Rabbi Lee Levinger, World War I, and the Lessons of American Democracy

Rabbi Lee Levinger was born in Burke, Idaho, and after earning his rabbinical degree at Hebrew Union College, took a pulpit in Paducah, KY. He came from a small town and might have stayed a small-town rabbi, but as the United States prepared to send American troops abroad to fight in WWI, Congress changed government regulations in order to provide a mechanism by which rabbis could receive commissions as U.S. military chaplains, and Levinger volunteered to serve. Upon receiving his chaplain’s commission, he left his wife Alma and their newborn twins at home, and took up his new post with the American Expeditionary Forces in France. After the war, Levinger returned home filled with renewed commitment to the value of American democracy. He dedicated much of the rest of his career to educating his fellow citizens in what he saw as the United States’ highest ideals of religious tolerance and inter-group cooperation. He wrote a Ph.D. dissertation that examined the causes of and cures for anti-Semitism in America, and published steadily on the history of Jews in the United States, and the opportunities and obstacles to their peaceful and patriotic coexistence with Christian Americans. This paper will examine Levinger’s career and his publications on American Jewish history. It will look at the ways that his vision was shaped by the experience of WWI and by his understanding of the United States’ place in the world. It will consider the lessons that Levinger believed WWI offered to Americans, and his struggles to make sense of the rise of interwar anti-Semitism both at home and abroad.