The great rush into Dakota took place in the decade after 1875. The Red River country was opened up by the Northern Pacific Railway, and the model farms which were established were advertised far and wide, so that the population of 6000 in this district in 1875 increased more than 2000 per cent in the following ten years.
In 1889 the territory of Dakota was divided on the 45° 55´ parallel, and North Dakota was admitted as a State with approximately 170,000 population. Its subsequent growth has kept it fairly homogeneous from a racial point of view, the State being almost wholly Nordic. Apart from the old native Americans the main elements have been British from Canada, Germans, and Scandinavians. The Norwegian immigration which began in the early '90's was particularly noteworthy. Norwegians now form about one-fourth of the total population of the State. An interesting small group is that of the Icelanders, representatives of one of the oldest, most highly cultured, and most stringently selected of all Nordic peoples.
The Russians in the State, approaching a hundred thousand in number, are mostly German-speaking. They are farmers whose ancestors were invited to South Russia several centuries ago, but who retained their speech and culture to a marked degree.
After the discovery of gold in the Black Hills, the country which is now South Dakota had a rush in 1876 and for some years following, much like that of Nevada and Montana during the Civil War and of California in 1849. This frequently does not result in a well-balanced permanent population, and the real settlement of South Dakota dates from the succeeding period when its prairie lands were taken up by wheat growers from the States of the upper Mississippi Valley. The wheat industry in Wisconsin gradually died during the decade of 1870-80, and many who found the ground unprofitable there moved farther west, as did others with similar motives from western New York and the States of the old Northwest Territory.
South Dakota has a slightly higher percentage of old Americans than its sister to the north; otherwise the two differ remarkably little in size, composition, and resources. In 1920, half of the inhabitants of North Dakota claimed South Dakota as a birthplace; while half of the inhabitants of South Dakota claimed North Dakota as theirs. Of all the forty-eight States, these two are unmistakably the Tweedledum and Tweedledee.
Nebraska after the Civil War continued to attract mainly the old American pioneer class, but it also became a haven for several foreign groups. It is said to contain about one-eighth of all the Bohemians in the United States. The serious permanent settlement of the State began in the early '70's. Many discharged soldiers seeking to make a new startwent West with their families. It was only a few years later that the foreign tide began to reach these prairies and thereafter the State attracted large fractions of the Bohemian, Scandinavian, and German immigrations. Like some of the other prairie States it also received many settlers who were listed as Russian because of their nationality, but who, in fact, were Germans whose ancestors had gone to Russia and failed to prosper there. Nebraska, therefore, though less than three-fourths native, is overwhelmingly Nordic.
Kansas is still four-fifths native and nine-tenths Nordic. It has received the same foreign contributions as Nebraska, but in much smaller quantities. At the same time it has continued to receive settlers from the Mississippi Valley, and even from Eastern States, such as New York and Pennsylvania.
On the whole, the prairie States have been notably successful in assimilating their immigrants and maintaining an American tradition. The newcomers were not segregated in slums but scattered on farms. It was almost a necessity for them to learn the speech and adopt the customs of their hosts. While some of the Scandinavians, as in Minnesota, have tried to have their children learn the language and preserve the traditions of the "old country," these have at least been Nordic traditions, and any feeling of aloofness or separateness is rapidly disappearing.
The mountain States date largely from the Civil War, when another of the country's waves of migration and settlement broke loose from its moorings and started westward.
The first great migration of the American stock began immediately after the Revolution, and resulted in the creation of Kentucky and Tennessee by the Southerners, the transformation of western New York by the New Englanders, and a mingling of these two streams as they crossed the Ohio River to open up the Northwest Territory.
The second great migration reached its crest with the panic of 1819. It completed the settlement of the Ohio Valley and of the States along the lower Mississippi and the Gulf.
The third great migration reached its height with the feverish land speculation promoted by Andrew Jackson's experiments in banking and broke with the collapse of the prosperity which Martin Van Buren inherited from his predecessor. It witnessed the settlement of the Mississippi Valley throughout almost its entire length; together with the Nordic absorption of Texas.
The fourth wave, slightly more diffuse, washed over the "great plains" and broke on the crests of the Rocky Mountains during the Civil War, though a heavy splash had meanwhile reached the Pacific Coast. It began with the settlement of Kansas, motivated in part by land hunger, but also by definite political calculations. Meanwhile the conquest of California, the discovery of gold there, the settlement of Oregon, and the Mormon appropriation of Utah, brought into existence an active traffic acrossthe plains, which was the beginning of Nebraska's existence.
The Rocky Mountain States grew up in the first place out of this traffic, then by the mining discoveries within their limits, and the fact that there was a restless population on the Pacific Coast, ready to surge back eastward, together with a footloose population to the East ready to move into any part of the West.
This Eastern contingent received its impetus from the panic of 1857, when many men, bankrupt or dislocated, were prepared to make a new start. The mining activities in the Far West encouraged adventurers to try their hand at the gold pan, and the country was full of prospectors, some of them professional but mostly amateur. Men who had no jobs at home thought they might as well seek a fortune in this way; it would not cost them much to live, and they could at least see the country. A similar renaissance of prospecting and small-scale mining took place all over the mountains of the West when the depression of 1929 was well under way.
To this element was shortly added another composed of people getting away from the Civil War. Some of these were actual deserters from military service; others went West to escape the pressure of public opinion toward enlistment; others in the border States, ruined by the conflict or unwilling to cast their lot with either combatant, simply started in motion as their fathers and grandfathers had done before them.
The population of the mountain States varied remarkably from month to month, as the crowd moved from one reputed bonanza to another. The government at Washington showed itself unusually ready to set up new governments in that region, because it was on the whole of unquestioned Union loyalty and, if the South, at the close of the war, should be brought back into the Union on the old terms, as President Lincoln evidently planned, a dozen new senators from half as many new Western States could easily be secured, leaving the South in the minority and breaking that deadlock of almost half a century which had been the source of so many compromises and the occasion of so many conflicts.
Colorado, at that time a part of Kansas, was an almost unknown "Indian territory" when prospectors struck gold in the neighborhood of Denver in 1858 and 1859. The rush from Kansas and Nebraska, when the legend "Pike's Peak or Bust," lettered on the sides of emigrant wagons, became traditional, disclosed how little was known of the country. Pike's Peak, though not near the gold diggings, was the only place in Colorado of which most Americans had ever heard.
In 1861 there was enough population to justify territorial government. Statehood was not attained until 1876. From then on until the agricultural period, the history of Colorado was the history of its fluctuating mining camps. But by 1930 the State had reached a permanent basis and a population of more than a million, of which two-thirds was nativeand the other third a heterogeneous lot, partly Nordic but containing strong Slav, Italian, and Mexican elements. So far as the native American population was concerned, its geographical origin still represented a fan spreading out from Pike's Peak until it reached the Atlantic Ocean. In large or small proportions, emigrants from most of the older States had converged on the Rockies.
Wyoming, first explored by trappers and fur traders, became important because it was traversed by the Oregon Trail; but it was merely a place to pass through, until the arrival of the Union Pacific Railway and the discovery of gold in the same year (1867) gave it a life of its own. Nearly 6000 persons spent the following winter in Cheyenne—a cosmopolitan crowd of adventurers and speculators. After its organization as a territory in 1859, agriculture had begun, stock raising became important, there were local gold rushes, and the region slowly developed until admitted to the Union in 1890.
Wyoming's population, smaller than that of any other State with the single exception of Nevada, is less than two-thirds native stock, and this represents a blend from all parts of the United States. Iowa, Missouri, Illinois, have all contributed more inhabitants than either of its neighbors, Colorado and Utah. In these mountain States the general rule that a State is settled by its neighbors, quite breaks down. Its foreign stock is equally mixed; while much is Nordic the State has also attracted its quota of Slavs and Italians, and even of Mexicans.
Idaho, after small Mormon settlements of farmers, owed most of its early population to its mines. During the Civil War it grew remarkably, but the fact that it could be reached more easily from the West than from the East, due to access by the Columbia River, made its settlement somewhat anomalous in American history, for it was settled largely by Westerners moving east from Oregon, Washington, and northern California.
In Idaho the development of Mormon colonies has given Utah a strong influence in the State. Apart from this, its population is made up nowadays more from the Mississippi Valley than from the mountain and Pacific Coast States. It is only three-fourths native, but most of the remainder is Nordic, British and Scandinavians both having sought its opportunities. A territory in 1863 and a State in 1890, Idaho now has a population of nearly half a million.
Montana, in the winter of 1862 and 1863 had a total population of 670 inhabitants of whomThe Chroniclecomplacently says: "Fifty-nine were evidently respectable women." Like Idaho, it attracted an element of Southern men escaping from the draft into the Confederate Army, but from then on a large part of its population was from the Northern States. Its growth of population was closely linked up with the fortunes of the mining industry.
Territorial status was given Montana at the time of the great gold discoveries in 1864, and the character of its population fluctuated a good deal, both as to quantity and quality, between that date and1889 when it was admitted to Statehood. It has now more than half a million inhabitants, nearly half of whom are of foreign stock and largely Roman Catholics. Most of the natives are from the Central States; most of the foreigners are Irish, Germans, or Canadians, though Montana has also attracted more than 50,000 Scandinavians.
Utah's population is now about the size of that of Montana, and but slightly more native in character (three-fifths). These natives are to a large extent born in the State, the descendants of the Mormon pioneers. The "Gentiles" are of widely scattered origin. The foreign stock is mostly English or Scandinavian, the Mormon missionaries having worked diligently in those kingdoms. Utah, therefore, represents a Nordic population, and one with a high birthrate, whence it is evidently destined to continue spreading steadily in the Great Basin.
Nevada sprang almost full grown from the desert, as Venus did from the waves. It scarcely existed, though on the maps as a transmontane part of California, until the gold rush of 1849 brought settlements into existence to take care of the travellers. Then it was attached administratively to Utah, which was also inconveniently distant. The discovery of silver in the fabulously rich Comstock Lode (1859) led to the establishment of Virginia City, and to the inrush of a torrent of miners, particularly from California, where the gold deposits were becoming exhausted.
In 1861 Nevada was established as a separate territory, and Lincoln's administration pushed it through to Statehood in 1864 to get the advantage of two more friendly senators. With the exhausting of the silver deposits in a quarter of a century, Nevada had a severe decline, many of her inhabitants moving away. There was another mining boom in the first ten or fifteen years of this century, but the State has never made a steady and substantial growth, and the 1930 census credited it with no more than 91,058 inhabitants. Not much more than half of these were of the native stock. The foreigners were a scattered lot, with an unexpectedly large Italian contingent.
Arizona was cut loose from New Mexico in 1863, and, after the Civil War, became a typical Western mining community, with a fluctuating frontier population. A district might be active one year and a few years later abandoned.
The Mormons made some of the early settlements in the State and still form a significant part of its population. Like Colorado, Arizona has more than its share of Mexicans, while some of the other Western States, Utah and Nevada for instance, have only negligible numbers of them. The presence of more than 100,000 Mexicans in 1930 gave Arizona, with less than half a million inhabitants all told, a bad position as to its proportion of native stock. If one takes account only of the Whites, 80 per cent are natives of native parentage, the others mostly British or German, with again a surprisingly large Canadian contingent, considering how far removed the tworegions are. The American population is of notably cosmopolitan origin, people having gone there from every State in the Union, in connection with mining, or for reasons of health. But Texas is by far the largest single contributor, with California a poor second.
New Mexico stands in the anomalous position of having an almost unparalleled percentage of its population born not merely in the United States, but within its own borders; and yet of having an unparalleled proportion of its population speaking an alien language. An official interpreter is still required in its State legislature, so that the local statesmen who boast of their Americanism but cannot speak English, can make their views known to the Americans. Since the "Spanish-Americans" are classified by the census as white, three-fourths of the population are listed as native white of native parentage. There were also, in 1930, about 60,000 Mexicans born south of the line, hence aliens. The other residents of foreign stock are scattering, with no one nationality greatly predominating.
California, which in 1860 had the highest percentage of foreigners, had not changed this situation strikingly in 1930, despite the great influx of old American stock from the Central States. Of its 5,677,251 residents, just over a half were native Whites of native parentage. The general character of the migration to California since the beginning of this century is too well known to require extended comment. Every part of the Union has contributed;even Florida is credited with a couple of thousand converts. On the whole, this influx has been of the purest Nordic stock, but if a constitutional convention were now to be called, its make-up would perhaps not differ greatly from that of 1849, which was attended by delegates born in thirty different States of the Union.
The foreign element in California is equally heterogeneous, though largely Nordic, so far as it is white at all. Canada has sent a quarter of a million, nearly all of English ancestry. Italy has contributed nearly a quarter of a million, who make an important part of the population in the northern half of the State. Unlike their fellow nationals in the Atlantic States, these California Italians are mostly from the northern part of that kingdom. Between North and South Italians there is not great sympathy—representatives of the two groups avoid intermarriage. They also avoid migrating to the same territories and, if the Neapolitan occupies the Atlantic States, the Genoese will push on to the other side of the continent. These northern Italians have played a much more prominent rôle around San Francisco than one would anticipate who knows only the southern Italian in New York or Boston.
The State has also attracted 150,000 Russians, partly refugees since the Bolshevik revolution, but mostly agriculturists of an earlier period; more than half a million British, including Irish, more than 300,000 Germans, more than 200,000 Scandinavians.
It is the non-white element that has attracted attention most continuously from the outside world. California had nearly half a million Mexicans, until the exodus which began after the depression of 1929 had made their manual labor less valuable.
It had 45,000 Filipinos, who created serious problems in some regions, both by competing with native labor, and by paying attention to white girls, which is resented by the Americans.
The State's population of 37,000 Chinese is declining steadily. The memorable agitation of the '70's for Chinese exclusion is now only a historical event, but it was important as helping to lay the foundation for a wise immigration policy in the United States. Mining, war times, and the building of the transcontinental railway had kept up inflated conditions for years. Chinese were pouring in, partly to the mines, and partly to the railway, which used them in construction work. Some 15,000 of these Oriental laborers, turned out of work by the completion of the Central Pacific Railway, principally in 1869-70, poured into San Francisco and made their presence unmistakable. A decade of dissatisfaction followed, particularly among American workingmen. The most conspicuous agitator was the Irish drayman, Dennis Kearney. In 1879 the State voted against the further immigration of Chinese by a majority of 154,638 to 883. There have been few issues in American history carried by a more nearly unanimous vote. In the same year the Federal Congress passed an exclusion act whichestablished the principle that an unassimilable people may be shut out entirely, if necessary to protect American standards.
Agitation along similar lines sprang up about 1906-7, due to the rapid increase of Japanese in the State. It was settled, first by a "gentlemen's agreement" between the United States and Japan, by which the latter undertook to prevent the emigration of its laboring class to the Pacific Coast States; second, by a law later adopted in California, which prevented alien Japanese from owning land; third, by a final exclusion of all Orientals through national legislation.
The hundred thousand Japanese shown in the 1930 census are no longer increasing rapidly, in spite of a fairly high birthrate. The existence of these second-generation Japanese (and the same is true, in proportion, of the Chinese) has, however, created a serious problem all its own, since they are not accepted by either race. They usually do not speak the Japanese language. They are inclined to look down upon its institutions, and admire those of America. Hence the real Japanese element both dislikes them, and does not employ them because of the language barrier. On the other hand, the American does not accept them as Americans, and they cannot be employed easily alongside of and in competition with white natives of the United States. The second-generation Oriental is practically a man without a country. Because of these special racial problems, California has had difficulties that some of the otherStates have not fully or sympathetically understood.
Oregon's million inhabitants are two-thirds native Whites of the old stock. Canada, the British Isles, Germany, and Scandinavia, have been the other large contributors. The American population is largely from the Central States.
Washington now has more than a million and a half inhabitants, 56 per cent of whom are of old native stock. Eastern Washington felt a boom in 1862 when it began to accumulate population attracted partly by mines and partly by farming possibilities, until it reached an equilibrium with the Puget Sound end of the State which has always been an important political factor. Many settlers at this time were immigrants from the "border States" of the Civil War, who became disgusted with the guerrilla warfare to which they were subjected, and who were not enthusiastically for either side. During the '80's, the rapid construction of railway lines brought the population of Washington up to a respectable figure in a very few years.
The present Whites are mainly from the States of the upper Mississippi Valley. Canada has furnished 100,000 more of British ancestry, and a slightly larger number has come direct from the British Isles. Germany has contributed 100,000, Scandinavia 175,000. As against this, Italy is represented by less than 25,000, and the Slav countries altogether by not much more than 60,000. Hence Washington is entitled to claim that it is one of the most Nordic of the States.
XIV
CHECKING THE ALIEN INVASION
Duringthe earlier part of the immigration period, the tradition of an "Asylum for the Oppressed" of all nations was the ruling principle in the national attitude towards aliens, though even then there was occasional objection to the undesirable character of some of the immigrants.
Various States adopted their own restrictions. Massachusetts, Maryland, Pennsylvania, and others tried to control the flow of new arrivals by head taxes and administrative regulations, while foreign governments sometimes opposed these measures, as in the case of Wurtemberg in 1855. The United States having sent back some paupers who had been dumped on its shores, public resolutions are said to have been passed by the Wurtembergers, protesting at this lack of hospitality. If the paupers were returned, they complained bitterly, "we shall have defrayed the expense of their journey in vain." But the right to deport undesirable aliens had been set forth by the famous Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798, and the Federal Government has never wavered in its assertion of this right.
For a generation before the Civil War, the undesirability of unrestricted immigration was debated, but without definite action. The first federal restriction was the law of 1875, excluding foreign convicts and prostitutes. President Roosevelt in 1907 appointed an Immigration Commission which made a long investigation and a voluminous report that served as a base for future measures and by 1914 most of the undesirable classes, except illiterates, were formally excluded.
The opposition to restriction was from the steamship companies, whose interest was obvious, and from the large employers of cheap labor, who were likewise not at all disinterested. It also arose among alien groups in the United States, that wished to get more of their own people into this country.
The most active forces in its favor were, primarily, organized labor, which wished no more competition from floating aliens with a wholly un-American standard of living and, most of all, the native American groups, eugenists and others who were far-sighted and unwilling to see the racial character and national unity of America destroyed and republican ideals endangered and undermined.
The first attempt at a general restriction to improve the quality of immigration was the adoption by Congress of the literacy test, which provided that those who could not read and write some language should be excluded. This was vetoed by President Wilson.
Meanwhile the outbreak of the World War had, for the time, put a virtual stop to international movements of population, and the nation had a breathingspace to consider its future policies. In 1917 the Burnett Act consolidated the existing provisions for excluding undesirables, and included the literacy test. President Wilson vetoed it also, but it was passed over his veto.
At the close of the war, there was widespread apprehension that the unsettled and impoverished peoples of Europe would begin a new mass migration westward. Before the war we had been receiving a million immigrants a year; travellers and consular agents predicted that we might look forward to receiving two million or more annually. It was felt that the literacy test, and the provisions against mental and physical defectives, would not be enough to stop this flood. Congress met the emergency by the Quota Act of 1921, which provided that the number of aliens of any nationality admitted in any one year should be no more than 3 per cent of the number of foreign-born persons of such nationality residing in the United States in 1910. This law was intended to preserve thestatus quo. What the nation was in 1910, that it should be forever.
Such a solution could not satisfy the native Americans, whose people had made the country great. Fortunately, the demand for a more scientific approach to regulation found an adequate representative in the Hon. Albert Johnson, a member of Congress from the State of Washington, under whose leadership the whole system was revised in the famous act of 1924.
Administratively, the proceedings were made moreworkable and more intelligent by placing on the United States consuls abroad the duty of approving passports, without which no immigrant could enter. When the quota was exhausted, the consul was required to refuse his visa on passports until the next year. There was no longer any possibility of hardship and apparent injustice.
Restrictively, the quota was reduced from 3 per cent to 2 per cent, and based not on the 1910 census, but on the 1890 census. The purpose of this was, frankly, to encourage new arrivals from the countries of the "old immigration,"—the countries of northern and western Europe who had contributed most to the American population and whose people were, therefore, most easily assimilable in the United States; and, conversely, to discourage immigration from the countries of southern and eastern Europe, most of whose nationals had come here since 1890.
This law reduced the total possible immigration under quota to 167,750 as against 357,800 permitted by the act it supplanted, and favored the European Nordic whose people made the United States what it is, as against the European Alpine and the Mediterranean who were late comers and intrusive elements. Unfortunately it did not apply to the western hemisphere, hence offered no obstacle to the Indian peon from Mexico nor to the Negro from the West Indies, nor were the Filipinos barred.
The most interesting provision of the law of 1924 and, in one sense, the reason for the existence of thispresent book, was a provision that the quotas should be based only temporarily on the 1890 census. That basis had been justly criticized on the ground that it made the immigrants of recent times, rather than the old native stock, the determinants of the future composition of the United States. The quotas, it was argued, should be based not on the number of aliens here in 1890, or in any other year; but on the ratio of these aliens to the whole population. The law therefore embodied the National Origins provision—one of the decisive events in the racial history of America.
An investigation was ordered to find the proportions of the various national (notracial) groups in the United States at the time of the 1920 census. The general quota to apply from July 1, 1927 (later delayed one year), was fixed at a total of 150,000. Each nationality was to be assigned such proportion of this 150,000 as the number of its people here in 1920 bore to the total population. Thus, if it should transpire that 10 per cent of the total population in 1920 was of Swedish ancestry, Sweden would receive a quota of 10 per cent of 150,000 or 15,000. Or if it were found, for example, that 2 per cent of the total population in 1920 derived from France, the French quota would become 3000.
While a committee of experts went to work on the necessary research for this purpose, an amusing competition began among the alien groups and hyphenates, to exaggerate as much as possible their claims so that their relatives and compatriots mightbenefit by an increase in their nation's quota. The Irish were perhaps the most industrious in this occupation, for they could take advantage of the confusion, due to the fact, pointed out in these pages time and again, that the territory now composing the Irish Free State had long taken credit for every one who has passed through Ireland. Actually the "Irish" immigration in Colonial times was, as already shown, not Irish at all, but for the most part Scotch, though taking shipping from Ulster; and the Free State Catholics had few representatives in America at the time of the Revolution. Such facts were conveniently ignored by the Irish patriots, who wrote books to demonstrate that the "Irish" not only fought and won the Revolution, but that they made up the predominant element at the present time. "It has been estimated by good authorities," affirmed one such enthusiast, "that at least 25,000,000 of our present population have more or less Irish blood coursing through their veins. We" (i.e., the population of the United States), he went on, warming up to his job, "are no more Anglo-Saxon than we are Hindu!"
If the Irish Catholics were inclined to claim something like one-fourth of the total population, the Germans were prepared to claim anything up to one-third. The quota based on the 1890 census had, in fact, been extraordinarily favorable for the Germans, since they were the group that had been coming into the country in greatest number just before that date, hence they had the largest number of actual foreign-born here present in that year. Their allotment on that basis was almost one-third of the quota for the entire world. The obvious unfairness of basing future immigration on such conditions, and of ignoring almost entirely the English and Scotch stock which was the overwhelming element in the building of America, but which together received only 20 per cent of the quota, was generally recognized.
Scarcely had this injustice been removed and the National Origins measure gone into effect, however, when business depression began to throw men out of work, and it was universally felt that no new seekers for jobs should be brought into the country to displace the workers already here. Administrative restrictions, therefore, cut down the incoming flow of aliens to almost nothing. At the same time, many recent arrivals went back home, thinking they could weather the storm better among their own people.
A direct benefit from the depression, then, was that it practically stopped foreign immigration. When the time comes for consideration of the renewal of present administrative restrictions, the National Origins Act will be on the statute books as a protection. Meanwhile Americans can consider what further measures they need to take to extend the quota provision to the western hemisphere.
The actual contribution of the alien groups to the population of the United States is based not merely on their net immigration, but also on their fecundity after they settle here. Many familiar studies showthat, in general, the immigrant women are more fecund than the old stock. They marry earlier, show a lower percentage of sterility, and have larger families.
The fact that women are in a minority among most of the recent immigrant groups has, however, tended to cut down their contribution. Of the whole foreign-born group, men and women have in late decades been in the ratio of about five to three. This means that the group, as a group, will make a smaller contribution than it would, had each man brought a wife with him. On the other hand, the surplus males usually marry women of other groups, their descendants being thus assimilated into the population more quickly, whether for good or for ill.
Again, the increase of the foreign-born groups is cut down by the fact that for the most part they have a higher rate of infant mortality. Variations among the races are striking. Thus while the native white has an infant mortality rate of 94 per 1000 births, that of the American Negro is 154, that of the Poles about the same, that of the French Canadians 171, that of the Portuguese 200, as shown in some extensive studies made by the Federal Children's Bureau.
In the second generation, the fecundity of the alien groups begins to decline. It is generally said that the immigrant's daughter bears one less child than did her mother. Hence if immigrants are let in slowly, they are not likely to swamp the native stock; and as to those already here, although some of them,particularly the Italians, have remarkably high birthrates, they will probably lose this advantage within the next couple of generations.
The question is often raised, whether the population of the United States would not be just as large today, if immigration had been permanently excluded in 1790. In other words, if no alien had arrived since the founding of the United States, would the descendants of the Colonial population have produced as many citizens as there are now here? This hypothesis, often known as Walker's Law, assumes that the fecundity of a group is cut down by the competition of immigrants, and that the latter do no more than fill the places which would otherwise have been filled by natural increase.
No one would claim that such a generalization is exact, but as a general tendency it seems to be near the truth. The United States would have grown large and strong, had immigration been shut off a century ago. It will continue to grow large and strong, with immigration shut off at the present time. That does not mean that the rate of growth which has been maintained during the last century will continue for another century. The Nordic civilization is at present near the end of a cycle of growth, and its rate of multiplication is slowing in every civilized country. In most of the Nordic nations, the population does not now replace itself. When the women now of child-bearing age pass from the scene, they will not leave enough daughters to take their places.
The influence of the "newer immigration" and its offspring is great enough to carry forward the United States population expansion a little longer, but all signs indicate that, assumingallimmigration ceased, the numerical growth of the United States would come to a standstill at the end of two or three generations, probably at a figure not higher than 150,000,000 of population, and no more are needed.
All the greater is the need, then, that this stock should be sound in quality. A memorable step toward this goal was taken by the Federal Supreme Court in 1923, when it held that only white persons and persons of African descent are eligible to citizenship.
In 1790 Congress enacted the first naturalization statute, the terms of which confined its benefits to "free white citizens." The restriction remained in force until extended in 1870 by statute giving the right of citizenship to persons of African descent. At present, then, only Whites and Negroes are eligible for naturalization. Interpreting the statute of 1790, the Supreme Court held that the term "free white" must be understood in its common meaning as used by the framers, and could not include a Hindu (Sikh) or, in another case, a Japanese.
Meanwhile the immigration act of 1924 provides that "no alien ineligible to citizenship shall be admitted to the United States." The Supreme Court decisions in the cases mentioned mean that this law excludes all colored and Oriental races—all, in short,save "free Whites" and Negroes. Another safeguard is thus thrown around the American stock.
The three millions of Whites of 1790 have increased to 109 millions in 1930. Of this number, one-third are either foreign-born or the children of such. One wonders how many of the 109 millions are the undiluted descendants of Colonial stock. While mathematical exactitude cannot be expected in such calculations, the census experts have figured that about one-third of the population is of such ancestry.
There are many others who have one parent Colonial and the other going back perhaps to an immigrant of 1850. Such latter, these experts claim, is the equivalent of half of a Colonial descendant. Two of them together they count as equivalent to one Colonial descendant. By this device the experts calculated that the "numerical equivalent" of the Colonial stock amounts to nearly one-half of the entire white population.
The investigations necessary to put the National Origins provision into effect, and to defend it from partisan criticism, brought out the salient facts concerning the composition of the population today—again, of course, subject to such margin of error as is inevitable. The white population of 1920 was apportioned as follows:
The United States is no longer 99 per cent Protestant, as it was in 1790; but it is still 80 per cent Protestant. Its white inhabitants are no longer 90 per cent Nordic, as after the Revolution; but theyare still 70 per cent Nordic.[13][14]Its future course must be guided in the light of a consideration of these facts.
FOOTNOTES:[11]It must be remembered that these figures show national origins, notracial. The numbers credited to such countries as Poland, Russia, and Austria-Hungary therefore include very large proportions of Jews.[12]These are the countries of the Western Hemisphere, of which Canada and Mexico have been the largest contributors.[13]This would, of course, include all Germany.[14]The Hoover Committee on Social Trends, in re National Origins, says that "about 85 per cent of the Whites in the United States in 1920 were from strains originating in northwestern Europe where Nordics predominate."
FOOTNOTES:
[11]It must be remembered that these figures show national origins, notracial. The numbers credited to such countries as Poland, Russia, and Austria-Hungary therefore include very large proportions of Jews.
[11]It must be remembered that these figures show national origins, notracial. The numbers credited to such countries as Poland, Russia, and Austria-Hungary therefore include very large proportions of Jews.
[12]These are the countries of the Western Hemisphere, of which Canada and Mexico have been the largest contributors.
[12]These are the countries of the Western Hemisphere, of which Canada and Mexico have been the largest contributors.
[13]This would, of course, include all Germany.
[13]This would, of course, include all Germany.
[14]The Hoover Committee on Social Trends, in re National Origins, says that "about 85 per cent of the Whites in the United States in 1920 were from strains originating in northwestern Europe where Nordics predominate."
[14]The Hoover Committee on Social Trends, in re National Origins, says that "about 85 per cent of the Whites in the United States in 1920 were from strains originating in northwestern Europe where Nordics predominate."
XV
THE LEGACY OF SLAVERY
Themost essential element in nationality is unity. This unity can be based on race, on language, on religion, on a long tradition held in common, or on several or all of these.
In the past century the United States has to some extent lost its unity of religion, of race, and of language. In the same period it has acquired a number of unassimilable elements brought in as cheap and docile labor to develop its industries or else allowed to enter through the false humanitarianism of the so-called Victorian Era. It had been forgotten that a cheap man makes a cheap job.
In the South manual labor was performed by the Negroes, but in the North, where there were no slaves, manual labor was chiefly performed by Americans, and it still is in the districts where there are no aliens. The moment that cheap alien labor was introduced to build railroads or dig canals, such labor became distasteful to the native American, because it was done by lowly foreigners whom they despised.
Among the various outland elements now in the United States which threaten in different degrees our national unity, the most important is the Negro. Unlike the other alien elements the blacks were brought into the country against their will. They brought with them no persisting language, religion,or other cultural attribute, but accepted these elements from their masters.
At the time of the first census (1790) the Negroes numbered 757,208, being 19.3 per cent of the total population. They were naturally mostly in the Southern States. In 1860 the Negroes numbered 4,441,830 and constituted 14.1 per cent of the population. They were still in the South. In 1930 the Negroes numbered 11,891,143 and constituted 9.69 per cent of the population, but there had been a distinct migration from the agricultural districts of the South to the large cities of the North.
When, after the Civil War, the Negroes were granted the franchise the Negro problem was greatly complicated. This ill-advised measure was forced on the country by a wave of feeling aroused by the wanton murder of Lincoln. The North feared to entrust the government of the country to those who had lately been in armed rebellion, so they conferred the voting power on the Negroes and thereby greatly increased the electoral vote of the South. If the franchise had been confined to the Whites only, the influence of the "Solid South" after the Civil War would have been much less than it now is. The purpose of the measure was to make the South Republican, its actual effect was to enhance the power of the South in Congress and in the Electoral College and make that section definitely Democratic. In the words of the late Chancellor Von Bismarck this was worse than a crime—it was a blunder.
NEGRO POPULATION193011,891,143
The Southerners understand how to treat theNegro—with firmness and with kindness—and the Negroes are liked below the Mason and Dixon line so so long as they keep to their proper relation to the Whites, but in the North the blocks of Negroes in the large cities, migrating from the South, have introduced new complications, which are certain to produce trouble in the future, especially if Communist propaganda makes headway among them.
In the Negro section of Harlem a further problem is arising from crosses between Negroes and Jews and Italians. These and other Mulattoes are showing a tendency toward Communism. During the World War a Communistic and racial movement was started there and a situation developed which was controlled with some difficulty, though without publicity.
The increase in the relative number of Mulattoes to Blacks is growing greater in the Northern States, as is obvious to any observer in the Negro districts of the larger cities. There can be seen many yellow and light-colored individuals, who are Negro in every other respect. Many of our dark immigrant Whites are themselves darker in color than the yellow Negroes and this enables some of these light Negroes to "pass" as Whites. This problem is one which will increase in gravity.
Evidence does not exist to show whether the number of Mulattoes being produced by primary union of Whites and Negroes is now larger than it was fifty or one hundred years ago. But evidence does exist to show that the intelligence and ability of acolored person are in pretty direct proportion to the amount of white blood he has, and that most of the positions of leadership, influence, and prominence in the Negro race are held not by real Negroes but by Mulattoes, many of whom have very little Negro blood. This is so true that to find a black Negro in a conspicuous position is a matter of comment. E.B. Reuter has calculated that a Mulatto child has a better chance than a black child to achieve prominence in the ratio of thirty-four to one.
Such a situation naturally puts a premium on white blood in the minds of Negroes, and therefore puts a prize on bastardy, discouraging any tendency to cultivate pure racial values on the part of the Blacks themselves. The black man who acquires wealth, at once wishes to show visible evidences of his affluence by acquiring a light yellow or "pink" wife, and the black girl is at a heavy discount matrimonially.
Even in adoption the same tendency is found. Child-placing societies may seek in vain to find a home for the pickaninny with black skin and curly hair, but the light-colored baby, despite other disqualifications, is eagerly adopted by darker Negro parents.
The religious world, the political world, and the educational world alike seem to have conspired to give all the rewards to the Negro with white blood and to make the bulk of the race feel that white blood is the greatest possible good for a Negro. Such a condonation of race mixture is an insidiousand far-reaching menace to the racial and ethical standards of both races.
How much white blood now circulates in the veins of our Negroes cannot be told. It is generally considered, however, that at least one-third of all those classed as Negroes in the United States have, in fact, some white blood and the proportion is probably larger.
The "pass-for-white" does so purely by virtue of his physical characters which approximate those of his white ancestors. His intellectual and emotional traits may insidiously go back to his black ancestry, and may be brought into the White race in this way.
Mentally and emotionally the Negro is the product of thousands of years of evolution under the most stringent natural selection in the hot lands of Africa. He is notably lacking in just those qualities necessary for success in a modern Nordic industrial civilization, as for instance in self-control and in capacity for co-operation. Physically he is the product of the same circumstances. His tough skin gives him an advantage over the White in resisting some diseases. His lower vital capacity puts him at a disadvantage in others. Thus the Negro is liable to succumb to tuberculosis or pneumonia, and is less prone to cancer and skin affections. With the aid of white sanitation and hygiene, the Negro is holding his own, even gaining ground in the Northern cities where it was formerly supposed he would die out.
Natural selection, therefore, in view of the present vital statistics of the two races, can no longer berelied upon to solve the problem by a gradual elimination of the Negro in America. Comfort has been found in the fall of the ratio of the Negroes to the total population; but their absolute increase goes on just the same.
No satisfactory solution of the problem has been suggested. At present, from a study of past history, there appear to be but three possible solutions.
First, slow amalgamation with the Whites and an ever-increasing number of Mulattoes, who little by little will "pass" for Whites. This amalgamation might easily assume serious proportions in the near future, with an increase of mixed breeds all over the United States. But if the sentimental views about Negroes engendered by the Civil War can be lived down, it may be that the oncoming generation will resolutely face this Mulatto menace. Otherwise the absorption of 10 per cent Negroes and Mulattoes, to say nothing of East and South Europeans, in addition to Mexicans, Filipinos, and Japanese will produce a racial chaos such as ruined the Roman Empire.
A second solution would be deportation, which was seriously suggested a hundred years ago. At that time it might have been possible to re-transport the then slaves to Africa, and such action would have involved only a fraction of the cost of the Civil War. This was considered as a possible remedy by some of the wisest statesmen in the years immediately preceding the Civil War. Today it is not possible, because Africa, with the exception of Liberia,is under the control of white states, which certainly would not welcome such an enormous addition to their own color problem, aside from all other practical considerations.
NEGRO POPULATIONINCREASE & DECREASE1920-1930Figures in each State show the percentage of increase and decrease.
Present-day advocates of repatriation argue that lack of native population is the principal factor likely to hold back the development of some of the healthiest and most fertile parts of interior Africa. The American Negro, they say, might well carry there the education he has received in the United States, and do better for himself than he could expect to do here, especially if, through a rising race consciousness among the Whites, they show themselves less hospitable to his claims for equality.
The substantial following, gained by the Negro Garvey, who started a "Back to Africa" movement a few years ago, is cited as evidence that the Negroes in this country are not necessarily adverse to leaving it. But much more evidence will be needed before the repatriation of the Negro can be considered seriously.
As a third possibility, segregation has been suggested. This would mean the abandonment by the Whites of whole sections of the country along the Gulf of Mexico. This has actually happened in some places along the lower Mississippi River, where the numbers of the Negroes have become so overwhelming that the few remaining Whites have simply moved out and abandoned the district to them. It has happened and is happening in the West Indies. Haiti and Santo Domingo have been entirely turnedover to Negroes and other examples of West Indian Islands almost abandoned to Negroes can be found.
Whatever be the final outcome, the Negro problem must be taken vigorously in hand by the Whites, without delay. States which have no laws preventing the intermarriage of white and black should adopt them. During the last quarter-century, many such bills, introduced in Northern legislatures, have been defeated by an organized pro-Negro lobby. The Christian churches in some parts of the North have also taken an unwise stand, in trying to break down the social barriers between Negro and White. This attitude goes back to the days of the abolitionists, who persuaded themselves that the Negro slave had all possible virtues and the Southern White man all possible vices. It was a primary factor in creating the tragedy of "reconstruction" after the Civil War.
Senator Roscoe Conkling hit this attitude off neatly when some one asked him what had happened in the Senate that day. He replied: "We have been discussing Senator Sumner's annual bill entitled 'An act to amend the act of God whereby there is a difference between white and black.'"
More necessary than legislation is a more vigorous and alert public opinion among the Whites, which will put a stop to social mixing of the two races. Social separation is the key to minimizing the evils of race mixture at the present time. Public opinion might well stop exalting the Mulatto and thereby putting its stamp of approval on miscegenation. Negroes should be encouraged to respect their own racial integrity. Finally, knowledge of methods of Birth Control now widespread among the Whites, should be made universally available to the Blacks.
Compared with the Negro, the American Indian offers no serious problem to American unity. On the entire continent north of Mexico there are only about 432,000. The 1930 census gives the Indian population of the United States as 332,397.
The distribution of these Indians is remarkably irregular. The West has the largest number; then comes the South, because of Oklahoma's 92,000, for the Gulf States have few. North Carolina, on the other hand, stands seventh in the list of States arranged according to Indian population. As against 137,000 in the West and 116,000 in the South, the North has but 78,000. These are widely scattered and often little known to the general public. New York State still has 7000 Indians, Michigan about the same number and North Dakota somewhat more; Wisconsin and Minnesota have 11,000 each, while South Dakota stands fourth on the list of all the States with its 22,000. In the West the Indian population is concentrated mainly in Arizona, New Mexico, California, Montana, and Washington, in the order named.
These Indians now represent 371 tribes, or remnants of tribes. How large their numbers were at the time of the first white settlement in North America has been a matter of interesting conjecture.Most estimates are not much above a million, but the population may have been considerably greater a few hundred years earlier. Since white occupation a few tribes have increased in numbers. Most have diminished, and some have become extinct, more frequently from the white man's diseases and from whiskey than from the results of fighting.
The densest Indian population at the time of the conquest was on the Pacific Coast, which did not come into close contact with the Whites until the last century. This Pacific Coast Indian population was also of a low scale of intelligence and culture, and remarkably broken up into distinct groups which could not understand each other. As many separate languages were spoken by the Indians of this region as by all the other Indians of the United States together. When the first mission on the West Coast was founded by the Spaniards, in 1769, the number of California Indians was computed at 220,000. This has decreased more than 90 per cent at this date.
The policy of the Catholic missionaries was to corral the Indians around the missions. The church considered itself the owner of all the land, and the Indians worked it as tenants. When the Mexican Government confiscated the property of the church, it took title to all the land. Hence the Indians, who had always lived on it, found themselves illegal trespassers, and until about 1913 they were landless, starving fugitives. At that time the government began to provide land for the Indians. While their treatment has decimated them nine times, their isolation prevented intermarriage with the Whites, so the California Indians are of relatively pure blood.
The revolt of the Pueblo Indians of Arizona and New Mexico against the Spanish in 1680-92 was the beginning of their decline. The Navajos and Apaches, on the contrary, have increased in numbers, at the same time avoiding white mixture.
The Indians of the Atlantic Coast were destroyed partly by disease, partly by war; and their remnants were pushed westward year after year by the Whites until they are mostly now west of the Mississippi, many of them being in Oklahoma. The Iroquois are an exception, and have perhaps increased in numbers. They got hold of firearms before their tribal neighbors and were able to destroy many of the latter, incorporating the remnants in their own tribe. The Sioux of the great plains are also said to have increased.
In the Gulf States, on the other hand, the Indians were largely exterminated before their remnants were moved to the Indian Territory. The Chickasaws told the French explorer, Iberville, in 1702, that in the preceding twelve years they had killed or captured for slave traders 2300 Choctaws, at a cost to themselves of 800 men.
In the Northwest and Alaska, whiskey and disease have been leading factors in the reduction of the number of the natives. With this, in many regions, went a low fertility, due partly to starvation.
Nearly all of the American Indians lived as hunters. When the Whites invaded the forests anddrove off or killed the game, the Indian economic system was broken up, and they had little opportunity to meet the rapidly changing conditions.
There has been, since early times, some intermarriage between Indians and Whites, but it has not been on a sufficiently large scale to be serious. The estimate however is sometimes made that one-half of the census population of Indians has white blood. Naturally, there is no way of proving or disproving such a conjecture. Only in Oklahoma has such mixing been looked on with favor, and even there some tribes held themselves largely aloof from white miscegenation and punished with death any interbreeding of their members with Negroes. The discovery of oil on Indian tribal lands made the claim to Indian blood a lucrative one and oil revenues unfortunately covered a multitude of sins. Throughout the West in general the term "squaw man" is a bitter reproach.
Taking the country over, the Whites who have married Indians have not been of a high class. But the total number of Indians in the United States is so small that their future is probably that of being absorbed in the White race through miscegenation, unless it be for a few tribes cultivating a racial purity of their own and, with favorable economic conditions, perpetuating themselves for a long time to come.
The Mexican population is found mainly in the Southwestern States, but has also assumed relatively large proportions in such States as Colorado, Kansas, Illinois, and Michigan. The character of this immigration has been described elsewhere in these pages. It has given the United States an alien element with a high birthrate and very low standards of living, with which white laborers cannot and will not compete.
The census of 1930 found nearly a million and a half Mexicans in the United States. It was generally supposed that the number who had entered the country illegally was greater than those who came through the recognized routes. To prevent such a nullification of immigration regulations, mere registration of aliens is not sufficient, for that is likely to affect only those who have entered legally. Our entire population should be registered. The advantages of a universal system of proving identity are many, and extension of the system of registering births, on the one hand, and of registering voters, on the other, would take care of this without setting up much new and expensive machinery.
The menace of Chinese and Japanese immigration has for the present been stopped by immigration laws which exclude any one not eligible to citizenship. A proper application of this rule as established by the Supreme Court might shut off much of the immigration of Indians from Mexico.
Since the end of the World War the immigration of Filipino young men has become a disturbing problem on the Pacific Coast. The number of arrivals up to 1930 amounts to nearly 50,000. These, like the Greeks and some other European immigrantgroups, bring but few women with them and therefore form a socially undesirable and racially threatening element wherever they are located.
Unlike the Puerto Ricans and Hawaiians, the Filipinos are not citizens of the United States, with rights of entry that cannot be abrogated. They are citizens of the Philippine Islands, and permitted to enter the United States only by courtesy. Congress, therefore, has full right to adopt legislation which will exclude them, and it should make immediate use of its power to protect white America from this reservoir of 10,000,000 Malays and Mongoloids now under the American flag and at present potential immigrants. If this cannot be done effectively, the United States will have no alternative but to admit that its adoption of the islands and its attempt to salvage them after Spanish misrule was a mistake. As a safeguard to its own racial welfare, it may become necessary to give the Filipino his independence, commend him to the benevolence of Providence and the League of Nations, and have nothing more to do with him.
In the same way there should be no thought of further acquisition of territory in the West Indies or in Central America. It is conceivable that the Central American countries might in a not too remote future be able to form a stable confederation and stand on their own feet more successfully than they have done during the last generation. If such a federation could include the West Indian Islands, the United States might well donate its possessions there.
Hindu immigration has so far been nothing more than a threat. The present immigration restrictions will prevent the immigration of these people, except for travel and study. Experience in many parts of the world has shown the folly of allowing white countries to be overrun by Hindus, and Americans should sympathize with the British possessions that are trying to maintain white supremacy in their own borders in this respect.
In Hawaii the United States has another possible source of undesirable immigration. The dominant element among its third of a million inhabitants is the Japanese, who have held themselves aloof from the other residents and shown little tendency to intermarry. Every Japanese child born in the islands is an American citizen, with the full right of entry to the mainland. The greater part of the rest of the population is a mongrel crowd. Chinese and native Hawaiians, until quite recently, have shown a marked tendency to intermarry. Every effort should be made to find some constitutional way by which Hawaii can be prevented from becoming a continuous source of supply of undesirable citizens of the United States.
While the list of unassimilable elements in the United States is a long one, it must be borne in mind that most of them are still small. A wise population policy promptly adopted and maintained henceforth will give the republic an opportunity to grow along sound and fruitful lines.
XVI
OUR NEIGHBORS ON THE NORTH
Beforedealing with the countries to the north of us, it may be well to call attention to the fact that there are three major divisions of Canada. First, the Maritime Provinces, which were acquired by Great Britain at a later date than the other Atlantic Colonies, as they were originally claimed by the French. In this division Newfoundland should be considered. These territories lying east of the United States were settled directly from England or at the time of the Revolution by Loyalist refugees from New England. There is a large Scotch element in the population, which was lacking in New England. On the whole, the area is thoroughly Nordic, except on the shores of the Gulf of Saint Lawrence and the Bay of Chaleurs, where the Alpine French Habitants have infiltrated.
The second division of the Dominion is French-speaking, Roman Catholic Quebec, with a fecund population of low cultural status. The French distrust of the New England Protestants, with whom they had been at war for one hundred and fifty years, was the predominant cause of their failure to join with the revolting American Colonies in 1776. Quebec was known as Lower Canada.
Like the territories of the United States, the Dominion of Canada of today represents a part of the Nordic conquest of North America, the sole exception being the French population of Quebec Province.
The country to the west of the Ottawa River constitutes the third major division and was, after the Revolution, known as Upper Canada. Its original population was composed chiefly of American Loyalists who fled there in numbers after the Revolution. The immigration into Upper Canada from Britain was later very largely Scotch, Scotch Irish, and North of England. This is true more or less of all English-speaking Canada, except possibly British Columbia.
In a measure the Dominion is an offshoot of the United States, and its development proceeded along lines parallel to those of the States to the south of the boundary. The character of the population west of Quebec Province is much the same as that of the United States, lacking, fortunately for Canada, some of our immigrant elements. The country was settled without the terrible Indian wars that afflicted our frontier and without the lawless element so conspicuous in the history of our Far West.
The French settlement of Quebec was contemporaneous with the first English settlement in North America at Jamestown. A majority of the emigrants were from northern France. So far as one can judge at the present time by the descendants of this population, the pure Nordic stock must have been rare among them. They are today in general a stocky, short-necked people, rather of the Alpine build, with eyes often rather dark. The blond hairand tall stature of the Nordic are so rare as to attract attention at once. The type suggests the Pre-Norman population of northwestern France, rather than its Nordic conquerors. Some of the seigneurs, the explorers, and the adventurers of the early period apparently were of Nordic stock, but they were probably always in a great minority and have left few descendants.
Very little satisfactory research has been done as to the origin of the Habitants. A recent study of a typical group has given some indication of the general conditions in Quebec. In this group stature was found to be five feet and five inches, which is about the general average of the French. The cephalic index was over 83.0, which is about the mean for Brittany and is higher than that of Normandy. The hair was rather dark brown and straight, this straightness is slightly suggestive of Indian admixture. The eye color was more often brown than mixed blue and brown. Pure blue eyes were present only in 15 per cent. The tall burly build of the Norman peasant was very rare.
The language spoken in Quebec is an archaic Norman patois of the time of Louis XIV. This fact has given rise to the general belief that the Habitants came from Normandy, but the more probable reason is that the Normans were the earliest immigrants and established their patois, which was accepted by later arrivals. The Normans appeared to have been far short of a majority of the total number of immigrants and Brittany supplied still fewer. The balance was divided among the provinces of the northern half of France.
The physical type of the Habitants of today suggestive as it is of the peasants of the interior of Brittany finds confirmative evidence in their subserviency to the church.
Throughout the French period the population consisted to a marked extent of soldiers, traders, administrators, priests, and others who did not bring their families with them. Efforts of the French Government to encourage family life were not always either well directed or successful. Colbert hoped for a large French population in Canada by intermarriage with the Indians. Administrative regulations penalized bachelors, who, for instance, were refused licenses to enter the fur trade, which was the main source of wealth in the country at that time.