Posted on 12/16/2004 10:25:42 AM PST by Alouette
The Orthodox community in America was caught up in the heightened excitement surrounding the recent US elections. For the first time ever, the Lakewood Vaad endorsed a particular candidate — President George W. Bush — "in consideration for his outstanding positions on family issues, domestic security and of significant consequences for Acheinu B'nai Yisroel in Eretz Yisroel."
In a more traditional effort, every Orthodox rabbi in Cleveland, led by Rabbi Chaim Stein rosh yeshivas Telshe, signed a Kol Korei calling on every Orthodox Jew to vote, and on the Shabbos preceding the election every congregational rabbi in Cleveland stressed in his droshoh the importance of voting.
Rabbi Yechiel Kalish, Midwest regional director of Agudath Israel of America, logged thousands of miles in the last week of the campaign in the key state of Ohio, traveling between Cleveland, Columbus, and Cincinnati on voter registration and getting-out-the-vote activities. And his colleague, Rabbi Moshe Matz, the Southern Florida regional director of Agudath Israel, was busy doing the same in southern Florida, another crucial state. Agudath Israel of America got involved in voter registration efforts to an unprecedented degree, out of a feeling that it would be a chilul Hashem for Orthodox Jews to sit on the sidelines in an election perceived as so vital by the American public, and especially after the 2000 elections demonstrated that every vote does count.
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Orthodox Jews turned out in large numbers and they voted overwhelmingly for President Bush. That support for the president grew stronger as one moved rightward on the religious spectrum towards the close-knit Chassidic communities. Despite the theological anti-Zionism in the latter, the concern for the well-being of Jews in Eretz Yisroel remains overwhelming.
Thus in Kiryas Yoel, a Satmar community in Sullivan County, New York, President Bush won 88 percent of the vote: 6314 to 529 (with the votes for Senator Kerry attributed to internal communal divisions.)
Al Gore Jr. carried Rockland County by 21,000 votes in 2000; this year George Bush carried it by 1,301 votes. That swing was largely attributed to the heavy Orthodox vote for the president. In New Square, for instance, President Bush won 99 percent of the vote; in 2000 he captured only 21 votes in New Square. When asked to explain the shift, the Skverer Rebbe answered, "Hakoras hatov." In those election districts in Rockland County in which Orthodox Jews comprise more than 50 percent of the eligible voters, the President captured 84 percent of the votes.
In Lakewood, New Jersey the communal efforts of fifty campaign workers (without direct support from the national or state Republican parties) paid off heavily for Bush. Though New Jersey went for the Democratic candidate, President Bush carried Lakewood by better than two to one. In the 12 election districts with a majority of Orthodox voters, he won 85 percent of the vote, and in the one exclusively Orthodox district he won over 99 percent.
Similar patterns were repeated in other heavily Orthodox areas. The Bush vote increased by 80 percent in Boro Park and over 100 percent in Flatbush. Both had gone heavily for Gore in 2000, and this year swung into the Bush column.
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Much of the political activity on the Republican side for the Orthodox vote was the result of the vision of one man: Jeff (Yehoshua) Ballabon, an Orthodox Jew from West Hempstead New York. Ballabon, 41, has long been active in Republican politics. After graduating Yale Law School, he worked on the staff of Senator John Danforth, now U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.
Ballabon, who had met then-Governor Bush in Austin in 1999 and had the chance to spend a few minutes talking with him, felt confident that his personal commitment to faith and values was profound, as was his feeling of respect, even affinity, towards the Jewish people and faith. Ballabon worked on the Bush campaign in 2000. Soon after he was elected, despite winning only 19 percent of the Jewish vote, President Bush began to prove his friendship.
Ballabon was particularly moved by the fact that President Bush, alone among major world leaders, refused to send an American delegation to the U.N. Conference on Racism at Durban, which quickly degenerated into an anti-Israel hate fest.
Ballabon felt that only someone firmly planted in both the Torah world and that of values-based politics could be the bridge for Torah Jews to the larger political world. Otherwise the conversations across the table would always be ones between strangers, each seeking to advance particular interests, not a conversation of allies searching for common ground. As a graduate of Yeshivas Ner Israel, and someone who has always been very open about his religious observance in both his political and professional life, Ballabon was suited to that task.
As a kippah-wearing Jew in the public limelight, he found himself constantly presented with opportunities to correct distortions of Judaism by so many who claim to speak in its name. Evangelical Christians and traditional Catholics in particular were always thrilled to meet a Jew who could reassure them that there are still Jews today living according to the precepts of the Torah.
Reaching out to the Orthodox community, Ballabon argued repeatedly, is not just a matter of having a kosher table at a Republican Jewish event. Orthodox Jews, he explained, view life and politics from a completely different perspective than their secular Jewish counterparts.
Together with friends like Gedalia Litke, a New York attorney, and Michael Fragin, today New York Governor George Pataki's liaison to the Jewish community, Ballabon formed ROSHEM, the Center for Jewish Values, in order to introduce Torah Jews to politicians, and to sell the possibilities of political action to observant Jews. Through ROSHEM, Ballabon introduced politicians with a strong social conservative message — e.g., Senator Sam Brownback of Kansas and Senator Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania — to successful Orthodox professionals and business people who could support their political campaigns.
Ballabon participated in roundtable discussions at conventions of Agudath Israel of America, in which he discussed ways to approach social issues within the guidelines of da'as Torah, in order to maximize the Kiddush Hashem message, while at the same time, not diminishing the uniqueness of Torah. He also addressed the national convention of the Orthodox Union and the rabbinical training conference of the National Council of Young Israel.
By constantly stressing moral values, Ballabon was able to make the Orthodox community into a more significant political player than its numbers would warrant. There are fewer than half a million Orthodox voters. But as a new demographic group focused around issues of values, Orthodox Jews were highly sought after by important constituencies within the Republican Party. Ballabon's personal experience in Washington confirms that principled action is often the most practically effective. His influence has grown as he has been perceived as a person of conviction and integrity rather than someone who merely buys and sells access.
Though he did not then know it, he was following in the path of the greatest of American Orthodox askonim, Rabbi Moshe Sherer, the long-time president of Agudath Israel of America. In discussions with politicians, Rabbi Sherer always confined himself to the principles of the issue on the table at that moment.
A longer version of this article appeared in Mishpacha. The writer is the director of the Israeli office of Am Echad, sponsored by the American Agudas Yisroel.
It's not good news. They vote for whoever will grant them favors. When Hillary Clinton ran for senate, they voted for her overwhelmingly (something like 14000 to 2), despite the fact that the fact that she ws a friend to the Palestinians (remember that kiss with Mrs. arafat?). 2 days after she was elected, her husband pardoned 4 Orthodox men who were in federal prison for embezzling funds from the federal goverment by setting up a phony religious school to get goverment grants.
The Orthox Jews are vonson.
Spoken like a person far removed from block busting. THey offered way more than what the property was worth. They are trying to get into the neighborhood, split the houses into multi-family dwelling, and force the rest out who don't want to live in a high density neighborhood.
Burn a cross on their lawn.
"In New Square, for instance, President Bush won 99 percent of the vote; in 2000 he captured only 21 votes in New Square. When asked to explain the shift, the Skverer Rebbe answered, "Hakoras hatov.""
"Burn a cross on their lawn."
It's not a matter that they are Jewish. I'm Jewish myself. It's matter that they are trying to change the existing neighborhoods from single family residential to high density apartment style housing.
And in a democracy this is not permitted?
'appreciation'
Thank you.
And you heard your numbers from where?
Your 7% figure is from 1990.
That slight rise over a decade would make sense, wouldn't it?
Wideawake:In 20 years, there could be 3 times as many.
Not if most of the Orthodox Jews make aliyah.
I believe only 2,000 or so Orthodox from America make aliyah each year.
I burst out laughing when I saw that my old neighborhood's Bush vote DOUBLED between 2000 and 2004.
Demographics *is* destroying the left's stranglehold on the Jewish vote.
Only if you believe that in 300 years all Jews in America will be Orthodox (at that rate).
It's a little disappointing that so many "ultra-Orthodox" votes went to the ultra-liberal Gore in 2000, but I suppose part of it was due to old habit (from when liberals were more pro-Israel and not as morally nihilistic) as well as to the presence of Joe Lieberman on the ticket.
At any rate, things seem to be on the mend here. Again, thank G-d for this.
Which is interesting considering it's considered a great mitzvot to make aliyah to Israel.
In my study of medieval Judaism I saw one continually recurring phenomenon - a prominent Jewish businessman or community leader in the Galut would work hard all his life making money or studying or both and then spend his last years in Israel.
I believe both the Rambam and the Gaon of Vilna had planned to do so and died on the way and Moshe de Leon did make it there.
bump for later read. This is great!
Now why would someone who thinks that all Israeli Jews are required by "international law" to throw themselves into the sea and drown be interested in this statistic?
Is ending "Zionist occupation of America" next on your agenda?
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