The Anti-Defamation League was launched in 1913 in response to rampant anti-Semitism and discrimination against Jews.

Unquestionably, many things have changed -- mainly for the better -- for Jews and other minorites in America since 1913. Discrimination in hiring, schooling, and housing, once so common, is now prohibited by law. Unlike in the past, few Americans feel compelled to conceal their origins. Offensive caricatures rarely appear in the mass media, and racial and religious stereotypes, on the whole, no longer dominate American popular culture. These changes are due, in large measure, to the efforts of the League and its allies.

What has "remained the same," unfortunately, is the persistence of anti-Semitism and other forms of bigotry -- which in recent years have included attacks on immigrants, Blacks, Hispanics, Asian-Americans, gay men and lesbians. And while the hatemongers of today may be lacking in numbers and in economic and political power, they still have the ability to cause emotional pain, physical injury, property destruction, even death -- not to mention the incalculable damage they do to the social fabric of America and to this country's cherished ideals of mutual respect and equal treatment for all.

The mission of ADL today is, as it has been in the past, to expose and combat the purveyors of hatred in our midst, responding to whatever new challenges may arise. Where once we protested admissions quotas at leading graduate schools, today we expose Internet sites devoted to Holocaust denial and white-supremacist propaganda. In the past, we challenged the anti-Semitic ranting of demagogues like Father Coughlin; in the present, we are no less vocal in opposition to Louis Farrakhan.

The particulars may change, but the goal remains the same: to stand up for the core values of America against those who seek to undermine them through word or deed. We can look to our past record to inspire us as we go forward into the new millennium and the second century of ADL.

Next: 1913-1920