Today is the anniversary of the consecration of the Mill Street Synagogue in New York City—the first synagogue in the American Colonies. There were some 500 members that day, April 8, 1730, on what is now South William Street in the Financial District of Lower Manhattan. Forty-six years later, in 1776, Gershom Mendes Seixas, then leader of the synagogue, prevailed on the New York Jewish community to move to Philadelphia when the British captured New York City, returning only after Colonial forces retook the city in 1783. Because of his support for the new country, he became known as the...