The Birth of the Jewish Agency

by Yigal Eilam

The Birth of the Jewish Agency, at an impressive ceremony on August 14, 1929, following the closing session of the 16th Zionist Congress in Zürich, was attended by a galaxy of the Jewish luminaries of the day: Louis Marshall, Felix Warburg, Albert Einstein, Leon Blum, Herbert Samuel, Lord Melchett (the former Sir Alfred Mond), Sholem Asch and others.

It was an impressive demonstration of the Jewish people's rallying together in unity around the Zionist Enterprise in Eretz Israel, for the Jewish Agency was intended to serve as the organizational instrument through which the entire nation would play its part in the building of the country.

From the outset, the Agency's establishment was conditional upon an agreement between the Zionist Organization and the non-Zionist groups within the Jewish world, whereby those spheres of competence that the Mandate had vested in the Zionist Organization would henceforth be transferred to the Agency, with the non-Zionists receiving a 50 per cent representation in that body.
On the face of it, negotiations between the Zionist Organization and the non-Zionists began immediately after the passing of the relevant resolution at the 13th Zionist Congress, in August 1923. Thus it would seem that the negotiations were indeed protracted and accompanied by difficulties and disputes between Zionists and non-Zionists, which even split these groups within themselves.

But the real debate on cooperation between the two in the building of a national Jewish home had already begun some time earlier, after the San Remo Conference's decision to establish a British Mandate in Palestine and set up a civil government whose main purpose was to aid in the establishment of a Jewish National Home (May-June 1920).

Moreover, following a decision of the Zionist Executive Council in August 1919, the draft of the Mandate charter had already recognized and defined the Zionist Organization as the Jewish Agency. The British, for their part, had already accepted the formulation offered them by the Zionist Organization, whereby this body would be recognized as the Jewish Agency, and would take in hand all those matters concerned with the building of a national home of the Jews under the term of the Mandate. When the Mandate charter was finally published in its authorized form just as the 13th Zionist Congress was meeting, the impression created was that Clause 4 imposed an obligation on the Zionist Organization to enter into negotiations with the non-Zionists, with a view to extending the organization and bringing them within its fold. This obligation was seen as one laid down by (and even initiated by) the Mandatory government itself. Fostered to no small extent by Weizmann, on the Zionist side, and Louis Marshall, on the non-Zionist side - who were both anxious to use it as a lever within their respective groups to promote cooperation between the two - this interpretation of Clause 4 considerably blurred over the circumstances of the Jewish Agency's birth and the fact that, from the very outset, the program was intended to facilitate Zionist cooperation with all non-Zionist groups in Jewry.
In any event, this is how Weizmann presented the plan to his colleagues on the Zionist Executive Council in August 1919. At that time it was a "Jewish council" that was on the agenda, a body that would represent the Jewish people to the Mandatory authorities and concentrate in its hands the responsibilities that were to fall to the Jewish side under a Mandatory regime. This plan for a "Jewish council" was first developed at the end of 1918 during discussions with the Zionist leadership group in London, with Herbert Samuel one of its chief sponsors.

Samuel was particularly aware of the administrative and legal necessity for establishing some body that should represent the Jewish side in the development of Palestine, resembling the charter companies with which the British were familiar through their earlier tradition of colonization.

From a Zionist point of view, the "Jewish council" was intended to fulfill the dream of uniting the Jewish people around the Eretz Israel enterprise. Thus, it was desirable at this juncture to call a world Jewish conference to undertake responsibility for the Zionist enterprise in Eretz Israel and elect a Jewish council to take charge of the establishment of the national home.

But it was to be precisely this intention, which lay at the very basis of the program for a Jewish council, that was to prove the first stumbling block on the road to implementation. For the leadership of the American Zionists, then headed by Louis Brandeis, was totally opposed to any move that would transform the Eretz Israel project into a lever to turn the Jewish people into a nation.

The American emphasis was quite the opposite: all manifestations of Jewish nationalism were to be confined to practical implementation of, and support for the Eretz Israel project. For this, there was no need for a world Jewish organization, or of any new Jewish body carrying out policy in the name of the Jewish people - such a body was likely to involve the Jews of the West in the thick of controversy about dual loyalties and identities.

The existing framework of the Zionist Organization was quite sufficient and, even here, it behoved that body to understand that the age of ideological and even political Zionism was passed, and that the era of practical Zionism was now upon it, under the aegis of the Mandatory regime.

All who wanted to take part in the Eretz Israel enterprise were free to join the Zionist Organization and work within its ranks.

During the great debate on the proposed "Jewish council" that took place in the Zionist Executive Council in August 1919, Brandeis's view of the subject was to some considerable extent adopted; the Zionist Organization was to be recognized as a Jewish council or agency, and the authority that the Mandatory charter draft proposed to vest in the Jewish council was henceforth to be transferred to this body.

Weizmann reacted sharply to this decision which he saw as clipping the wings of Zionism.

But in the long view, Brandeis's formulation did more good than harm. It assured the status of the Zionist Organization vis-a-vis the Mandatory government, and made it independent of the need to negotiate with other sections of the Jewish people who were not identified with the Zionist movement.

Thus, the Zionist Organization was henceforth free to move ahead with its work in Eretz Israel, even if others did not join its ranks.

And yet, in the course of time, neither Brandeis's nor Weizmann's condition for non-Zionist participation in the Zionist enterprise was to prove acceptable. Non-Zionist groups and individuals concerned for the development of Eretz Israel were not interested in joining the Zionist Organization (as Brandeis had suggested they might), and they were certainly not prepared to participate in a world Jewish congress (as Weizmann had proposed). They were, instead, to opt for working with a neutral framework, common to them and the Zionist Organization, in which they were not required to lose their non-Zionist identity, while the Zionist Organization, for its part, was also not called to blur its own identity.

The cooperation of the non-Zionists became the more urgent in the light of the financial difficulties that the Zionist Organization faced in meeting the enormous investments required to lay some economic infrastructure in Eretz Israel. Following the London Conference in July 1920, the way seemed to be open for bringing this partnership to fulfillment via two new bodies - "The Economic Council", headed by Alfred Mond, who was Anglo Jewry's senior non-Zionist leader (he was also a minister in the British government and was particularly close to Weizmann and Zionism), and the Keren Hayesod, set up for the purpose of attracting financial contributions from all sections of Jewry. But the hopes that the Zionist leadership placed in both bodies were vain. It was America, rather than England, that offered some real hope of enlisting the Jewish people in the raising of financial resources and in securing support from the non-Zionist elements. And in the course of time it also became obvious that these two elements were interdependent: for the Keren Hayesod could not hope to compete with the Joint Distribution Committee unless the two reached agreement about their campaigns and in fact ran them together, with the money being divided between them by arrangement, and preference given to the Zionist endeavor.

Louis Marshall, who headed the American Jewish Committee and was in many ways the uncrowned leader of American Jewry in the 1920s, was the non-Zionist personality with whom Weizmann found a common language and with whom he carried out the protracted negotiations for the non-Zionist entry into an expanded Jewish Agency.

It was back to a program for a Jewish Agency once again, and for two reasons: first, because this was the framework seemingly forced on the Zionists and non-Zionists alike by the Mandate charter, and, second, because this framework seemed to promise the non-Zionists their most effective method of maintaining authority and control over Zionist financial outgoings which the non-Zionists, for their part were to be at pains to collect and which they also wanted, therefore, to supervise.

Ideologically there was no chance of any agreement of joint platform between Zionists and non-Zionists. If Brandeis feared the emergence of any global form of Jewish nationalism which might lay American Jewry open to the charge of dual loyalties, the non-Zionists were even more sensitive on this score, and they had never seen Zionism as a compelling and exclusive solution to the problem of Jewish existence.

Marshall, for his part, was always at pains to make it clear that he was not anti-Zionist, and that he had a natural sympathy for the Zionist movement and for its contribution to the solution of the Jewish problems. He did, indeed, possess special sentiments for everything connected with Eretz Israel, and his heart was fired by the possibility of a Jewish spiritual renascence there. He took at his motto, "Nothing Jewish is strange to me". And within this view he included Zionism too.

But such an all-encompassing global view as Marshall's was not acceptable to the Zionists. What they wanted was pride of place, if not exclusivity.

Their view was subsequently to cause misunderstandings and delay in the negotiations for the establishment of the expanded Jewish Agency at the time of the Crimean program, which the non-Zionists adopted in opposition to the Zionist plan.

Weizmann was convinced that only the cooperation of the non-Zionists in the Zionist enterprise and within the framework of a broad Jewish Agency would enlarge the possible scope of the Zionist Organizations's work, and thus save the whole venture from economic and organizational collapse. He gave himself up heart and soul to the struggle for such a broadly-based Jewish Agency, despite mounting opposition from the Zionist camp.

Truth to tell, most of the politically aligned groups within the Zionist movement violently opposed the plan. They included the Labor movement, the new Revisionist movement, the new radical movement led by Yitzhak Gruenbaum and Nahum Goldmann, prominent personalities among the General Zionists and in the Yishuv, leaders of the Zionist Executive, and even those within the senior echelons, both in London and in Jerusalem, such as Ussishkin and Soloveichick.

Then opposition's main complaint was that by enlisting the non-Zionists other than through an elected Jewish world congress the principle of democracy would be jeopardized; this would be tantamount to handing over the Zionist movement to those whom they termed "magnates", "plutocrats" and "Yahudim" who had nothing to do with Zionism.

The opposition waged its struggle fiercely in every conceivable Zionist forum from the Executive, through the annual meetings, to the Congresses, all the while seeking to curb the authority granted the non-Zionists in any future Jewish Agency. Controversy became open conflagration in the pages of the Zionist press in the years 1923-26.
The Crimean settlement scheme had the support of the Bolshevik government in Russia and was also helped by the Yevsektsii (the special Jewish sections created within the Communist Party) and by Zionist groups in Russia. Representatives of the Joint in Eastern Europe contacted these groups and placed before them the Communist government's request for aid in setting up the grandiose settlement scheme. The American government, for its part, showed no opposition to the Joint being involved in the scheme, despite the fact that there were then no official relations between the two countries.

Faced with an ending of its work in Eastern Europe, the Joint seized eagerly on the appeal from the Russian Jews. Marshall was initially less than enthusiastic, but was slowly, and almost against his will, dragged in. The non-Zionists were simply incapable of ignoring an appeal of this type.

Not so the Zionist circles, and particularly the American Zionists, who immediately raised bitter objections to what they termed the Joint's "deviation."

Weizmann wrang his hands in despair. Sincere efforts were, in fact, made on both sides to tone down and contain the dispute, and a compromise was reached at the Philadelphia conference in September 1925. Here there came to light misunderstandings between Zionists and non-Zionists, and, as a result of these, negotiations between Weizmann and Marshall again broke down for another year. It was only the mediating of Felix Warburg, then head of the "Joint", that brought them together again in November 1928, and even then Weizmann had to placate Marshall and beg for a renewal of the alliance between Zionist and non-Zionist groups.

Behind Weizmann's desire for a renewal of the talks were the mounting economic pressures being brought to bear on the Zionist Organization and its work in Eretz Israel, the rapidly growing needs of the yishuv (which in turn brought about a change within the labor movement to the plan for a Jewish Agency), the first warning signs of the coming economic crisis in Eretz Israel and finally, a sharping of the conflict with the Revisionist movement under Jabotinsky's leadership. (At meeting of its Zionist executive council in April 1927, Weizmann complained that David Ben Gurion had threatened to resign from the Zionist Organization if money was not forthcoming to alleviate the plight of the yishuv workers.) Everything combined to give a new urgency to the establishment of an expanded Jewish Agency and thus to help him in setting up a fairly broad basis of support for the scheme including support from groups which had earlier opposed if or at least held off.

Yet for all this, Weizmann was able to move things forward with the help of as series of resolutions taken by the Zionist Executive in 1923, and by the 13th Zionist Congress of 1923. He leaned primarily on his followers in the Executive and on the massive support5 he received from the majority of national Zionist federations, a base which stretched from Poland, through Germany all the way to America, where the movement was headed by Louis Lipsky. During the 1920s it must be remembered these national groupings were still stronger than the political parties which ultimately emerged within the Zionist Organization. And it was on their might that Weizmann built his uncontested leadership in those years, using it finally to push through the controversial Jewish Agency program.

The decision taken by the non-Zionists to cooperate with the Zionist Organization in the Eretz Israel project was the result of two non-Zionist conferences led by Louis Marshall before and after the 13th Zionist Congress. Marshall himself would have liked to expand even further, to include non-Zionists in Europe, too, but it was obvious from the start that the decisive element was American Jewry.

Not that all the non-Zionists were so eager for partnership with the Zionists; they too had their reservations and held things up as can be seen in their doubts on the subject. Primarily it was the Zionist ideology which had always deterred the non-Zionists. Moreover, the Zionist Organization had a dubious reputation in everything connected with the proper management of practical affairs in general, and financial matters in particular.

While the non-Zionists were apparently intent on standing on their right to maintain complete control over the Zionist enterprise and to be full partners in management and overseeing, the members of the Zionist Executive, on behalf of the Zionists, tried to hold back on that process and clip the powers granted the non-Zionists.

Weizmann tried to push things through faster and put considerable pressure on his colleagues. But Louis Marshall cannot be said to have thrown all his weight behind the negotiations. And thus, events overtook him; while he was still making slow progress towards the convening of the third non-Zionist convention that did finally meet in March 1925. controversy broke out over the Crimean settlement scheme, and negotiations on the Jewish Agency were held up.

The Crimean scheme was now side-stepped by the Zionists, just as the non-Zionists had earlier side-stepped the issue over the Zionists' ideology. Marshall accepted Weizmann's proposal that a fact-finding mission of experts be dispatched to Palestine to draw up a detailed critical report on the Zionist enterprise, and make suggestions and recommendations. This was an idea that had great appeal to the "practical, businesslike" outlook of the non-Zionists who would thus, as it were, be taking their decision to join the Jewish Agency on the basis of the experts' findings.

But Zionist circles were equally firm in their unwillingness to accept the mission, with the opposition coming particularly from the yishuv and the agricultural settlements. They had been burned more than once by the hastily-drawn, hostile conclusions of observers and visitors who had come, taken a hurried glance, and then left, to injure from afar, without bothering at all to look below the surface of the settlers' lives.

It was Alfred Mond who agreed to head the mission, after Herbert Samuel had earlier turned down the offer made to him. Lee K. Frankel served as Marshall's man in coordinating the mission on behalf of the American non-Zionists. There were endless, tedious debates on the mission's composition and terms of reference. The Zionists' pedantry and caution drove Marshal to distraction on more than one occasion, and he accused the Zionist side of trickery and pressure tactics.

Negotiations went on up to June 1927, the eve of the 15th Congress in Basel. Here, the mission's program was accepted, while the Congress also reiterated its support for the Jewish Agency plan. Nevertheless, Weizmann ran into considerable difficulties because of the troubled state of affairs in Eretz Israel at that time.

The fact-finding mission was at work in Palestine in the closing months of 1927 and the first months of 1928. The members did not arrive as a group, nor at the same time, and their reports too, were compiled separately. In June 1928, the non-Zionist sponsors of the report met in London with the Zionist Executive to consider the mission's findings. Zionist circles felt that some of the recommendations and overall observations needed to be toned down. In order to avoid unnecessary trouble, they even suggested that the report not be published, although, by and large, it was moderate in tone and the general sense that it conveyed was that the Zionists had succeeded quite well in Eretz Israel, particularly in view of the difficult conditions. But Marshall insisted that it be published and circulated to the non-Zionists prior to the conference they were to hold at which the crucial decision was to be taken.

Up for discussion now was the participation of the non-Zionists on a parity basis with the Zionists in the proposed Jewish Agency, the details having already been worked out in earlier negotiations.

The non-Zionist conference met in October 1928 in New York. Here it authorized what had been decided over three years earlier, in March 1925: the group having now considered the report of the fact-finding mission, was to join a broad Jewish Agency. An organization committee was appointed to enter into negotiations with the Zionists on the details of the agreement, on the coordination of decisions taken by parallel bodies within the two groups, on the form of election of non-Zionist representatives (who could not be elected within any form of democratic procedure that would parallel the Zionists' elections) and other details.
The agreement reached between Weizmann, on the Zionist side, and Marshall, on the non-Zionist side, was brought before the Zionist Executive meeting in Berlin in December 1928. But there was still strong residual opposition to an agreement with the non-Zionists and it was fully expressed on this occasion. True, Weizmann pushed it through with relative ease, but it still needed ratification by the 16th Zionist Congress, to be held in Basel in August 1929.

In the time between the two meetings, there was many an upset and misunderstanding between Marshall and the Zionist leadership. More than anything else, these last arguments testified to the heritage of distrust that separated Zionists from non-Zionists, despite their new resolve to cooperate in the building of Eretz Israel. The non-Zionists claimed more than once that the development of the country under the terms of the Mandate charter was a goal for the entire Jewish people, and not merely a Zionist preserve (Weizmann himself had used this argument in discussion with the non-Zionists over their participation in the whole project.)

They, for their part, were ready to help, irrespective of their attitude to the Zionist Organization. Clearly, however, they would have preferred that body to remove itself from the scene, thus leaving the way open for non-Zionists to join in the work of building Eretz Israel without involving themselves in any Zionist-nationalist ideological controversy.

Although Marshall complained frequently about "Zionist tricks", there was no place for underestimating the doubts that the Zionists felt concerning the non-Zionists' involvement in the fateful political questions that the Zionist movement would have to face in the future. Of equal concern to them was the status of the Zionist Organization vis-a-vis the Mandatory government should be partnership between Zionists and non-Zionists break down and the Jewish Agency then fall apart. Marshall and Warburg were well aware of the Zionist Organization's sensitivities on this score, and in the final analysis they had no desire to supersede them. They thus agreed to changes in the wording of the agreement which made it quite clear that, in the event of the Jewish Agency's dissolution, all authority vested in it would revert to the Zionist Organization.

The primacy of the Zionist Organization in the Jewish Agency, and even, to an extent, the overlapping identity of the Jewish Agency and the Zionist Organization, was determined by the two having a common president. The weight of the non-Zionists within the Jewish Agency would ultimately depend on the extent to which they would prove ready and able to play their part within the new body.

Negotiations of the final draft of the constitution of the broadly-based Jewish Agency went on up to the last minute: the chief remaining points of dispute needing clarification were, first, the possible dissolution of the Agency and the reversion of its powers to the Zionist Organization, and second, the method whereby non-Zionist representatives were to be chosen (by "democratic" election if possible, but it was left to each body to make the final decision).

When Marshall sailed from New York en route to the ceremony that was finally to establish the Agency, he said he was soon to bring about what had up to then seemed to be impossible of realization: the unification of the entire Jewish people, divided hitherto and now rallied together around a reasonable and practical program.

While the Zionists still had many doubts about the entry of the non-Zionists, there were those who nevertheless saw it as a first step towards integrating all Jews within Zionist work, and thus perhaps eventually winning them over to the cause.

Common to both sides was the hope that with the establishment of the new body the building and development of a national home in Eretz Israel would receive fresh impetus and a renewal of energy.

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