JUDAICA - Wisdom In Torah

eckelman, moses w.
BECKELMAN, MOSES W. (1906–1955), U.S. social worker.
Beckelman was born in New York City. He was a lecturer
in social work at the City College of New York (1927–30),
and managing editor of the Jewish Social Service Quarterly
(1936–39). At the outbreak of World War II Beckelman was
sent by the *American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee
to Lithuania, where he helped large numbers of refugees
to emigrate, until he was forced to leave in 1941. In 1942
Beckelman joined the U.S. Office of Strategic Services, and
in 1943 directed a refugee camp in Morocco for UNRRA.
After serving as an assistant director of the Intergovernmental
Committee on Refugees, from February 1945, he rejoined
the “Joint” in 1946 and became its director general in Europe
in 1951. Until his death Beckelman supervised the liquidation
of the displaced persons camps, the establishment of *Malben
in Israel for the social care of immigrants, and extensive social
work programs for Jews, especially in Morocco and Iran.
[Yehuda Bauer]
BECKER, U.S. family of bankers and philanthropists. ABRA-
HAM G. BECKER (1857–1925), U.S. banker and philanthropist,
was born in Warsaw, Ohio, and eventually settled in Chicago.
He organized his own commercial paper house, A.G. Becker
and Company, which pioneered in the syndication of large
loans. Active in communal affairs, Becker helped found the
Associated Jewish Charities of Chicago and served as its president
for eight years. He was a trustee of Hebrew Union College
and the Chicago Orchestral Association and bequeathed
large sums to the Chicago Art Institute and the Chicago Jewish
charities. His son, JAMES HERMAN (1894–1970), was also
a banker and communal leader. In 1914, while an undergraduate
at Cornell University, he helped convoke the original Jewish
War Relief Conference in Chicago. Becker served with the
U.S. Army in Europe from 1918 to 1921, assisting war victims
through the American Relief Association and later as director
general of the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee
in Europe. Upon his return to America in 1921, Becker joined
his father’s firm, becoming director (1926), president (1947),
and chairman (1961). He also directed several other companies
and served with many Jewish organizations. In 1936 he
was chosen president of the Chicago Jewish Welfare Fund, a
post that he held for nearly 30 years.
[Edward L. Greenstein]
BECKER, AHARON (1906–1995), Israeli labor leader. Born
in Kobrin, Belorussia, Becker grew up in Brest-Litovsk, where
he joined the Zionist labor youth movement and *He-Ḥalutz.
In 1925 he settled in Palestine. He was a construction worker
in Petaḥ Tikvah and Tel Aviv and cofounder of Ha-Baḥarut
ha-Soẓyalistit ha-Ivrit, the union of young members of *Aḥdut
ha-Avodah. He started his career as a *Histadrut worker in
1929 as the secretary of the workers’ council in Ramat Gan; he
later worked in Tel Aviv in various trade unions and was on
its workers’ council. He was an initiator of the cost-of-living
scale for wages and salaries. In 1947 Becker was appointed by
Ben-Gurion to organize the supply department of the Haganah
and later of Israel’s army, but in 1949 returned to Histadrut
work, becoming the chairman of its executive’s trade union
department, a post he held for 12 years. From 1961 until 1969
he served as the Histadrut’s secretary-general. He maintained
many international contacts, and regularly attended the conferences
of the International Labor Organization in Geneva,
serving on its governing body from 1957 until 1971. Becker was
elected to the Knesset (from the Third to the Seventh Knesset)
on the Mapai and Labor Party ticket. He published a book entitled
Bi-Ymei Shilton ha-Labor (“In the Period of Labor Government,”
1955), after visiting Britain in the early 1950s, and
Ha-Oved be-Yisrael (“The Worker in Israel,” 1970).
[Shmuel Soler]
BECKER, EDWARD ROY (1933– ), U.S. jurist. Becker was
born in Philadelphia, Penn. He received his B.A. from the University
of Pennsylvania in 1954 and his LL.B. from Yale Law
School in 1957. He practiced law in Philadelphia with Becker,
Fryman and Ervais from 1957 until 1970. In 1970, President
Richard M. *Nixon nominated Becker, then only 37 years
old, to the U.S. District Court, Eastern District of Pennsylvania.
In 1981, President Ronald *Reagan nominated him to
the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit. He was Chief
Judge from 1998 to 2003 and achieved a remarkable collegiality
in the Court.
Federal appellate courts often decide cases with a single
word: “Affirmed.” Becker felt that this was a mistake, “that we
owed the bar more.” Providing a rationale for a judicial decision,
Becker said, “was the right thing to do.” When he began
his term as Chief Judge, the Third Circuit resolved 53% of its
cases without comment. By the end of 2002, the number was
3%. His passion for writing comprehensive opinions, leaving
no hard issue behind and clarifying the law no matter how
complex, led colleagues to chide him for his predilection for
extensive footnotes In fact, his article “In Praise of Footnotes”
has become a judicial classic.
He was deeply involved in efforts to improve the administration
of justice, serving on the executive committee of the
Judicial Conference and the board of the Federal Judicial Center.
He helped simplify the management of complex litigation,
improve the Federal Rules, and coordinate state and federal
judicial efforts. He wrote and lectured extensively on cuttingedge
legal issues and produced more than 1,000 opinions, a
significant number of which were precedent-setting. His expertise
– particularly in anti-trust, securities, class actions,
scientific evidence, and tort law – is widely recognized, and
his opinions are often cited by other judges, including justices
of the Supreme Court.
In 2002, the American Judicature Society conferred
its prestigious Devitt Distinguished Service Award upon him.
This award honors a federal judge whose “career has been
exemplary and who has made significant contributions to
244 ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 3