As with most historical questions that ask why this or that happened or did not happen, there is no simple or single answer. No one planned to derail that which was unfolding a generation or more ago. Part of the explanation is in lifestyle changes, in conditions that have reduced our ability to advocate what we believe in. Not in our religious life but in public affairs. Volunteerism is in decline in America and so is the role of ideas. Within Orthodox life, askanos or lay leadership is nearly as dead as the dodo. Most of us who might be active or creative are too busy and we leave the job to organizations whose agenda inevitably revolves around their self-interest, to the detriment of the larger community.
There is little contact today, however, whether directly through meetings or over the phone. Strange as it may seem, among the yeshiva-world Orthodox there is a greater likelihood of sitting down with Federation and secular leaders than with other Orthodox. In short, the abandonment of cooperation has resulted in the diminution of our influence.
This is linked in turn to the root cause of current Orthodox feebleness in public affairs. What I wrote forty years ago holds the key to what has changed. We had then broken away from mainstream American Jewry, explicitly not wanting to be part of what had harmed the prospect for Jewish continuity. We insisted on our independence, on the right to advocate religious interests and to challenge the establishment. We weren’t interested in being popular or having access. Being outsiders was just fine, if that status would yield results. Emphatically, we did not exalt being outsiders as a goal unto itself; rather, we recognized that by their abandonment of what had kept Judaism alive, the Jewish establishment made us into outsiders.
The tax relief legislation just enacted in New York resulted largely from the efforts of the Sephardic Community Federation, a Syrian Jewish organization that deliberately presents itself as an outsider. Without its advocacy, there would be no legislation. This group is also searching for creative approaches to the constitutioal issues raised by governmental activity that assists parochial schools. Here, too, mainstream Orthodoxy is asleep.
The abandonment of advocacy is also evident in the neglected field of protecting religious persons in the workplace and elsewhere. This neglect has harmful consequences because hard-working religious Jews are often stuck in jobs that offer no advancement, while others cannot get jobs for which they are certainly qualified. Strangely, the rank and file of Orthodox Jewry derives little comfort from the stream of organizational press releases announcing phantom achievements.
One fantasy advanced by those who have little to show in the legislative and legal arenas is that there are behind-the-scenes achievements that are so “top secret” that they cannot be discussed. Of course there are private arrangements, but to maintain that the key interests of Orthodox Jews are being advanced in this fashion is to promote a falsehood. Legislation and litigation are public activities.
I might note that in recent years, even as certain of the Orthodox have achieved access to Federation, there is growing Federation support for intermarriage-related activities and other dubious projects that are promoted as “continuity.”
