The Chicago Jews are really fine, likeable people, as fine and likeable as they were in the old country.....The Chicago Jews are not fanatics; on the contrary, they are very liberal people. For instance, a Jew who lives in the Lawndale district is a member of an Orthodox synagogue, but as soon as he moves to the North Side, he becomes a member of a Reform temple. Many Chicago Jews are not particular about their articles of faith, and they are not fanatical adherents of a certain set of principles. However, there are a few principles in which the Chicago Jews firmly believe. These principles are:

1. That every dead body must be brought to the synagogue and a funeral oration must be delivered; otherwise the soul of the dead person will not go to heaven by express train.

2. That weddings and wedding suppers must be held in a Down-Town hotel; otherwise the newlyweds will be unhappy.

3. That the newly arrived immigrants, the greenhorns, have no brains, and that all wisdom is lodged in the Chicago Jews.

4. That Shnevr Zalmen [J. Loebner] fights the world every Wednesday, with his Galician Jews.

5. That during the rending of the Torah, one should chatter and gossip.

6. That by giving to charity, one becomes poor.

7. That every Reform rabbi is an educated man.

8. That the editor of a Jewish newspaper is a public errand-boy.

9. That with his twenty-five or fifty-dollar donation to the Keren Hayesod ["exchequer" of World Zionist Organization], he [the Jew] is making the Jewish people happy, he is building Palestine, and fulfilling all of his Jewish duties; he thereby deserves a million dollars' worth of publicity and ten million dollars' worth of Paradise.

10. That it is better [to have] money without a man than [to have] a man without money.

If my dearly beloved Chicago Jews will ever get rid of these superstitions, they will really become civilized.

Will we ever live to see that day?