Foreign-born

“ It is worth while to examine the conditions, to observe the extent to which the foreign born actually do participate in our political processes, and on the basis of such facts as are available, to judge the effect that foreign birth does tend to have upon the quality of that participation. ”

“ The child of foreign-born parents, as well as the native-born child, often learns in the public school to despise what is other than American in dress, customs, language, and political institutions, and both are thus influenced to despise the foreign-born parent who continues in the old way. ”

“ CHILDREN OF ALIENS HERE AMERICAN BORN These statistics bring out also another extremely interesting, and to most people surprising, fact; that is, that the children of our foreign-born citizens largely were born in this country and are therefore, in their own right, American citizens. ”

“ They make for the intelligence and the social values which mean an enhancement of life. And just because the foreign-born retains this expressiveness is he likely to be a better citizen of the American community. ”

“ I mean by that phrase those white, native-born citizens of this country whose ancestry, birth and training has been such as to give them to-day a full share in the basic principles, the ideals and the practice of our American civilization. I do not mean that a foreign-born citizen can not be a good citizen. On the contrary, many of our foreign-born are excellent citizens. ”

“ The foreign-born are more numerously represented among the criminal, defective and dependent classes than their numerical strength would justify. They also tend to segregate more or less, especially in large cities. ”

“ The foreign-born population of this country must be an Americanized population no other kind can fight the battles of America either in war or peace. It must talk the language of its native-born fellow-citizens; it must possess American citizenship and American ideals. ”

“ That is to say, the proportion of the foreign-born in great cities is four times as great, and the proportion of the children of foreign parents is three and one-third times as great as that of the colonial and older native stock. ”

“ I firmly believe that the amalgamation of the foreign-born would be speeded up wonderfully if we could make it obligatory that every foreign-born American citizen should revisit his native land at stated intervals of time. Had I not visited my native land so many times since my landing at Castle Garden in 1874, the memory of my early experiences in America, described in the earlier parts of this narrative, would probably have faded away completely long ago. ”

“ But when I look around me at the American-born I have come to know as my close friends, I wonder whether, after all, the foreign-born does not make in some sense a better American--whether he is not able to get a truer perspective; whether his is not the deeper desire to see America greater; whether he is not less content to let its faulty institutions be as they are ”

“ First, it can exhibit, so far as possible, the difficulties encountered by foreign-born families in attaining in their family relationships such satisfaction as would constitute a genuine feeling of hominess, and make the immigrant home an integral part of the domestic development in this country. ”

“ The high birth rate of the foreign born is, of course, in part to be explained through the fact that the foreign-born population is made up for the most part of individuals in the prime of life, that is, in the reproductive age. ”

“ As discussed in more detail in the following section of this report, there have been some legitimate legal arguments and varying opinions about the status of foreign born children of U.S. citizens as being either “natural born” citizens under common law principles, or citizens who are “naturalized” by statute. ”

“ Abandoning the old system without substituting something better is probably the least frequent reaction to the situation, but it is one that [155] is especially dangerous in immigrant groups. The native-born parent who relaxes all discipline has this advantage over the foreign born; in general he can at will demonstrate his superior knowledge, and the child looks up to him and takes his advice, while the foreign-born parent is peculiarly helpless because the child thinks that his own knowledge, demonstrably superior in some things, extends to all fields. ”

“ The great majority of our people are either European immigrants, or the descendants of European immigrants who came to this country within the last century and a half. With reference to European immigration we distinguish three groups: the foreign-born, the native-born children of the foreign-born, and natives. Natives include those whose ancestors have been in this country two or more generations. On the basis of this classification, about one seventh of our population is foreign-born while over one third is either foreign-born or the native-born children of foreign-born parents. ”

“ The children of our foreign born citizens in our public schools are intensely American. A boy who was born in this country but whose parents were foreign born, was for some misdemeanor chastised by his father. ”

“ A study made by the United States Immigration Commission some years ago showed that of 68,942 foreign born males employed in various mining and manufacturing industries, and who had been in the United States for five years or more, only 33.3 per cent had obtained naturalization papers. ”

“ Does not every man of experience who has seen much of this country know that some of the States in which the foreign-born population is proportionately strongest are among the most orderly, best-governed, and most prosperous in the land ”

“ Still we have not reached the relative increase of the native whites North and South. Allowance should be made for the excess of prolificacy of foreign-born mothers who came previous to the beginning of the decade. The foreigners among us have larger families than the natives of the North generally. So large a proportion of immigrants come in the prime of life, that, though the males predominate, foreigners have a larger percentage of increase than natives, even if their families were not larger. ”

“ Generally speaking, and as might be expected under the circumscribing influences of all kinds, the foreign-born [309] woman has epitomized all the spiritual, intellectual, social, and political traditions and heritages with which immigrants come to America. The children, the husband, the working uncles and male cousins, all mix immediately with the civilization of the street, the factory, the shop. They have to learn English with all possible promptness in order “to get along.” ”

“ Those responsible for some of the institutes realize very keenly the significance of the problem, and impress upon the children they meet their great interest in the Old-World background of the parents, their appreciation of the mother's being able to speak another language besides English, their pleasure in old-country dances, costumes, and songs. They try in every way possible to maintain the respect of the daughter for her foreign-born mother. ”

“ Seriously, I know what I am talking about: I speak from systematic investigations, reports, statistics. The very latest investigation shows that all but about thirteen per cent. of these women were either born abroad or else are the children of foreign parents. It is always the newest immigrants that swell the ranks, and of course the newest immigrants are our lowest type."
"I don't see that all this alters the question."
"Well, it does."
"The lower they are, the more plainly it is our duty to raise them."
"My dear Marian, how can you raise them when you don't understand them?" ”

“ Finding a healthy, Caucasian, American baby is virtually out of the question, so naturally we focus on foreign-borns. All the same, it can take years, and there's incredible paperwork. Passports for the kid, an extended visa for you while you go there and then wait around to process everything in triplicate. ”

“ According to this rule every child born on the territory of such State, whether the parents be citizens or aliens, becomes a subject of such State, whereas a child born abroad is foreign, although the parents may be subjects. Again, other States, as Great Britain [620] and the United States, have adopted a mixed principle, since, according to their Municipal Law, not only children of their subjects born at home or abroad become their subjects, but also such children of alien parents as are born on their territory. ”

“ We find on comparison that a far greater proportion of the delinquent classes are found among the inhabitants of foreign birth than among those of native ancestry, and even those born in this country of alien parents furnish a larger ratio to these classes than those of purely American parentage. ”

“ The status of children born of American parents residing in a foreign country, of American women who have married aliens, of American citizens residing abroad where such question is not regulated by treaty, are all sources of frequent difficulty and discussion. ”

“ It may be safely said that it will on an average take two generations before the children of the non-English-speaking immigrants shall cease to suffer more or less from these prejudices. Certainly the children of immigrant parents, although born and brought up in this country, are often subjected to sneers and taunts by their more fortunate playfellows, even within the walls of the American public schools. ”

“ In spite of the steady immigration, with its persistent tide of foreign blood, they have chosen to speak often and to think always of our people as sprung after all from a common stock, bearing a family likeness in every branch, and following all the while old, familiar, family ways. ”

“ He reaches the conclusion that there is a tendency manifest in the American-born children of immigrants to approach a common physical type in this country, and that this tendency becomes more marked as the mother’s length of residence in the United States, previous to the birth of the child, increases. ”

“ Children of naturalized citizens who were under the age of twenty-one at the time of the naturalization of their parents, if dwelling in the United States, are considered citizens, as are children of citizens, born outside of the United States. ”

“ It often happens that parents of foreign birth cannot comprehend the character and actions of their own children, who are so different, being superficial and frivolous, where they are deep and sound; cool and calculating where they are fire and flame. ”

“ The child of the European, although born in India, must be sent home in early life to the climate of his ancestors, or to one closely resembling it, in order to escape incurable disease, if not premature death. ”

“ But, if material were available for a comprehensive analysis of American leadership in life and thought today, a larger number of names of non-native origin would no doubt appear than was disclosed in 1891 by Senator Lodge's analysis. All the learned professions, for instance, and many lines of business are finding their numbers swelled by persons of foreign parentage. This change is to be expected. The influence of environment, especially of free education and unfettered opportunity, is calling forth the talents of the children of the immigrants. ”

“ Only so many immigrants of any people should be admitted as we can Americanize. Let the maximum permissible annual immigration from any people be a definite per cent. (say five) of the sum of the American-born children of that people plus those who have become naturalized of the same people. Let this restriction be imposed only upon adult males. ”

“ But they are the exception and not the rule. It is not to be imagined that because many people of foreign birth do not live so well, according to our standards, as a thrifty man of American birth, therefore the foreigner is suffering. ”

“ Nothing is better settled at the common law than the doctrine that the children, even of aliens, born in a country while the parents are resident there under the protection of the government and owing a temporary allegiance thereto, are subjects by birth. ”

“ Status of Minors.—The naturalization of a man confers citizenship upon his wife and upon such of his children as are minors at the time. A child of his born in this country, either before or after his naturalization, is a "natural-born" citizen. This is also the case if the child is born on the ocean while the parents are coming to this country, provided that they are coming with the intention of seeking citizenship. If an alien dies after declaring his intention, his wife and minor children may become citizens upon taking the oath required. ”

“ This antipathy is most noticeable in places where the number of foreigners is very great, but less where they are few, and may be explained and partly excused by the fact that, when a great number of foreigners live together they are more apt to maintain their customs, language and amusements, which differ from those of the native-born. ”