Changing Perspectives: Black-Jewish Relations in Houston during the Civil Rights Era by Allison E. Schottenstein

Abstract

Reviewed by: Changing Perspectives: Black-Jewish Relations in Houston during the Civil Rights Era by Allison E. Schottenstein Timothy Riggio Quevillon Changing Perspectives: Black-Jewish Relations in Houston during the Civil Rights Era. By Allison E. Schottenstein. (Denton: University of North Texas Press, 2021. Pp. 432. Illustrations, notes, bibliography, index.) While much has been written on the state of Black and Jewish relations in the twentieth century, particularly in the South, Houston has long been a curious omission from scholarship. This has also been true of Houston’s place in general scholarship on African American history. Despite the city’s large Black population and historical position as one of the South’s largest cities, few works on African American history, whether they address civil rights, urban life, or Black migration, have put much focus on it. This has changed in the 2010s, as scholars such as Michael Botson, Bernadette Pruitt, and Tyina Steptoe have increasingly engaged Houston’s history within a larger southern history. Allison Schottenstein’s first book, Changing Perspectives: Black-Jewish Relations in Houston During the Civil Rights Era, fits perfectly into this growing interest in Houston and southeast Texas. Changing Perspectives focuses primarily on Jewish activists in Houston and their responses to the inequities faced by the local Black community. Schottenstein contends that, in the face of civil rights struggles, Houston’s Jews largely “adopted a philosophy that was both liberal and focused on acculturation” (12). In practice, this meant finding ways to ensure the rights of Black Houstonians without sacrificing their acceptance among White non-Jews. While Houston’s Jews created a public perception that they accepted segregation laws, Schottenstein discusses how this was not always how community relations played out in private. Focusing on eight distinct periods in Houston’s Jewish history, including communist scares, desegregation, Jewish neighborhood migration, and religion in schools, Schottenstein examines how the relationship between Houston’s Black and Jewish communities grew throughout the course of the postwar decades. [End Page 329] Perhaps the strongest part of Changing Perspectives is its chapter dedicated to the coinciding fights against segregation of and religion in the schools. Schottenstein’s is the first major work to draw a connection between desegregation and the secularization of public schools, despite both movements having targeted White, conservative school boards in the South. For Houston’s Jews, Schottenstein argues, the fight over school prayer highlighted that “their identity as white Americans of Jewish faith did not provide them with complete acceptance in the Gentile world” (197). In realizing this, and seeing the roots of White discrimination against Blacks and Jews as interrelated, Houston’s Jews embraced the causes of Black Houstonians with greater publicity. The failures of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to protect religion compelled Houston’s Jewish leadership to champion the cause of full school equality more aggressively. Overall, Allison Schottenstein’s book is a welcome addition to the historiography of Jewish civil rights activism. She builds upon the work of Clive Webb and Mark Bauman in arguing that the relationship between southern Jews and Black Americans was more nuanced than arguments of Jewish inaction would suggest. Changing Perspectives also adds to the historiography on interracial political coalitions within Texas by highlighting the interconnectedness of Black and Jewish political issues in postwar Houston. The biggest strength of Changing Perspectives is its accessibility. Schottenstein strives to use history to be inclusive and a tool to build bridges, making it accessible to a broad spectrum of our society. Both academic and lay readers alike will find use in this book as it balances original and insightful research with an accessible and compelling narrative. Schottenstein’s abundant use of oral histories highlights the unique stories of Jewish shop owners, tradesmen, and school board members who quietly became staunch allies for racial change and equality in Texas. Ultimately, these stories will be what grips lay readers while offering scholars important details on Houston’s desegregation campaign that, until now, remained unexamined. Timothy Riggio Quevillon University of Houston Copyright © 2022 The Texas State Historical Association