Aliens or Americans? Part 9

"Accordingly, in its work the Society employs agents to look after the needs of the immigrants at Ellis Island; it runs an escort service, by which competent persons are furnished, at nominal cost, to take immigrants to their destination; it conducts an employment agency; it maintains an information bureau; it cooperates with the United States authorities to enforce the Immigration Laws; it manages labor camps for contractors; it wages war on all persons engaged in swindling immigrants; it is engaged in breaking up the padrone system in all its forms; and lastly and generally, it does all it can to help immigrants, so that as soon as possible they may become self-supporting and self-respecting citizens, a benefit and not a detriment to this country."

[Sidenote: Grants from Italian Government]

The Society is supported by voluntary contributions, and by grants to the amount of about $7,000 a year from the Italian government. The Society has met with the approval of the police department of the city, the United States authorities at Ellis Island, and the Italian Royal Department of Emigration, and of all individuals who have made themselves familiar with what it is doing. There is also a Boston Italian Society, organized in 1902, to protect newcomers from sharpers, thieves, and fraudulent persons; also from the frauds of bankers and padrones. The Italian government has given $1,000 a year to this Society.

[Sidenote: Hebrew and Other Societies]

A similar work is done by the United Hebrew Charities, and the Removal Bureau established by the Jews in New York in 1901. Through this agency in the past three years over 10,000 of the Russian or Roumanian Jews have been kept from increasing the overcrowded population of the ghetto and swelling the sum of sweat-shop misery. While the number distributed is small compared with the steady inflow (5,525 sent out in 1903, while 43,000 settled in New York), the work bids fair to make itself felt, and shows an appreciation by the Jews already here of the situation and the necessity of changing it, for the sake both of the immigrants and the country. Industrial removal is now known wherever Jews are found, and all that is possible is being done to stimulate artificial distribution as the remedy for the worst evils of una.s.similated and congested immigration.[45] There are also German, Scandinavian and other societies, benevolent and protective, which aid in distribution.

[Sidenote: A Chief Obstacle]

The princ.i.p.al difficulty with the distribution scheme, so far as most of the present-day immigrants are concerned, is that with the exception of the Italians they are not fitted for agriculture, while it is the farms that most need workers. Another difficulty[46] is that the authorities of the various states object to receiving shipments of immigrants from the city tenement districts, regarding them as decidedly undesirable additions to the population. The United States Immigration Investigating Commission asked the governors of the different states what nationalities of immigrants they desired, and in only two cases was any desire expressed for Slavs, Latins, Jews, or Asiatics, and these two related to Italian farmers with money, intending to become permanent settlers. The officials protest against the shipment of southern and eastern Europeans from the city slums into the states. Care must be taken, too, that the immigrants do not settle in country colonies, which would render them almost as difficult of Americanization as though they were colonized in the city.

[Sidenote: What the South is Doing]

The New South is already giving object lessons to the country at large in the successful attraction and utilization of the alien influx. The Four States Immigration League, composed of representatives of business organizations in Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas, was organized in 1903 to secure desirable immigrants for those states. "It was keenly realized," observed the Chattanooga Times, "that of the enormous inflow from the old country, the number seeking homes in the South was ridiculously small and out of all proportion to the importance of the country and the inducements our productive fields hold out to home seekers." An Immigration Bureau has been established in Chattanooga, and South Carolina and other states have organized active departments of agriculture and immigration.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Born in Ireland--Resident in the United States 1900

The small dots grouped about N.Y. City, include, also, the totals of Conn. and N.J.--Chart Boston: of Ma.s.s. and R.I.

Reproduced by special permission of "The World's Work." Copyright 1909.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Born in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Belgium, Luxembourg. Resident in the U.S. 1900

Reproduced by special permission from "The World's Work." Copyright 1903.]

The leading railway lines promise active cooperation, as their interests lie positively in this direction. Some, indeed, have actively engaged in the work of securing distribution.

[Sidenote: New Zealand Plan]

The suggestion is a good one that we might study with profit, in this connection, the methods of New Zealand.[47] There the established Department of Labor has regarded as "its vital duty the practical task of finding where labor was wanted and depositing there the labor running elsewhere to waste." To this end a widely extended system of agencies is maintained for bringing workers and work together, the unemployed are scattered through the colony, and charity is refused. The experience there shows that city people and men of trades have been successful as farmers and farm workers. Mr. Lord says: "It may be a novel function of government to undertake the distributing of labor, but it is none the less more rational than an edict of exclusion would be, or the tolerance of congestion and slums now is."

[Sidenote: Information Before Embarking]

One thing that government can do is to make sure that intending immigrants are fully informed, in their own countries, before they start, concerning the laws of the United States, the conditions of the various sections, the advantages and drawbacks, the demand for labor and of what kind. An official bureau of correspondence and information would help check undesirable immigrants from coming, and distribute desirable ones when they do come.

[Sidenote: Looking on the Bright Side]

While the question of distribution has only recently been taken up in earnest, its importance is now realized, and there is every reason to believe that it will receive henceforth large attention, and that wise measures will be vigorously pushed. Remedied congestion will mean increased a.s.similation and decreased danger. As we review the situation, while there is much in it that requires serious consideration and wise action, we agree heartily with these words of Dr. Charles L. Thompson:

[Sidenote: Not Bars but Guides]

"There is no need of becoming pessimistic. Above all we should not go back on the history of our Country. We have grown great by a.s.similation.

Let us have a dignified confidence in the power of our inst.i.tutions and of our Christianity to continue the process which has developed the strength of the Republic. If we are true to our principles we will be equal to any strain that may be put upon them. Only let us see to it that our principles--both civic and religious--are at work in full vigor on the questions which the floodtide of immigration raises. What we need is not more bars to keep foreigners out but more laborers to work with them and teach them how to gather the harvest of American and Christian liberty."[48]

QUESTIONS FOR CHAPTER III

AIM: TO STUDY THE PROBLEMS OF LEGISLATION AND DISTRIBUTION REGARDING ALIENS

I. _The Opinions of Capable Observers Regarding Legislation_.

1. Give the names and opinions of some who favor restriction of immigration. Of some who are opposed. With which do you agree?

2. The Immigration Conference of 1905: What was it? What did it recommend?

3. As to free admission: What are the rights of the government? Of the individual?

4. What does President Roosevelt recommend?

II. _Proposed Legislation_.

5. What abuses specially need to be corrected?

6. Name the chief provisions of the "Gardner Bill," before Congress in 1906.

7. * Give reasons for and against a reading test. Would you have voted for it or against?

8. Describe and give your opinion of other proposed methods of restricting immigration.

9. Would it be possible to sift immigrants before they leave Europe?

III. _Distribution._

10. How much can be done toward a wider distribution of the stream of immigrants?

11. Where do the larger numbers now settle? In what cities? What states?

12. What Societies are helping them to find better locations?

13. What special efforts are being made by some Southern states?

14. How does New Zealand deal with this question? Can we copy that plan?

15. * What spirit is needed in dealing with the whole problem?

16. Can you tell of any special endeavors to bring about better control or direction of immigration?

REFERENCES FOR ADVANCED STUDY.--CHAPTER III

I. _Further Study of Opinions of United States Immigration Officials._

See Commissioner-General's Annual Report, furnished free from Washington upon application to the "Commissioner of Immigration."