Constructing the 'Jew', writing the Holocaust: Hungary 1920-45

Patterns of Prejudice

Volumn 33, Issue 3, 1999, Pages 19-27

  Cole, Tim ^a  

^a NONE

Author keywords

Antisemitism; Definition; Exemption; Hannah Arendt; Hungarian Holocaust; Jew; Legislation; Numerus clausus; Randolph Braham

Indexed keywords

EID: 0033243553     PISSN: 0031322X     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1080/003132299128810605     Document Type: Article

References (40)

1. P. Jackson (ed.), Rice and Racism. Essays in Social Geography (London: Allen and Unwin 1987), 6.
2. Ibid.
3. Critical Inquiry, vol. 12, no. 1, 1985, published as H. L. Gates, Jr. (ed.), 'Race', Writing and Difference (Chicago: University of Chicago Press 1985).
4. Critical Inquiry, vol. 12, no. 1, 1985, published as H. L. Gates, Jr. (ed.), 'Race', Writing and Difference (Chicago: University of Chicago Press 1985).
5. Ibid., 4.
6. Ibid., 5.
7. Ibid.
8. Ibid.
9. F. Anthias and N. Yuval-Davis, Racialized Boundaries. Race, Nation, Gender, Colour and Class and the Anti-Racist Struggle (London: Routledge 1993), 3-4.
10. R. Hilberg, The Destruction of the European Jews (London: W. H. Allen 1961), 48. The 'Jew' was also someone with two 'Jewish' grandparents who was a member of the 'Jewish' community or married to a 'Jew' on or after 15 September 1935.
11. See the discussion in Anthias and Yuval-Davis, 5, where they speak of the positioning of ethnic boundaries as changing 'over time and in response to concrete economic, political or ideological conditions', and the ways in which 'different criteria or signifiers of inclusion may be used by those on the inside and those on the outside'.
12. Jackson, 7.
13. Hilberg, 43.
14. Ibid., 512.
15. R. L. Braham, The Politics of Genocide (New York: Columbia University Press 1981), 30.
16. Ibid., 37n62. The title of law XXV of 1920 was 'The regulation of registration to the universities, polytechnical institutes, the school of political economy of Budapest and the law academies'.
17. Ibid., 30.
18. See the full text in L. Gonda, A zsidóság Magyarországon 1526-1945 (Budapest: Századrég Kiadó 1992), 271-2. There is a summary of the text in English in N. Katzburg, Hungary and the Jews. Policy and Legislation, 1920-1943 (Ramat Gan: Bar-Ilan University Press 1981), 61, 76-7. The 'Jew' was referred to in law XIV of 1928 which replaced the reference to 'national or racial minorities' in the 1920 law with socio-economic categories; see the text in Gonda, 272-6.
19. See the full text in L. Gonda, A zsidóság Magyarországon 1526-1945 (Budapest: Századrég Kiadó 1992), 271-2. There is a summary of the text in English in N. Katzburg, Hungary and the Jews. Policy and Legislation, 1920-1943 (Ramat Gan: Bar-Ilan University Press 1981), 61, 76-7. The 'Jew' was referred to in law XIV of 1928 which replaced the reference to 'national or racial minorities' in the 1920 law with socio-economic categories; see the text in Gonda, 272-6.
20. See the full text in L. Gonda, A zsidóság Magyarországon 1526-1945 (Budapest: Századrég Kiadó 1992), 271-2. There is a summary of the text in English in N. Katzburg, Hungary and the Jews. Policy and Legislation, 1920-1943 (Ramat Gan: Bar-Ilan University Press 1981), 61, 76-7. The 'Jew' was referred to in law XIV of 1928 which replaced the reference to 'national or racial minorities' in the 1920 law with socio-economic categories; see the text in Gonda, 272-6.
21. See T. Spira, 'Hungary's numerus clausus, the Jewish minority, and the League of Nations', Ungarn Jahrbuch, vol. 4, 1972, 117-19.
22. Katzburg, 62.
23. Ibid., 137n71: 'the term Israelite (Izraelita) was the official appellation for Jews and this was employed in official documents. The commonly used term Jew (Zsidó) was introduced into official usage with the First Jewish Law'. However cf. n17 above.
24. See full text in Gonda, 276-9.
25. The 'Israelite faith' had been fully recognized in law XLII of 1895; for the text, see ibid., 271.
26. Katzburg, 103-4.
27. See full text in Gonda, 279-92, cf. Hilberg, 513, table 65 (Hilberg does not give the full definition of the 1939 law).
28. Katzburg, 140-1 notes that 'unlike the First Jewish Law, which was more liberal with respect to war veterans and granted exemption to all front-line soldiers, the second law was restrictive and exempted only those who had earned distinction. The reason given was that during war military service was compulsory and thus service alone, since it was a civic obligation, did not earn entitlement to exemption.'
29. Braham, 194.
30. See full text in Gonda, 292-4.
31. Hilberg, 513 suggests that 'in 1941 about 725,000 persons in Hungary belonged to the Jewish religion. At the same time an estimated 787,000 persons were affected by the law. 62,000 people were consequently non-Jews by religion and Jews by definition.'
32. Katzburg, 178.
33. See parallels with the German Nuremberg laws in J. Noakes, 'The development of Nazi policy towards the German-Jewish "mischlinge" 1933-1945', Leo Baeck Institute Yearbook, vol. 34, 1989, 353: 'by separating off the mischlinge as a discrete category in the Nuremberg decrees, the Jews could be isolated from the "Aryan" population that much more easily'. Although in Hungary there was no Mischlinge category, the 1941 law can be seen as an attempt to create clear water between the 'Jew' and the 'non-Jew'.
34. See, for example, the text of 1240/1944 Me. (legislation making the wearing of the yellow star compulsory) and 1610/1944 Me. (ghettoization legislation) in I. Beneschofsky and E. Karsai (eds), Vádirat a Nácizmus ellen I (Budapest: A Magyar Izraeliták Országos Képviselete Kidása 1958), 53, 248.
35. See, for example, the text of 500/1944 Bm. (legislation restricting 'Jewish' access to hotels and restaurants) and 510/1944 Bm. (legislation restricting 'Jewish' access to places of entertainment) in I. Beneschofsky and E. Karsai (eds.), Vádirat a Nácizmus ellen II (Budapest: A Magyar Izraeliták Országos Képviselete Kidása 1960), 86, 88.
36. Decree 1.730/1944 Me.: see full text in Beneschofsky and Karsai, Vádirat I, 250-3, translated in Braham, 782.
37. H. Arendt, Eichmann in Jerusalem. A Report on the Banality of Evil (London: Faber 1963), 117.
38. Braham, 784.
39. See T. Cole and G. Smith, 'Ghettoization and the Holocaust: Budapest 1944', Journal of Historical Geography, vol. 21, no. 3, 1995, 311.
40. Budapest City Archives IX/2787.1944 - Bp. Szék. Polg. 148.254 (20 June 1944).