Immigration

“ There remains by far the greatest and most universal argument for immigration—the economic one. The one plea for the free admission of aliens, that has weight to-day, is that our industrial organization demands it. ”

“ Whatever the future may bring forth, then, our immigration at present springs from European sources. [136] Every country on the continent furnishes its contingent, 169large or small. From the cities, towns, and villages, most of all from the rural sections, even to the most remote corners of the back districts, they come, inspired with great hopes by the emigration agents and the labor contractors, aided by friends or relatives or future employers on the other side. Homes and property are mortgaged, the labor of their bodies—even their very souls—are pledged, to pay their passage. ”

“ There are three classes of effects of immigration which may be clearly distinguished, and which will interest different persons in different degrees. These are the effects upon the United States, the effects upon the countries of source, and the effects upon the immigrants themselves. The second and third of these interest the American citizen only as he is open to broad humanitarian considerations ”

“ Place yourself in any one of these hundred odd cities or villages thus peopled, without a single American inhabitant, with everything foreign, including religion; then realize that just such a foreign population as is represented by all these places has actually been put somewhere in this country within a twelvemonth, and the immigration problem may assume a new aspect and take on a new concern. ”

“ The great westward tide of immigration has again begun to rise. Annually to the ports of entry and to the great inland centers of distribution come thousands of immigrant families, strange men and women with young children, unattached girls, and vigorous, simple lads. ”

“ In regard to national prosperity and welfare, moreover, it must ever be remembered that the effects of immigration upon all countries concerned, particularly upon the receiving country, are scarcely more than in the embryo. Such a tremendous movement as this must inevitably have significant and far-reaching results. ”

“ For immigration, even more than colonization, is a phenomenon of peace. On the part of the people who are to take part in the movement a high degree of civilization is demanded. They must be trained to act on individual initiative, and must have sufficient personal enterprise to undertake a weighty venture without an official or state backing. ”

“ I for one do not complain of this system;—but on the contrary, believe it will be beneficial to society in the end, and wait its progress. Hence the necessity for immigration to fill up the blank occasioned by the independence and comfort of our former servants. ”

“ Many of them find their level in clerical and professional occupations, but they escape the manual toil which to them is the token of subordination. These manual portions are the peculiar province of the foreign immigrant, and foreign immigration is mainly a movement from the farms of Europe to the cities of America. ”

“ Once again, the question is not, shall immigration be a natural and uncontrolled movement or not, but shall it be controlled by greedy, selfish, and unscrupulous individuals, or by a well-intentioned government? For the rest of this book we shall take the position that the immigration problem is one of applied sociology, and that immigration is a proper subject for government control, by such means and to such an extent as the most careful and scientific study shall warrant. ”

“ Secondly, as has been pointed out, immigration is distinctly a modern movement, and history furnishes no parallels, but only more or less remote analogies.
The opinion of the average American citizen, based perhaps upon prejudice or conviction, rather than reasoning or investigation, is probably that a certain degree of assimilation is essential to the welfare of the American nation, and that the nearer the approach to complete assimilation, the better. ”

“ Italians, Slavs, Poles, Magyars, East European Hebrews, Finns, Portuguese, Greeks, Roumanians and representatives of many other small nationalities began to seek fortunes in America. The earlier immigration had been made up largely of those who sought escape from religious or political tyranny and came to settle permanent homes. The newer immigration was made up, on the whole, of those who frankly sought wealth. The difference in the reason for coming could not fail to mean a difference in selection of the immigrants, quite apart from the change in the races. ”

“ Immigration is an emotional issue. And it's sparked passionate debate. When we discuss immigration, we're talking about the integrity of our borders, the enforcement of our laws, and the character of our Nation. ”

“ In view of this imposing weight of authoritative opinion, it is perhaps surprising that the popular mind still holds so tenaciously and universally to the belief that immigration directly increases population. ”

“ Thus we find that, in this respect also, moral as well as physical causes control emigration. The first are as powerful, if not more powerful than the latter. In the United States, both are at work in attracting emigrants, and hence why there is a larger European immigration to this country than to any other on the face of the globe. ”

“ The fundamental matters are the laws or principles which underlie the great type of population movement which we call immigration, and these are relatively constant and unchanging. It is a knowledge of these principles which fits one to understand the movement in its ever changing aspects, and to grapple with it as a problem of practical politics or sociology. ”

“ The question of the effects of immigration upon the immigrants is perhaps the most difficult of all to determine. It is manifest that it must affect all of their life interests, in their own generation and for many generations to come. ”

“ Do not take immigration at its worst, but rather at its best, or at least above the average conditions. Assume that you belong to the more intelligent and desirable class, finding a legitimate reason for leaving your home in Europe, because of hard conditions and poor outlook there and bright visions of fortune in the land of liberty, whither relatives have preceded you. Your steamship ticket is bought in your native town, and you have no care concerning fare or baggage. A number of people of your race and neighborhood are on the way, so that you are not alone. ”

“ THE EXPLOITATION OF IMMIGRANTS. RELIGION. BIRTHS, MARRIAGES, AND DEATHS. RECREATION There is a group of peculiar economic institutions which have been developed by the immigrants in this country, and which are especially characteristic of the new immigration. This group includes the padrone system, the contract labor system, the immigrant bank, and two or three similar institutions, particularly the sweating system, which is now practically dependent on immigrants.
The word “padrone” is adopted from the Italian, and signifies master or “boss.” ”

“ Foreign immigration, which in the past has added so much to the wealth, development, and resources, and increase of power to this Republic, the asylum of the oppressed of all nations, should be fostered and encouraged by a liberal and just policy. ”

“ The immigration problem, which I have been discussing in previous numbers of The Arena, cannot be unravelled without considering one important thread which adds to the entanglement. I shall apply to it the term "Inter-migration," a word not found in the dictionary, because it is freshly coined for the purpose. Let me try to define its meaning.
A person is said to migrate when he leaves his native land, seeking a new home in some other country. Around the word emigrant or immigrant hovers always the idea of an exchange of habits, customs, and language of one country with those of another. ”

“ In the case of the old immigration there are, to be sure, certain immediate and superficial effects which may be postulated with a fair degree of certainty. As an example, we may be reasonably sure that the old immigration has increased the proportion of Irish, German, and Scandinavian blood in the composite American people. But as to the ultimate effects of this movement upon the social, religious, moral, and economic aspects of our national life, we can, at best, hazard only a forecast. ”

“ The classes in which we are particularly interested are naturally the immigrant and emigrant aliens, for they are the only participants in true immigration movements, according to our definition. The others are merely travelers. Yet they are important and interesting travelers, and the modern problems of immigration cannot be thoroughly understood without taking some consideration of them. As for the aliens in transit, they can be quickly disposed of. ”

“ Immigration is now, and for a year or two past has been, largely in excess of this figure, but probably not for the past decade; and the resultant is a gain of twenty per cent for the entire native white population. ”

“ Doubtless immigration in the last fifty years of the 19th century had a modifying effect on American life; but on the whole the power of a modern civilized community working through individual freedom to assimilate elements not differing from it too radically has been displayed to a remarkable degree. ”

“ There was, moreover, a great amount of truth in this view during earlier periods of immigration. Many of the migrations of two or three centuries ago were inspired by religious or political motives, or very often by a combination of the two. Such was the exodus of the Huguenots from France, of the Palatines from 378Germany, the Puritans from England, the Scotch-Irish from Ireland. In such cases as these, emigration implies strength of character, independence, firmness of conviction, moral courage, bravery, hatred of oppression, etc. ”

“ This is, that these foreign-born residents of the country, amounting to one seventh of the total, constitute a net addition to the population; in other words, that immigration has increased the total population of the country by an amount approximately equal to the number of immigrants, allowing, of course, for removals and deaths. ”

“ In considering the specific causes of the rise of the new immigration we will confine our attention primarily to the countries of Austria-Hungary, Italy, and Russia, which send us the great bulk of the immigrants, and in which conditions are sufficiently representative to give a satisfactory idea of the nature of the new movement in general. ”

“ Most problems in applied sociology have to do with interests; certainly the problem of immigration does. Having answered the first part of our query in the affirmative, the problem now expresses itself thus: how shall the movement of aliens from foreign countries to the United States be so controlled as to further the best interests of somebody? ”

“ Not only have the religious and political motives almost wholly disappeared in favor of the economic in modern immigration, but the European immigrant of to-day is in no sense going to a new or unknown land, when he embarks for the United States. American life and conditions, particularly economic conditions, are well known in those sections of Europe which furnish our large contingents of immigration. ”

“ The positive arguments for, and the negative arguments against, immigration center around the question whether the United States needs the immigrants. The positive arguments against, and the negative arguments for, immigration have to do with the claim that immigration injures the United States. ”

“ The Restriction of Immigration.—Measures for straining out the unfit will not be neglected by our government in the future. Americans are changing their minds about further admission of foreigners fit for citizenship. It may be that the past view and the present view are equally right in their relations. Certain ideas about the effect of immigration are untenable: (a) That immigration constitutes a net reinforcement of the population of the country. ”

“ The fact that this dense population cannot make a living under the present and backward conditions on the island, and that it is continually exercising its right of entry to the United States, is one of the most serious features of the present immigration policy. ”

“ NEWSHOLME, Vital Statistics.
CHAPTER IX THE IMMIGRATION PROBLEM In new countries population may increase by immigration as well as by the surplus of births over deaths. Immigration is, therefore, a secondary means of increasing the population of a country, and in new countries is often of great importance.
Immigration, or the migration of a people into a country, along with its correlative emigration, or the migration of a people out of a country, constitutes a most important social phenomenon. All peoples seem more or less migratory in their habits. ”

“ If the foregoing views are true, or contain any considerable degree of truth, foreign immigration into this country has, from the time it first assumed large proportions, amounted, not to a reinforcement of our population, but to a replacement of native by foreign stock. ”

“ It is manifest that the United States, the countries of source, the immigrants, and humanity in general all have interests which may be 388affected by immigration, that these interests are not always harmonious or correlative, but that they may be, and in some cases must be, in direct opposition to each other. ”

“ What counts here, of course, is not the value the immigrants may have acquired by education or experience, but that fundamental worth which does not depend on opportunity, and which may be transmitted to one's descendants. Now, in the present state of our knowledge, it is perhaps risky to make a comparison in ability between the races which contributed the old immigration and those which [297] are supplying the new immigration. ”

“ Immigration occurs to this country under two conditions: 1. The emigrant is driven from home by famine, in which case the poorer class emigrate, or, 2, he is allured by advantages for labor or business, when the middle classes principally emigrate. ”