February 19, 1999
Recently a Cossack Jewish friend sent me an article from the San Diego Jewish Press Heritage newspaper that carried a biographical article on Supreme Court Justice Benjamin N. Cardozo (1860-1938). It came as a surprise to know that an Hispano/Jewish person had been a Supreme Court Justice. My well-intentioned friend saw in the article a potential bond between the Jewish and the Mexican-Latino communities of San Diego.
Cardozo was a Sephardic Jew whose grandparents had come from Portugal. Individually, the families of both sides of his family migrated by way of Holland and England to America before the Revolutionary War.
Cardozo's father was a prominent lawyer in New York and rose to be the Judge of the New York Superior Court. The son followed in his father's footsteps and rose to become the chief judge of the New York's Supreme Court. In 1932, President Herbert Hoover appointed Cardozo to the United States Supreme Court, where he became one of the finest jurists in this country. Truly here was a "role model" that would have given all Hispanos a reason to be proud of…if we only had known about him and his roots. How often have the no-nothings residing in the San Diego area denigrated our people? How often have we been told to go back to our country i.e. Mexico? Little do the racists in this society know of our heritage and culture and of our role in the founding of this country.
We are aware of our Sephardic Jews. They have been members of the Mexican-Latino countries for centuries. They migrated there since the inquisition and deportations that came about when the most Catholic king and Queen Fernando and Isabelle ended the Caliph's rule over Spain and Portugal.
The Jews were given the choice of staying Jewish and practice their religion or renounce it and convert to the Catholic religion. Those Jews that stayed were labeled Marranos by those that left after the Inquisition (Supposedly because they would eat pork which is forbidden in the Jewish religion)
The Mormons have frequently stated that they have found the evidence that Mexicans-Latinos is in fact the 13th tribe of Israel. Be that true or not, my Cossack friend made his point when he sent the article… We have more things that bind us together then separates us. Shalom.
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