HOW JEWISH CONNECTIONS HAVE
INFLUENCED THESE PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATES
by: Josh Marks
Looking at the field of Democrats running for president, it would be understandable to mistake this run for the White House with an Israeli election for prime minister- four of the candidates have at least some Jewish background or some connection with Judaism. With the 2004 presidential nomination process in full swing- the Iowa caucuses are in January- a total of 9 Democratic candidates are competing for the chance to challenge President Bush in November. Joe Lieberman, John Kerry, Wesley Clark, and Howard Dean all have varying degrees of connections to the Jewish people. Each candidates’ connection with Judaism has had an effect on them both personally and politically; from the very observant Lieberman, to revelations about Clark and Kerry’s Jewish ancestors, to Dean’s Jewish wife and two Jewish children. With the recent 2004 Annual Survey of American Jewish Opinion claiming that the majority of U.S. Jews would support a Democratic candidate over Bush, it is important to learn more about how each candidates’ Jewish background has gotten them where they are today.
Connecticut Senator and former vice presidential candidate, Joe Lieberman is running for president for the first time. If elected, he would be the first Jewish president in U.S. history.
Lieberman has said that his Orthodox Jewish beliefs were an important reason why he chose public service. In a November 25, 2003 story from the Jewish Telegraphic Agency titled For Lieberman, Jewishness key but it doesn’t tell the whole story, Lieberman says “There’s no question that one of the motivating factors (in choosing public service) was my religious upbringing and the basic understanding that my life was a gift from God and I had a responsibility to give back by- stated in its simplest form- doing tikkun olam, by working to improve the world.” On how Lieberman votes in Congress, he says, “I don’t go to the rabbi for guidance as to how to vote. But it’s the sense of justice and responsibility, that we’re taught we have to pursue justice, to pursue mercy and righteousness. It’s all part of me and I’m sure part of the decisions I make.”
Lieberman’s second and current wife, Hadassah, is the child of Holocaust survivors. Together they have four children and three grandchildren. Both Lieberman and his wife observe the Sabbath. On the few times during his tenure that the Senate has met on a Friday night, Lieberman has voted; however, he rarely campaigns during Shabbat.
Boston, Massachusetts native and practicing Catholic John Kerry recently found out that his paternal grandfather was a Jewish immigrant- the Boston Globe hired a genealogist to unearth Kerry’s roots. In 1905, Kerry’s grandfather, Frederick Kerry (formerly Fritz Kohn), emigrated to the United States from a small town in the Czech Republic which was then part of the Austrian empire. His grandfather committed suicide in a Boston hotel in 1921. Kerry had already known for 15 years that his paternal grandmother was Jewish.
How this recent revelation about Kerry’s Jewish ancestry- and the fact that his younger brother married a Jewish woman and converted to Judaism in 1983- affects Kerry is still to be determined. A hint might have been on display at a speech he gave to Jewish Democrats at a synagogue in Des Moines, Iowa on November 16, 2003. After blasting the Bush Administration for their “unholy alliance” with the Saudi government, the Boston Globe quoted Kerry as saying that “there is no community that I need to say less to about how dangerous and complicated the world is. There’s no community that has lived with history in as poignantly and as costly a fashion as you have. So you know what I mean when I talk about leadership.”
Former Vermont governor Howard Dean has had a lot of experience with the Jewish community, in fact, he even married one and has two kids who consider themselves Jewish. Dean was a member of the Episcopal Church before becoming a Congregationalist- leaving his Vermont church 25 years ago after a dispute about a bike path.
Coming from a well to do New York family, Dean’s first introduction to the Jewish community came from a college friend at Yale. His friend’s name was David Berg, a Zionist who was a former president of Young Judea. They often talked about Middle Eastern politics, and, according to a Jewish Telegraphic Agency article titled Jewish knowledge reaches deep into Howard Dean’s past- and his home, “their friendship developed over the years, and Berg counseled Dean on his interactions with the Jewish community- for instance, when he attended the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York and married a Jewish woman.”
While Dean has gotten in trouble with the Jewish community for recent comments he has made about Israel, it is important to note that former president of AIPAC, Steven Grossman, is co-chairing Dean’s presidential campaign.
58-year-old retired general Wesley Clark has an interesting Jewish background. Growing up in Little Rock, Arkansas, Clark had no idea of his Jewish heritage, even though he visited his father’s extended Jewish family in Chicago and was a lifeguard at the Jewish country club.
It wasn’t until he was a 24 year old Rhodes scholar in England that Clark found out from his mother that his father, who died when Clark was only 4, was Jewish. Benjamin Kanne, according to a September 26, 2003 article in the magazine Forward titled Wesley Clark Jumps in With Kosher-Style Kickoff, “was a Jewish lawyer and Democratic politico whose own father, Jacob Nemerovsky, had been a refugee from Minsk.”
In an earlier interview with the Forward, Clark said his Jewish background influenced him during the civil rights movement, especially living in Little Rock and being sheltered from his Jewish background by his mother who was fearful of the prejudice Clark might experience if his Jewish heritage was revealed.
As far as any worry about Clark’s support of Israel, a revealing Rolling Stone magazine interview should quell any doubts. In the interview Clark said, “Israel has a unique problem. It is beset by nations that want to destroy it. Any nation that is under attack has the right to self-defense . . .We will be there for Israel, and they will survive and be a great nation.”