York. His letters are
an eloquent expression and hope for religious harmony
and endure as indelible statements of the most
fundamental tenets of American democracy.
THOMAS JEFFERSON was the first President to appoint a
Jew to a Federal post. In 1801 he named Reuben Etting
of Baltimore as US Marshall for Maryland.
JAMES MADISON was the first President to appoint a
Jew to a diplomatic post. He sent Mordecai M. Noah to
Tunis from 1813 to 1816.
MARTIN VAN BUREN was the first President to order an
American consul to intervene on behalf of Jews
abroad. In 1840 he instructed the U.S. consul in
Alexandria, Egypt to use his good offices to protect
the Jews of Damascus who were under attack because of
a false blood ritual accusation.
JOHN TYLER was the first President to nominate a U.S.
consul to Palestine. Warder Cresson, a Quaker convert
to Judaism who established a pioneer Zionist colony,
received the appointment in 1844.
FRANKLIN PIERCE was the first and probably the only
President whose name appears on the charter of a
synagogue. Pierce signed the Act of Congress in 1857
that amended the laws of the District of Columbia to
enable the incorporation of the city's first
synagogue, the Washington Hebrew Congregation.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN was the first President to make it
possible for rabbis to serve as military chaplains.
He did this by signing the 1862 Act of Congress which
changed the law that had previously barred all but
Christian clergymen from the chaplainry. Lincoln was
also the first, and happily the only President who
was called upon to revoke an official act of
anti-Semitism by the U.S. government. It was Lincoln
who canceled General Ulysses S. Grant's "Order No.
11" expelling all Jews from Tennessee from the
district controlled by his armies during the Civil
War. Grant always denied personal responsibility for
this act attributing it to his subordinate.
ULYSSES S. GRANT was the first President to attend
a synagogue service while in office. When Adas Israel
Congregation in Washington D.C. was dedicated in
1874, Grant and all members of his Cabinet were
present.
RUTHERFORD B. HAYES was the first President to
designate a Jewish ambassador for the stated purpose
of fighting anti-Semitism. In 1870, he named Benjamin
Peixotto Consul-General to Rumania. Hays also was the
first President to assure a Civil Service employee her
right to work for the Federal government and yet
observe the Sabbath.. He ordered the employment of a
Jewish woman who had been denied a position in the
Department of the Interior because of her refusal to
work on Saturday.
THEODORE ROOSEVELT was the first President to appoint
a Jew to a presidential cabinet. In 1906 he named
Oscar S. Straus Secretary of Commerce and Labor.
Theodore Roosevelt was also the first President to
contribute his own funds to a Jewish cause. In 1919,
when he received the Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts
while President to settle the Russo-Japanese War,
Roosevelt contributed part of his prize to the
National Jewish Welfare Board.
WILLIAM HOWARD TAFT was the first President to attend
a Seder while in office. In 1912, when he visited
Providence, RI, he participated in the family Seder of
Colonel Harry Cutler, first president of the National
Jewish Welfare Board, in the Cutler home on Glenham
Street.
WOODROW WILSON was the first President to nominate a
Jew, Louis Dembitz Brandeis, to the United States
Supreme Court. Standing firm against great pressure to
withdraw the nomination, Wilson insisted that he knew
no one better qualified by judicial temperament as
well as legal and social understanding, confirmation
was finally voted by the Senate on June 1, 1916.
Wilson was also the first President to publicly
endorse a national Jewish philanthropic campaign. In a
letter to Jacob Schiff, on November 22, 1917, Wilson
called for wide support of the United Jewish Relief
Campaign which was raising funds for European War
relief.
WARREN HARDING was the first President to sign a
Joint Congressional Resolution endorsing the Balfour
Declaration and the Palestine Mandate supporting the
establishment in Palestine of a national Jewish home
for the Jewish people. The resolution was signed
September 22, 1922.
CALVIN COOLIDGE was the first President to
participate in the dedication of a Jewish community
institution that was not a house of worship. On May
3, 1925, he helped dedicate the cornerstone of the
Washington, D.C. Jewish Community center.
FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT was the first President to be
given a Torah as a gift. He received a miniature Torah
from Young Israel and another that had been rescued
from a burning synagogue in Czechoslovakia. Both are
now in the Roosevelt Memorial Library in Hyde Park.
The Roosevelt administration's failure to expand the
existing refuge quota system ensured that large
numbers of Jews would ultimately become some of the
Holocaust's six million victims. Fifty-six years after
Roosevelt's death, the arguments continue over
Roosevelt's response to the Holocaust.
HARRY S. TRUMAN, on May 14, 1948, just eleven minutes
after Israel's proclamation of independence, was the
first head of a government to announce to the press
that "the United Stated recognizes the provisional
government as the de facto authority of the new state
of Israel." Truman was also the first U.S. President
to receive a president of Israel at the White House -
Chaim Weizman, in 1948 and an Ambassador from Israel -
Eliahu Elat in1948. With Israel staggering under the
burdens of mass immigration in 1951-1952, President
Truman obtained from Congress close to $140 million in
loans and grants.
DWIGHT D. EISENHOWER was the first President to
participate in a coast-to-coast TV program sponsored
by a Jewish organization. It was a network show in
1954 celebrating the 300th anniversary of the American
Jewish community. On this occasion he said that it was
one of the enduring satisfactions of his life that he
was privileged to lead the forces of the free world
which finally crushed the brutal regime in Germany,
freeing the remnant of Jews for a new life and hope in
Israel.
JOHN F. KENNEDY named two Jews to his cabinet -
Abraham Ribicoff as Secretary of Health, Education
and Welfare, and Arthur Goldberg as Secretary of
Labor. Kennedy was the only President for whom a
national Jewish Award was named. The annual peace
award of the Synagogue Council of America was
re-named the John F. Kennedy Peace Award after his
assassination in 1963.
JIMMY CARTER in a number of impassioned speeches
stated his concern for human rights and stressed the
right of Russian Jews to emigrate. He is credited
with being the person responsible for the Camp David
Accords.
GEORGE H.W. BUSH in 1985 as Vice President had
played a personal role in "Operation Joshua," the
airlift which brought 10,000 Jews out of Ethiopia
directly to resettlement in Israel. Then, again in
1991, when Bush was President, American help played
a critical role in "Operation Solomon," the escape of
14,000 more Ethiopian Jews. Most dramatically, Bush
got to the U.N. to revoke its 1975 "Zionism is
Racism" resolution.
BILL CLINTON appointed more Jews to his cabinet than all of the previous presidents put together.
GEORGE 'DUBYA' BUSH is the first president since Herbert
Hoover who has no Jews in his cabinet at all.
Ans still Bush gets criticized for being "zionist", Go figure!
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