Ethnic groups, assimilation and voting

[ag]

I always like to quote the old interview of the original leader of Russian Socialist Revolutionary terrorists, Grigory Gershuni, which he gave upon arrival into the US after fleeing the Siberian prison he had been sent to (this was in the 1900s, Teddy Roosevelt's time). Apparently, when he came to San Francisco, a "delegation" showed up in his hotel, asking that he make a speech. As he told the journalist, Gershuni was surprised (Revolution in the US was not on his radar) and asked if there would be people in the city, for whom it would be interesting. The response was that the town was full of Jews. Gershuni, then, asked, if they (the Jews) were ready for the revolution. "Jews are always ready for the revolution" was the obvious response of the "delegates".  

Of course, some of the more prosperous German Jews were on the conservative side. But, overwhelmingly, back then Jews were urban migrant rif-raf, and urban migrant rif-raf back then voted for Democrats (if they voted), or, else, for somebody on the extreme left. For many Jews FDR, when he emerged, was a fairly conservative mainstream politician. As late as in the late 1940s in New York "right", if said in Yiddish, meant a socialist (a Bernie Sanders type, though, perhaps, a tad more radical). "Left" was reserved for the proper Communists.