CHAPTER VThe Popular Vote
We are facing a national election in which the “vote of the people” will decide the future of America more certainly than at any election since the Civil War. One of the most vital questions before us this year is: Will the foreign-born vote tend to solidarity and be cast in racial interests, or will it be cast for America along broad lines of national policy? Will the 1500 foreign-language newspapers influence the foreign-born vote in favor of a national policy or will it attempt to influence it along racial lines?
The returns of the next national election should have an important bearing upon our future immigration policy of admission. Should we find the vote tending to solidify along racial lines then we have an additional reason for insisting upon the development of an assimilationpolicy if we are to continue to admit aliens. The racial vote may prove to be a far more anti-American influence than the foreign colony. America cannot afford to have an Irish vote, a German-American vote, a Jewish vote, casten blocfor any measures or man, if Americanism as defined in the Declaration of Independence and Federal Constitution is to prevail.
The issues promise to center more about candidates than platforms. Parties will impress us more as election machinery than as vehicles of any really fundamental ideals and program. We shall probably have three measures of preparedness from which to choose. There will be a sincere, genuine program of preparedness, including international duty, Americanism, and preparation at home carried by the Republicans, to fit its candidate, and probably indorsed by the Progressives. There will be a milder course, a kind of middle-of-the-road preparedness carried by the Democrats, in the hope of holding their own. The indications are now that there will be a third party of pacifists, anti-preparedness at most points, whichwill include the ultra-contented, the discontented, and a considerable socialist and labor following. Each platform will doubtless carry some planks dealing with “pressing national questions” as ballast, but few voters will consider them seriously. The main issue of preparedness will determine the lines of the vote, because America now knows that all of its internal progress and “reform” depend upon an America that can defend itself. Belgium drove that lesson home. Through the intricate paths of American honor, international duty, adequate preparedness, national service, universal training, Mexican strategy, the American voter must wend his way. He will be beset at every turn by the “record of the administration and of Congress,” interpreted first one way and then another by the propaganda of defense organizations and of their opponents. He will be deluged with accurate and inaccurate information, from which he will find it difficult to select the best. He will be bombarded with literature, and enticed to meetings and will be given promises hard to keep in 1917. Within the next fewmonths he will receive more gratuitous condensed education on all these questions than during the entire time since 1912.
In addition to all this confusion of mind and competitive struggle, prevailing about the native-born voter, the foreign-born voter will be torn by loyalties and sympathies which go back many generations to the fatherland. Most of them have some one dear to them at the front or lying dead on some battle field. Their mail is censored and they often do not know who is dead and who is living or what has happened to their little homestead in the old country. They see ammunition going out of America, not to fight their battles, but to kill some of their countrymen. They see America growing rich from this manufacture. They are only waiting the first assurance of peace to go back and see what has happened or to help their home country.
It is inevitable that some expression of this should find voice at the polls, and the question is how to make the American issues so fine and big and strong and world compelling that they will engulf this greathuman sorrow and devotion and make it of service to America. How can we in this next election make every voter feel that America is for him—to serve, to guard, to use, so we may stem the great tide of discontent, aversion, and desertion which has set in among our foreign-born voters? How can we in this coming election remove the indifference, irresponsibility, and profit seeking which characterizes our native-born voter?
Now that we face the crisis and know the necessity, we look with amazement and alarm at what our preparation has been. We turn to our schools and ask them what they have been doing in the way of preparing the voter—what has he been taught about America and its government, institutions, and opportunities? How have these been related to his own local civic life? What sense of national service has he acquired in his town school? Alas—we find there is nothing held so cheap as the American vote, and the last form of preparedness is that for voting. Of the American boy we require that he shall be born here, and shall be 21 years of age. We assumethat somehow the public school, which he is required to attend in some states only, will teach him the value of the vote and how to use it, and something of his duties and obligations to his country. We also assume that the boy’s parents will educate him along these lines. To the girl in most states we deny the vote for apparently no reasons other than precedent, prejudice, conjecture, or apprehension.
There is no ceremony, no pledge of allegiance, no occasion made patriotically memorable in the mind of the boy when he casts his first vote. No one makes him welcome as a citizen of the country. He registers in his home town in an automatic way, and if he thinks of voting in the future as an obnoxious duty that interferes with his business or week ends, it is surely not entirely his own fault.
In some schools there is an increasing attempt to bring his rather localized experience into relation to the broader questions of the day, and into the national political life, but the mass of boys depend upon the newspapers and such discussion as they stimulate or hear among their fellows. This is good so far as it goes,but it is too critical, too superficial, too opinionated, too provincial to serve the great national need of America in the crucial test of elections. Despite our many thousands of educational organizations it is very difficult to obtain an impartial and scientific statement on any political controversy. There are many briefs for one side or the other, but few impartial statements that are not special pleading.
The indifference and ignorance of the native-born voter are real impediments to Americanism. A vote is a practical thing requiring as much knowledge and experience in its use as any other responsible act of life. You cannot teach a man to handle a gun by a series of lectures on the ethics of warfare. Neither can you teach a man to handle a vote by the average treatise on civil government.
In our failure to find this training in the public school, we turn next to the political school, the club, the district organization. Here we find every mechanism possible for getting the vote and holding it, but practically none for training or instructing that vote. It is easy to finda dozen men to help a prospective voter to obtain his citizenship papers, but very difficult to find one man or an institution to educate him in Americanism and English, enabling him to qualify. It is easy to find men who condemn the sinking of theLusitaniaand watchful waiting in Mexico, but hard to find a man who has a clear, practical idea of how he will register that protest in November. Thousands will vote forMr.Roosevelt as their protest in case he is nominated. But supposeMr.Roosevelt is not nominated. Have they thought of their next effective protest at the polls? Justice Hughes perhaps. But who knows where he stands on these questions? Those of us who have worked with him as governor of New York, and knew him, take no risks, but how about the average voter who has no such knowledge and must make up his own mind?
As shown in the preceding chapter the acquiring of citizenship by aliens does not have for its main object the vote. To him, it is connected more closely with a job, with getting on in America, with freedom from the tyranny of his owncountry and from military service, and with gain. The power of the vote is, generally speaking, an unknown quantity to him, until he has been here some time—often it represents something which he can sell, or which he has to have to keep his job—ideals set before him by some native American. It is a rather curious thing that the padrone system had its real origin in our political rather than in our industrial system. The padrone is a labor boss who furnishes men to industrial organizations, and in return for keeping up the supply of men, has the privilege of housing and feeding them—making his profit from the employment fees, housing, and supplies. The padrone, however, is usually a political leader, not in the camp or quarry or mine where the industry is located, but in the city, which is the source of the supply of men. It was generally understood that the padrone, in return for the contract to furnish men, would deliver the foreign-born vote in his district in favor of the candidate acceptable to the company with whom he had contracted. He saw to it that his countrymen were naturalized and howthey voted. In this way the position of the padrone became impregnable.
If a community as a whole fails to use the immigrant as a political and citizenship asset, some other force in the community is fairly sure to awaken to his political usefulness. The only way in which a community can “control” its alien vote is by controlling preparation for citizenship. Most communities, far from controlling it, have not yet developed interest in it. The American community, without night schools, without interest, without responsibility for the Americanism of one third or one half of its residents, is the real parent of this “alien” vote.
The ignorance of the newly naturalized voter is different from that of the American. But like the indifference and ignorance of the American voter, the ignorance of the foreign voter is largely a social matter, and is subject to the same remedies. In other words, it is notmerelyinstruction in English and Civics, the usual preparation for citizenship, that makes an immigrant a good voter or a bad one. A verygreat deal depends uponhis social background, upon the understanding and point of view he has been able to develop as a result of his contacts with American institutions and American community life. To develop a social understanding large enough and deep enough to make a man grasp readily a national political issue in all its importance, and the subtler aspects of community issues and legislation, when they come up to the vote, is a tremendous task—not a task that even a very intelligent and educated immigrant can compass for himself. This, in a political sense, is the heart of our present difficulty with the naturalized voter. His social assimilation has not been sufficiently thorough to give him the background he needs at the polls or to enable him to find himself among the various political parties and sub-parties.
Now, the average voter is too thoroughly localized. In other words, his political status in America is very much like his social status. He becomes fixed in a neighborhood, a colony, a ward, and he never learns to think of himselfnationally. Politically, the issues arepresented to him in the impersonation of local figures and interests—Max Schroeder at the corner saloon, or Tim Connolly of the Labor Council. National issues are invariably translated in ward terms and the immigrant accepts them at this valuation. After this kind of political tradition has persisted for a few generations the result is a community or colony of hopelessly provincial voters, keenly alive to the immediate practical profit or loss involved in any political issue, almost oblivious of the fact that the greatest good to the greatest number is the thing for which the citizen of a Republic is to vote if he is to fulfill his republicanism.
The social education of Americans is difficult enough. We need to Americanize the American voter quite as much as the foreign. But with the immigrant the problem of social education as a prerequisite to political freedom and competence is a far more difficult thing. The truth is that nobody can coach him in American life. He needs to live it and must be allowed to do so, if we are to have competent voters. In proportion to thebreadth of his human contacts, and to the number and variety of American institutions which he touches he will be informed upon those subjects and points of view that fit him for the actual exercise of the vote.
This is a social responsibility on the part of America toward its foreign-born citizens. It does not belong to the courts, or, to any great degree, to the schools. These two agencies are to see to it that the candidate for naturalization knows and can use the English language, is of good moral character, and is “attached to the principles of the Constitution.” But at the best, the preparation for and the process of naturalization alone does not Americanize, does not qualify a man for the Americanvotein nation, state, or city.
With some sense of this, the schools that prepare for citizenship have within the last year been revising their courses in “civics” for aliens. They have put aside the paraphrases of the Constitution which have been the traditional textbooks for these classes and they have evolved a system of “community civics”designed to teach the alien his privileges and responsibilities in their simplest form, with direct reference to his everyday life and his own immediate points of contact with the laws of public health, of property, of parents’ obligations, etc.
This is a much-needed movement. But it should be accompanied by some organized effort to make the immigrant voters of this country an entirely intelligent political force. I am referring of course to the great body of adult immigrantswho have attained most of their education in this country, outside of work hours. It would be invidious to suggest that certain of our immigrant voters need any assistance whatever for intelligent voting.
How can we best put the newly naturalized immigrant, alert, well-intentioned, but usually socially and politically unassimilated, in touch with the political issues of the day in their large national bearings, and in their practical expression.
I should like to see the political forum, in its best form, become a recognized part of American life.It is needed for the native born. It is practically indispensable forthe foreign born. It would not be non-partisan, nor attempt to be. The forums would be conducted by the parties separately, but always openly, regularly, as a routine of community series of meetings for discussion and information. And the party that did its educational work best, and placed its ideas and objects most frankly in the light, would in the long run get the votes. But it would have to be a sustained piece of work, carried on from year to year, with quite as much zeal and quite as muchsustained party supportafter elections as before. The most significant effort made in this direction was tried by the Progressive Party through its Progressive Service.[1]This educational division carried on political educational work throughout the country and drafted legislation, though it was not in office nor directly responsible to the people for its enactment. It failed temporarily because the average voter does not yet respond to national issues in the absence of danger and conflict; of controversy and emergency. He hasbeen too long taught that he can learn all he needs to know at election time. This attempt to realize an ideal ahead of its time has suffered defeat but temporarily. So long as the party system prevails there will exist a need for political education by parties. How long it will be before leaders are freed from the spoils system and recognize this obligation cannot be foretold.
[1]“A New Spirit in Party Organization.”The North American Review, June, 1914.
[1]“A New Spirit in Party Organization.”The North American Review, June, 1914.
Athens feared that if the town hall grew too small to hold a convocation of the people, Hellenic democracy would perish from the earth. Here in America we cannot revert to the town meeting. But in the interests of Americanism, I believe the political parties of this country will be forced, by the developing intelligence of public sentiment, to create systems of party education which will have to bear the light of day—and the challenge of severe competition. Party education now means campaign literature, speeches only by candidates or for them, a virulent emotionalism which even the unsophisticated voter no longer takes seriously. A party “stands firm” for “social and industrial justice” for allmen and women alike. But these same men and women, who donotattend conventions, who are sorely in need of social and industrial justice or who would like to help in securing it for others, never learn what its concrete definition is, or how to secure it through the vote. Our political parties need, first of all,great leaders. And after the great leaders we need an informed and alert and sensitive citizen body, insistent for information, undismayed by long ballot sheets, at home among political ideas. We need party laboratories, publicists not advertisers, a thoroughgoing machinery for getting studies and facts and opinions to people in a form in which they can weigh and use them.
The very introduction of the word “political” revives the conventional fear that the immigrant will be “used” in dark and dangerous ways. It is certainly true that he has been. But what America really needs to face with greater apprehension is the immigrant that isnot used. The time has passed for a negative position. How is the political force of the foreign-born residents and citizens to beintelligently and practically connected with the body politic? It is folly to let our fear of the word “political” justify our gross neglect of the political intelligence and potential power of from one third to one half the population of many of our important cities and towns. Theuseof the immigrant politically is more likely than anything else to put an end to the politicalabuse ofhim.
Many Americans have taken some satisfaction during late years in attributing radical votes and platforms to the foreign born. And yet in the last presidential election Ohio, with a population of about half that of New York, and with a native-born percentage of 87.4 as against New York’s 69.8, cast 27,000 more votes for the Socialist candidate. In that election, New York state, with a foreign-born population of 30 per cent, gave the Socialist candidate a vote amounting to seven tenths of one per cent of its total population. In the same year Kansas, with a foreign-born population of 8 per cent, gave the Socialist candidate a vote amounting to seven tenths of one per cent of its total population, or twice theNew York Socialist vote. Oklahoma, with a native-born population of 97.6 per cent, cast a Socialist vote amounting to 2¹⁄₂ per cent of its population, or nearly four times the ratio for New York, nearly twice the ratio for Illinois, where the foreign born are one fifth of the population, and two and one half times the ratio for Pennsylvania, where the foreign-born population is almost one fifth of the total.
One of the most dangerous conditions—at least potentially—concerning the alien vote we have deliberately brought upon ourselves. In ten states of the Union we have been for years allowing immigrants to vote upon their first papers. In the last presidential election declarants voted in Alabama, Arkansas, Indiana, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, South Dakota, Texas, Oregon, and Wisconsin. The result has been shameless grafting and fraud. In Nebraska the alien in order to vote need only have been in the state six months, and have made his declaration thirty days before election. In other words, an Italian or Russian or Pole or Armenian or Turk who landed at Ellis Island about six months before thelast presidential election—say in April, 1912—and who went out to Nebraska at once and lived there until fall, making his declaration in October, could have voted at the last presidential election;and this absolutely without reference to whether he knew a word of English, understood a single provision of the Constitution, or knew even the name of the political party with which he was voting.
The one great fact that stands out is this: That the voting quality of a number of our states is not and never has been subject to review, from the point of view ofnationalpolitical ideals, of Americanism. So long as we have citizens of states that vote who are not citizens of the nation, we have a disrupting force in our national political organization. Citizenship in the United States is constitutionally defined in Amendment 14 thus: “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States, and of the states in which they reside.” No other kind of citizenship is provided for in the Constitution. A state may need voters, and undoubtedly manyof the first-paper men, pioneers in our western states, have voted wisely and well, with a grasp of local conditions. But because of the greater variety in our present immigration as compared with that of former years, and because American citizenship, including the power to vote, is a matter for national valuation, a state should no more arrogate unto itself the power to make its own citizens than to coin its own money or set up its own postal system. The time has come for conscious statesmanship, for international purposeful dealing with this fundamental element in our political organization.
A situation quite as much in need of national review concerns the relation of women to citizenship. An immigrant woman, no matter what her educational qualifications or length of residence in this country, becomes a citizen by the act of her husband or father’s naturalization. This means in eleven states of the Union that she can vote at all elections. But immigrant women are very generally years behind the men in Americanization. They lack not only the social assimilation which makes them fit to vote, but eventhe technical requirements for citizenship, which their husbands or fathers have at least mastered. And yet of 3,723,971 possible women voters in the suffrage states, 902,129 are foreign born—one quarter of the whole number. Of late a number of our western suffragist leaders have assured us that the immigrant woman makes a good voter—that she is conscientious about going to the polls, and seems to take a direct and personal interest in registering her opinion on matters that she knows to affect the welfare of her home, her husband, her children. But there are many thousands of immigrant women in this country who have not mastered the English language in even a small degree, who have had no opportunity to learn our civic ideals, whose homes are not American homes. The thing that concerns us is not that this vote of immigrant women will corrupt our political situation. It is rather to lament that so much civic force and interest, of inestimable value in political rating, is lost to the community and to the nation.
We must know and direct the politicalforces, or we shall direct the social and civic forces in vain. “Civic consciousness” is coming to be too diluted a quantity, too general, too philosophic, too “broad” and non-partisan to act promptly or definitely. It stands for too much, directs too little. The civic welfare of towns has become separate from their political welfare. And the real danger of the salutary modern social and civic movements that are spreading through our cities and towns is that it tends to become so. Most American towns, as such, never think of their immigrants, representing one third or one half of the town in numbers, as voters or as potential voters—or make any effort to bring their force into play in any national way, as a part of public sentiment. They are left to the by-ways of politics. And it is small wonder if they learn the habit and tricks of the by-ways.
Hundreds of immigrants in small towns to-day are getting their political education from just two sources: the ward boss, who tells them no more than he thinks they need to know; and the foreign language newspaper, which ispublished inthe big city and circulatedin hundreds of small towns over a wide radius. There are at least 1500 such papers in the country, reaching more than 9,000,000 regular readers daily. Many of them have an acknowledged political interest and trend—witness the vigor of the campaign editorials now beginning to appear with such calculated timeliness. Many of the editors of these papers regard it as their first charge to instruct their fellow countrymen in the political events and tendencies and issues of America. But a very great many of these editors are themselves not initiated in these things. The force that guides the immigrant to the polls must come more directly and warmly from the American center of American affairs.
The American attitude of indifference to the vote, of refusal to consider it a national privilege and a national service, is at bottom responsible for our difficulties with the immigrant vote. When that changes, and the force of the change carries through the political world, the American vote will be regenerated among native and foreign born alike. I shouldmake the occasion of giving an immigrant the vote the occasion for insisting upon the duties that must go with the exercise of it. At present the immigrant is too much in possession of the idea that it is a right and a privilege—partly sold to him, and which it is his privilege—or duty—to sell or contribute to his benefactors or superiors in return.
The problem before the political parties has long been how to extend the social ideal and how to make it count in the body politic. The “politicians” of vigor and imagination cherish a practical hope of organizing the idealism of men, restoring human belief and values to party organization. In the peculiar opportunity now presented to the country to take stock of its citizenship, to reënforce its unity, to justify itself as a democracy, to make the most of its powers, to use the intelligence and the ardor of its citizens of many races, and to bring the newest of these into accord with its ideals and its practices, lies a great opportunity for the political parties of this country. By an organized effort to instruct newly naturalized citizens in the use of theAmerican vote, and to bring them into real accord with the social forces behind the vote, we shall secure Americanism in politics, without which we can have no genuine preparedness.