Jews were granted burgher rights — citizenship — in New Amsterdam on this date in 1657. The campaign to win these rights was led by Asser Levy, one of 23 bedraggled Jews who arrived in New Amsterdam (today’s New York City) from Recife, Brazil, in 1654, in flight from the Portuguese reconquest of Brazil (which meant the reintroduction of the Inquisition). Even the disembarkation of these Jews was opposed by Governor Peter Stuyvesant, and it took three years for them to gain their rights — a victory enabled by the fact that Dutch Jews were significant investors in the Dutch West India Company, which ran the colony. In 1655, Levy was permitted to help patrol the stockades along Wall Street as part of the Burgher Guard. Full citizenship rights came two years later. An Ashkenazi Jew from Vilnius, he was licensed to operate a butcher shop in 1677 (“excused from killing hogs, as his religion does not allow him to do it”), and eventually became a tavern keeper, real estate investor (in Albany and New Amsterdam/New York), attorney and civic leader.
“For long, lonely stretches as Dutch rule waned and the rest of the Jews departed for colonies with more sun and promise, Levy’s was the only Jewish family in town.” —Jonathan D. Sarna