Speech #540077647

President. I do not care about entering into any particular discussion of the merits of the bill more than to state my views in regard to it. I propose rather to make a brief recapitulation or risum6 of the immigration to this country during the past years of the Republic. and the effect it has had upon the institutions of this country. Mr. President. the darker and more unpromising features of the immigration problem have been presented on this floor in eloquent and vivid language. I shall not undertake to question or contradict anything that has been said in favor of restrictive legislation. I shall content myself. and feel that I have done my duty. in presenting to the Senate the brighter and more promisingside of the problem. and in calling your attention to the substantial and important benefits that have accrued to our country from the continued flow of immigrants to our shores. By having both sides presented. you will be better able to divest yourselves of all prejudice. better able to judge impartially. and. above all. better able to legislate wisely on a matterof so much importance. The question should be considered in its economic. its political. its social. and its ethnic features. Our own experience should be scanned and studied. for it will furnish us much information and many valuable lessons. We have been. to a large extent. a nation of immigrants. and a large share of our history is a history of immigration. No nation of modern times has had such a varied and extended experience in this field. The chief factors in our extraordinary growth and development have been our free system of government. our abundant supply of cheap and fertile lands. and the immense immigration to our shores. The first two have brought about. absorbed. and utilized the third. And the three combined have been a trio. in force and magnitude. such as no other nation ever possessed. Ample space. ample freedom. and ample numbers have given us a force and momentum of growth unknown and unheard of in any other nation. and the evidences of it are palpable on all sides. We have no statistics of immigration prior to 1820. It is estimated that from 1783 till 1820 about 250.000 immigrants settled in the country. Our entire population at the latter period was. according to the census then taken. 9.633.822scarcely 200.000 more than our foreignborn population in 1890. Since that time. up to the beginning of the present year. 18.022.785 immigrants have come to this country. It is claimed that these figures are too high because no account has been taken of immigrants who. having gone back on a visit to their native land. have. on their return. landed a second time at our ports. But whatever discrepancy there may be on this score is more than counterbalanced by the fact that no account has been kept of the immigration through or from Canada since 1885. I append to my remarks a table of the yearly immigration since 1820. It shows a continued and incessant though fluctuating flow. In 1890. out of a total population of 62.622.250. 9.249.547 were foreign born. 8.085.019 were natives whose parents were both foreign born. and 3.418.656 were natives with one foreignborn parent. It thus appears that 20.753.222. or about a third of our population. was at this time foreign born or directly of foreign parentage. If the same ratio of increase be applied to our entire volume of immigration since 1820in all 18.022.785we have evidently had as a result of the same 15.753.737 native born with both parents of foreign birth. and 6.661.071 native born with one parent of foreign birth. or a total of 40.437.593 of foreign immigrants and their children of the first generation. I shall not take up the time of the Senate to read it. but shall append to my remarks a table which states in detail the countries from whence all our immigrants have come. Only a small proportion of them have belonged to the learned professions or been skilled laborers. The great body have been small farmers. small tradesmen. and agricultural and other unskilled laborers. Nearly all of them have been from the ranks of the common people. the toiling masses of humanity. People of rank and of wealth have little occasion or desire to emigrate. nor. indeed have they been desirable in a country progressing under conditions such as ours. We have needed men to dig our canals. to build our railroads. to open and exploit our mines. to clear our vast forests. to open. develop. and reduce to a state of cultivation our vast expanse of .untilled land. in short. to perform the toil and drudgery and to bear the trials and misfortunes incident to the development of a new and unsettled country. This want has in a large measure been supplied by our foreignborn immigrants. In this field they have not been hostile usurpers. but have merely occupied groundthat has most willingly been accorded to them by the native born. And this toiling. struggling mass of humanity. charged to a large extent with the drudgery of our progress and civilization. viewed from an economic and financial standpoint has added millions to the wealth and capital of our country. An immigrant increases our wealth in a twofold wayby the money he brings into the country and by his value as a laborer and producer of wealth. The average amount of money brought by an immigrant has been variously estimated at from $10 to $100. There are no exact or complete statistics on the subject. I think that on the whole. during all the past. $50 would be a low. safe. and moderate estimate for each immigrant. But his chief value has been his productive labor capacity. Different estimates are put upon this. Friedrich Kapp. a former commissioner of immigration in the State of New York. estimated the economic or labor value of an immigrant at from $1.000 to $1.200. Dr. William Farr. a former head of the statistical department of the registrargenerals office. in England. estimates it at $875. Dr. Becker. the head of the German statistical office. estimates it at from $200 to $225. and Edward Young. chief of the Bureau of Statistics. in 1871. in his special report on immigration made in that year. makes this estimate and statement: From the foregoing considerations. therefore. the sum of $800 seems to be the full average capital value of each immigrant. At this rate. those who landed upon our shores during the year just closed added upward of $25.000.000 to our national wealth. while during the last half century the increment from this source exceeds $6.243.880.800. It is impossible to make an intelligent estimate of the value to the country of those foreignborn citizens who brought their educated minds. their cultivated tastes. their skill in the arts. and their inventive genius.