ABSTRACT
The withdrawal of the French in 1813 left a vacuum, and William Frederick of Orange quickly stepped into it, declaring himself ‘Sovereign Prince’. In 1814 he was crowned King William I. He soon had to concern himself with the Jewish community, since a major division had emerged regarding the best course to take. The older leaders and rabbis wanted to return to the situation before the emancipation of 1796 and become a ‘Jewish Nation’ once again. But the more enlightened leaders did not want to abandon the achievements of the Batavian-French period, which had brought equality of civil rights and a national organizational structure.
