would provide considerable material from the tradition. The choice of Kaufmann Kohler as chairman did, however, provide the Committee with status. As President of the Hebrew Union College and Honorary President of the Central Conference of American Rabbis, no person of greater standing could have been appointed. Kohler was active in the Central Conference and served on six other committees. His appointment as chairman may also have reflected the controversial nature of this committee whose path remained undefined; his chairmanship removed it from politics. The appointment of Kaufmann Kohler provided a link between the college and its graduates in the day to day conduct of their rabbinate which could in theory have had a major influence on the American rabbinate though that was not destined to occur. The committee could and eventually did serve as a brake on extremism, as a bulwark for those who sought a more traditional position, and as a way of helping to bring uniformity into ritual practice. Those possibilities existed when the committee was established although they were not Kohler ’s concern.
The real development of the responsa literature in the American Reform movement did not occur until the period immediately following World War IL. A number of factors influenced this course. The growing traditionalism of Reform Judaism which has been influenced in part on the nostalgia of the more recent and second generation Eastern European Jews, and in part on a recognition that the earlier path of Reform Judaism had been too radical. This produced a new interest in the tradition and its literature. A second factor was the appointment of Solomon B. Freehof , a congregational rabbi with a real interest in responsa, as chairman of the Responsa Committee. For the last four decades under the guidance of Solomon B. Freehof , myself, and now Gunther Plaut , the Responsa Committee has been led by congregational rabbis. These developments will be discussed in a subsequent paper.
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