Posted by Roger M. Firestone on March 10, 19101 at 18:01:52:
In Reply to: Re: Ben Franklin's Attitude Towards Jews posted by Harry on October 10, 19100 at 21:55:09:
>: I don't know if he was anti-semitic or not, but
>he was adamant in trying to keep Jews from
>becoming citizens of the new country. He said that
>in 200 years our country would be morally and
>spiritually bankrupt. I could find the exact
>quote.
You cannot find the exact quote because the "quote" is a forgery. It supposedly comes from a diary kept by Charles Pinckney at the 1787 Constitutional Convention. No such diary has ever been found or proven ever to have existed. James Madison's notes are the only known historical record of the Convention. The Pinckney diary does not exist and never did. Nor did Ben Franklin ever make any other remarks which can soundly be attributed to him which would indicate that he held such anti-Semitic points of view. It is hard to believe that his alleged expression of such anti-Semitism would not have been widely reported, given the attitudes of other delegates to Philadelphia regarding religious toleration, of which we have historical record.