Anti-Semitism in Europe and Hitler's Rise to Power

Anti-Semitism came on the rise in Europe in the early 1900s. In France, Prime Minister Leon Blum was prepared to take a surplus of Jews from Poland but backed out, although he was initially accepting of the idea of taking in Polish Jews. Leon Blum had also served as the party chairman for the Socialist Party. Blum was born the son of a Jewish manufacturer and entered the intellectual world at a very early age. Blum became a public attorney in France and was engaged in the Dreyfus Affair in France. In 1904 Blum was appointed as the editor of the Socialist Party newspaper called "L'Humanite." Blum soon became the leader of the party. Using his crafty diplomacy, he soon campaigned to be the French Prime Minister and won. During his 1936 campaign, Blum faced violent anti-Semitism including getting mugged and beaten up. This incident appealed to the French people as sympathetic toward Blum and he was able to win the prime minister position. In 1936 when Blum became the prime minister, he acted in similar fashion as U.S. President FDR and Blum passed many legislative bills for workers including paid vacations, a 40 hour workweek, collective bargaining, unemployment insurance, and many others.

However, elsewhere in the country of France, anti-Semitism spread with the growing membership of two political parties called the "Parti Populaire Francais" and had 170,000 members by 1938. The party was anit-communist, anti-Jew, and anti-parliament. In June of 1937, his own Communist Party split into two factions called the Popular Front. They no longer supported Blum because of his failure to act to support the communist rebels in Spain. Blum submitted his resignation as he felt his country no longer supported him.

In France, Anti-Semitism rose within the government as they believed that Jews were infiltrating the country and that quotas needed to be established to control the Jewish population. There was even a plan to move all of the Jews into Madagascar. The Catholic Church also held Anti-Semitic views and viewed the Jews as ritual murderers and an impure race of people. These views had a profound affect on France.