Evening Republican, Volume 23, Number 148, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 19 June 1920 — 33,000,000 Come in 144 Years [ARTICLE]

33,000,000 Come in 144 Years

Immigration Figures Show Great Britain Has Given 8,400,000 to Our Population. • & 4,500,000 COME FROM IRELAND New York City Is Huge Melting Pot for the Hordes That Come From Overseas—Austria One of the Largest Contributors. New York —Thirty-three million immigrants have come to this country In the 144 years since It was proclaimed that all men are born free and equal, and yet It was estimated at tlje recent national convention on Immigration held here that there was a shortage of 4,000,000 immigrant workers in this country, which was given as one of the chief reasons for the high cost of living. “History records no similar movement of population which In rapidity or volume can equal this,” says a bulletin of the National Geographic society. “Compared to it the hordes that Invaded Europe from Asia, great and enormous as they were, were insignificant “Of the 33,000,000 who have come more than 14,000,000 still live among us, and their children and children’s children are now in good truth bone of our bone and blood of our blood. Not long ago America crossed the 100,000,000 line in the number of its citizens, and it is interesting to note the composition of that population. “To begin with, there are 11,000,000 colored people. Then there are 14,500,000 people of foreign birth among us. In addition to these there are 14,000,000 children of foreign bom fathers and mothers and 6,500,000 children of foreign born fathers and native mothers, or vice versa. When all these have been deducted from the 100,000,000 only 54,000,000 remain of full white native ancestry. Includes Illustrious Citizens. "Yet the 35,000,000 American people who are of foreign stock —that is, foreign bom or the children of forelgn-

born parents—lncludes some of the most illustrious citizens of our republic. Even the president of the United States has only one ancestor who was born in America, and the list is long and notable of statesmen, captains of Industry, leaders of finance, investors, makers of literature and progress, who have strains of blood not more than one generation on this side of the sea. “An examination of the statistics of American immigration shows that since the foundation of our. government Great Britain has contributed 8,400,000 of her people and Germany more than 6,000,000. Ireland with more than 4,000,000 the rest of Great Britain with a little less than 4,000,000, and Scandinavia, with something less than 2,000,000, have, together with Germany contributed more than Half of the total immigration to our shores since the beginning of the Revolutionary war. “When we take the German immigration of the United States between 1776 and 1890 and compare it with that from other countries, a somewhat startling result, and one usually unsuspected, is The total arrivals of aliens in those 114 years aggregated 15,698,000, of whom more than 6,000,000 were British and Irish, and 5,125,000 were Germans, which shows that one alien out of every three arriving in-America during more than a century of our existence was a German. Only Great Britain shows a greater proportion. “Since 1890 the trend has been very different. With more than 17,000,000 immigrant arrivals since that date, only 1.023,000 have been Germans. If from this number a proper deduction is made for those who returned to their homeland and those who have died since their arrival, it will be seen that there are fewer than a million former subjects of the kaiser in this country who have not been here more than 26 years. Of more than 8,000,000 people of German birth and Immediate ancestry among, us less than a million fail to have a background of birth or long residence ip America behind them. Ireland Sends Many. “It~ls interesting to note the other foreign elements that have entered into the makeup of American population since 1776.' What a wealth of blood that wonderful little island, Ireland, has given us. More Irish have crossed the seas to become part of us than have remained behind. It Is remarkable that so small an island—smaller, indeed, than the state of Maine—could In a century and a half send us enough people to duplicate the present population of eleven of our states having an aggregate area as large as the United Kingdom, France, Germany and Austria-Hungary together. “Austria stands next on the list of contributors. Italy has sent us enough of her people to duplicate the population of Montana, Wyoming, Idaho, Oregon, Nevada, Utah, Colorado, Arizona and New Mexico,- while England’s and Scotland’s contribution, 3,889,000 in all, together with Ireland’s 4,500,000, gives a total of 8,389,000, or plenty to populate all the-states lying west of Texas and the Dakotas. The Russians who have come to our shores number 3,419,000.” ’ ' In considering the part that New York city has played in aiding to assimilate this vast Influx, it is pointed out that three persons out of every four here were born under foreign fthgs or are the children of the foreignborn. Commenting on how the onefourth of the city’s population, that. Is, of native ancestry, has Americanized the three-fourths that Is foreign in birth or parentage, the society says; - “He who studies at first hand the processes of Americanization and citizen building finds work being done which would stir the heart of the most unemotional observer. He realizes that all of what is-called New York’s politics, stories of graft and-the like, are but the froth and foam which fleck the waves of the city’s life, while beneath runs a deep current of progress and public spirit which takes form in carefully conceived and splendidly executed health laws, In a school system that

has accomplished wonders, in a water system surpassing anytihng of its kind on earth. Vocational Education. Along with many other cities, New York learned that a vast majority of the children who attend public schools do not go to college afterward. From that suggestion developed the Idea of vocational education which is now accomplishing wonders. Perhaps more than any other one agent it is helping to transform in heart and action ths alien life of the metropolis Into part and parcel of our body politic. The immigrants’ children are being fitted for that economic Independence which comes with skilled hands instead of being sent forth from school with untrained hands and poorly trained minds. “When one reflects that seven out of every nine children of school age In New York are of immigrant parentage, a situation Is disclosed that might be termed startling, especially when it is remembered that the school army is so large that if it marched ten abreast in close formation the front rank would be boarding a North river ferryboat when the rear guard were crossing the Schuylkill out of Philadelphia. “It is a staggering task which confronts the city in Americanizing such huge numbers of youthful foreigners. Indeed, did it not happen that New York is so rich —with assessed values greater than those of the next seven cities in America combined —it might well call upon the national government for aid. But with such wealth it Is bearing the burden alone and is doing It admirably. “One might write at length about striking features of the New York public schools which stand among all the agencies for Americanizing immigrants’ children. How these schools take seventy odd tongues and substitute good English; how they not only labor to fit boys and girls for intelligent and useful places in the country's great industrial system, but also to employment bring the trained pupil and the open job together; how they provide every year for the children of' an added population equal to that of Memphis, Tenn. —are achievements and problems worthy of consideration of Americans everywhere.”