Repatriation

“ The immediate repatriation without reciprocity of all Allied prisoners of war and interned subjects, and of civil populations evacuated from their homes, on conditions to be laid down by the Commanders-in-Chief of the forces of the Associated Powers on the various fronts.
8. Sick and wounded who cannot be removed from evacuated territory will be cared for by Austro-Hungarian personnel who will be left on the spot with the medical material required. ”

“ The whole cost of repatriation from the moment of starting shall be borne by the German Government who shall also provide the land and sea transport and staff considered necessary by the Commission referred to in Article 215. ”

“ Noting with appreciation the efforts undertaken to date by the Secretary-General in support of the Central American peace process, including his continuing efforts to promote voluntary demobilization, resettlement and repatriation, as reflected in his report of 15 March 1990, ( [1] )
1. ”

“ We must also bear in mind that all of these millions who came to America do not remain with us. There is a constant emigration going on, a departure of aliens back to their native land either for a time, or for all time. Up to 1908, the Bureau of Immigration kept no record of the “ebb of the tide” but since that time vessels taking aliens out of the United States, are obliged by law to make a list containing name, age, sex, nationality, residence in the United States, occupation, and time of last arrival of each alien passenger, which must be filed with the Federal Collector of Customs. ”

“ Nothing now remained for me but to return to my country. In crossing the frontier, at the end of the second emigration, I could not avoid thinking of the circumstances of my return after the first, and what a difference of sentiment distinguished them! ”

“ SECTION 2.—UNIVERSAL EMIGRATION. We have in our remarks on the Over-Sea Colony referred to the general concensus of opinion on the part of those who have studied the Social Question as to Emigration being the only remedy for the overcrowded population of this country, at the same time showing some of the difficulties which lie in the way of the adoption of the remedy; the dislike of the people to so great a change as is involved in going from one country to another ”

“ Peaceful emigration to and from that portion of the country is one of the best means that can be thought of for the restoration of harmony, and that emigration would have been prevented; for what emigrant from abroad, what industrious citizen at home, would place himself willingly under military rule? The chief persons who would have followed in the train of the Army would have been dependents on the General Government or men who expected profit from the miseries of their erring fellow-citizens. ”

“ 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. ”

“ 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. ”

“ The emigrant breaks with his past, closes the volume of his British birth, with all of pride, honour, and love that it includes, and puts it from him altogether, or retains it only as the goal which he may hope to attain again for the comfort of his declining years. The emigrant, in a word, if he be a man of ordinary patriotism and good feeling, is to be pitied. ”

“ But without official advice and help emigration is difficult. Parents do not know where to send their sons, nor what training to give them. Mistakes are made, money is wasted, and bitter disappointment caused. All this may be obviated if the Government will take the matter up seriously. The real issue of this war is whether our great colonies are to continue British; and the question will be decided not only on the field of battle, but by the action of our Government and people after peace is declared. ”

“ We have also obtained [Pg 451] from the government of this kingdom, a passport for a vessel to come from England to Nantes, or L'Orient, with American prisoners, there to take in British prisoners in exchange. We now sincerely hope that you will obtain your liberty. We cannot certainly say, however, that all will be immediately exchanged, because we fear we have not an equal number to be sent to England. Those that remain, if any, will be those who have been the latest in captivity, and consequently have suffered the least. ”

“ All that the association desires is that the British government shall, in conjunction with the colonial authorities, draw up a well-considered scheme of emigration and colonisation, by means of which able-bodied and industrious men, who may not be possessed of the means necessary to enable them to emigrate, shall be provided with the means of colonising, or of emigrating with their families under the strictest possible guarantee that the money shall be repaid with easy interest within a certain number of years. ”

“ A Contracting State shall, in conformity with its laws and regulations, permit refugees to transfer assets which they have brought into its territory, to another country where they have been admitted for the purposes of resettlement. ”

“ And, as time rolled on, and wave after wave of immigration brought with it more and more of the precious life- blood of Europe, from no country was there a richer contribution of piety and zeal, of devotion and self-sacrifice, than from that advanced outpost of the Old World, whose western shores first break the fury of the Atlantic; to whose people Providence appears to have assigned a destiny grand and heroic—of carrying the civilization of the Cross to remote lands and distant nations. ”

“ Emigrants, being for the most part drawn from among dry-land-living populations, are apt to be daunted by the idea of a long voyage. People would be more ready, perhaps, to contemplate becoming colonists, were it not for that dreaded crossing of the sea which must necessarily be their first step. Their terrors may be natural enough, but they are more fanciful than real; and once overcome, the emigrant smiles at his former self. ”

“ As emigration comprises the voluntary removal of an individual from his home State with the intention of residing abroad, but not necessarily with the intention of renouncing his nationality, it is obvious that emigrants may well retain their nationality. Emigration is in fact entirely a matter of internal legislation of the different States. ”

“ Valuable emigration field in these colonies.It is far from my purpose, in laying these facts before Your Majesty, to discourage emigration to Your North American colonies. On the contrary, I am satisfied that the chief value of those colonies to the mother country consists in their presenting a field where millions even, of those who are distressed at home, might be established in plenty and happiness. All the gentlemen whose evidence I have last quoted, are warm advocates of systematic emigration. ”

“ That all those who may be disposed to emigrate from the United States will with their families be received on board his Majesty's ships or vessels of war or at the military ports that may be established upon or near the coast of the U.S. where they will have their choice of either entering his Majesty's sea or land forces, or of being sent as Free Settlers to the British possessions in North America or the West Indies where they will meet all due encouragement. ”

“ England, therefore, encourages emigration; means are notoriously supplied to emigrants, to assist their conveyance, from public funds; and the New World, and most especially these United States, receive the many thousands of her subjects thus ejected from the bosom of their native land by the necessities of their condition. ”

“ In early days our increase used to be made up, in a great measure, by emigrants from foreign nations. The past few years our emigration has attained to some three or four thousand, annually, from the various countries in which missions are established, while it has increased many times that number from the great and glorious presence of God our Father, who sends the spirits to this world to dwell. ”

“ Foreign immigration was measurably stopped, because men fly from convulsions, not to countries where they are to be encountered. When war desolates the nations of Europe, the people migrate hither to avoid its horrors; when it desolates ours, they remain at home. ”

“ One of the dangers that threaten this glorious Republic is the foreign emigration. Attracted by her rich resources and the marvellous stories of her wealth, the people of other nations are coming to share our blessings. ”

“ Emigration.—The movement of emigration may be divided into two currents, temporary and permanent—the former going chiefly towards neighbouring European countries and to North Africa, and consisting of manual labourers, the latter towards trans-oceanic countries, principally Brazil, Argentina and the United States. These emigrants remain abroad for several years, even when they do not definitively establish themselves there. ”

“ They brush against you as though you were a camel or a horse, and had four legs on which to stand instead of two. Sometimes a foreigner forgets that these men from the desert, where the foreign element has not come, are following out the religious training of a lifetime, and strikes at one of them with his riding-whip, and then takes refuge in a consulate and leaves on the next boat. ”

“ The residence or continuance of one nation in one place is not of the law of nature, which (being in itself immutable) would admit no transmigration of people or transplantations of nations. But I will propound unto you two grounds of nature, as more proper to this purpose. ”

“ The genesis of a new and potent nationality may be said to have been involved in the acceptance, by the colonists, of these conditions, as inducements to emigration, with all else dependent on their own manly courage. ”

“ While the principle of expatriation is still adhered to and insisted upon by the government of the United States, it holds that citizenship is a privilege to be conferred and not a right which can be claimed by every foreigner who enters the country. ”

“ Resolved, That in thus expressing our opinions, it is not our purpose to counsel emigration as either necessary or proper in every case. The transfer of an entire people from one country to another, must necessarily be the work of generations. ”

“ Now, if Englishmen expect to do as much in the emigration line as Irishmen, they must take a leaf out of Pat's book. There is nothing better than light weights for a long run: the baggage of the Roman soldier was called impedementa, from which we have our word "impediment." Take all the money you can get, and no luggage that you can possibly do without. ”

“ The true test of fitness in this case is the possession, on the part of each individual133 concerned, of the will and ability to emigrate; and the probability of helpless multitudes being sent forth, who, both for their own sakes and for that of the colony, ought to have remained at home, is increased in proportion as other motives and other interests besides those of the emigrant himself influence his act of expatriation. ”

“ To transplant the civilization of one distant country to another, requires either the simultaneous migration of a large body of the people, or a long and regular intercourse, a constant immigration from the parent race. ”

“ The majority of the aliens in the selective service did so choose and the great bulk of the foreign-born part of the huge army that was ferried across the Atlantic had acquired American citizenship. Aliens who did not wish to serve could, and some thousands did, claim, and were granted, exemption on that ground. ”

“ Some countries, as France and England, disclaim their subjects if they become naturalized in another country, others, again, passively permit expatriation whether a new nationality has been acquired or not ”

“ The number of emigrants from fashion or caprice is probably not great; and whom shall we now dare to include under this description, when the humble artizan, the laborious peasant, and the village priest, have ensanguined the scaffold destined for the prince or the prelate?—But if the emigrants be justifiable, the refugees are yet more so. ”

“ I approach any allusion to the causes which led to the practical expatriation of five people—in the prime of youth, it is true, but inexperienced—and their subjection to a manner of existence such as they had never imagined could be real. ”

“ Congress has provided that 'any alien who, at any time after entering the United States, is found to have been at the time of entry, or to have become thereafter, a member of any one of the classes of aliens enumerated in this section' shall be deported. ”

“ The emigrants that new countries will care to get are not those that we want to leave us, while those we can best spare are not likely to be willingly received. Under such circumstances, the plans of state-aided emigration, put forward with too much persistency, seems to me to be sadly mistaken. ”

“ The retreat, which almost resembled a rout, had undeceived even the most confident of us. In France, all emigres were proscribed under pain of death, so everyone who had a family to protect or support sought for a haven of safety and rest. ”