Post-war Repercussions
After the Civil War, General Order No. 11 became an issue in the presidential election of 1868 in which Grant stood as the Republican candidate. The Democrats raised the order as an issue, with the prominent Democrat and rabbi Isaac Mayer Wise urging fellow Jews to vote against Grant because of his alleged anti-semitism. Grant repudiated the controversial order, asserting it had been drafted by a subordinate and that he had signed it without reading, in the press of warfare. He wrote in reply to a correspondent:
I do not pretend to sustain the order. At the time of its publication, I was incensed by a reprimand received from Washington for permitting acts which Jews within my lines were engaged in ... The order was issued and sent without any reflection and without thinking of the Jews as a set or race to themselves, but simply as persons who had successfully ... violated an order.The episode did not cause much long-term damage to Grant's relationship with the American Jewish community. He won the presidential election, taking the majority of the Jewish vote.
Read more about this topic: General Order No. 11 (1862)
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