There can be no question here of a negative solution of the
Jewish problem, for the very possibility of such a problem was not
considered. Least of all did Catherine think that in the lapse of
years her ukase of December 23, 1791, in which neither faith nor
nationality was mentioned, would give birth to ... the "Pale of
Settlement." At that time the Jews were confined within the limits of
the "Pale" neither more nor less than the Ukrainian population of that
section, or the people of the old Russian provinces were. It will be
remembered that in those times the law forbade a townsman to take up
his residence in another town or in a village. It was not a special
limitation intended for the Jews, it affected all the Russian subjects
throughout the Empire. How then did it result in a special Jewish
disability?
It did not result either from the increase in the rights of other
citizens, or from the limitation of the rights of the Jews as a
nationality. The afore-mentioned limitations were removed from the
townspeople of non-Jewish birth both in the newly annexed provinces
and elsewhere.
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