Speech #570064636

Now. Mr. Chairnan. between the years 1790 and 1830. when the foundation stones of this Republic were laid. there were only a few hundred thousand immigrants coming into this country. yet the nation of itself developed in those years from 4.000.000 to 13.000.000 of people. What did that demonstrate? It demonstrated that the reproductive powers of our own people. the opportr.nities for growth. the opportunities for the development of our own people. responded to the needs of the country. and the body of American citizenship developed along natural channels. But if you intend to stifle the people of our own country by making the struggle and the battle for life harder by bringing the pauper labor of Europe here in competition with them. you are of necessity. as all history points. going to cut off the growth of the American citizen himself. you are going to crowd out the people who have built the country. you are going to pull down the standard of living thereby. and you are going to undertake the task of assimilating a class of people that may endanger your republican institutions. In the beginning of the century we had full opportunity to take care of all the immigrants that came to this country. The homestead laws between 1860 and 1880 allowed immigrants to come to this country and buy small homesteads at $1.25 an acre. and build their homes there and develop the country. The result is. as we find from the statistics. that between 1860 and 1880. when the great West was developing. there were 5.100.000 immigrants landed in this country. Most of them went to the West to build their homes and make their living. What has been the result? The great West was practically developed by 1880. but in the twenty years succeedingfrom 1880 to 1000we find that 9.100.000 immigrants have come to this country. And where have they settled? Not in the great West. Most of them have crowded the already overcrowded cities of the North. Notwithstanding our country had been filled up in the West. the opportunities for free homesteads practically gone. the steamship lines continued to foster the business of bringing immigrants to this country. Naturally these companies selected as the field from which to draw these immigrants portions of Europe where they could be obtained most readily. and that was where the people were most dissatisfied with the conditions that confronted them. So that instead of the high class of immigrants that we had up to 1880. the character of our immigration has been gradually growing lower and lower. until today it is a threat to the American Republic. There is another reason why the immigrants that we had in the beginning do not come now. and why the poorer classes of immigrants are coming to this country. In the first two decades that I spoke of after the civil war. agricultural prices were at their highest point. There was full opportunity and inviting opportunity for the best classes of the farming population of Europe to come here as immigrants and make a good living. Since that time there has been a gradual fall in agricultural prices. Today agriculture is more profitable than it was a few years ago. nevertheless. it has had a downward tendency for many years. and the better classes of European immigrants have not found the field inviting. The object of bringing this immense number of immigrants to this country now is to supply the demands for labor. But even today. when the demand for labor is at its height. the field for employment is overcrowded in almost all the cities and manufacturing districts. There is no place for this surplus of laboring population to go except to the farms. and we know that there is very little of homestead land left to absorb this supply. As I said. in the beginning of the century the immigrants who came here depended upon their own energy. thrift. and pluck to fight their own way. The class of immigrants who are coming here today depend alone on the agents of the steamship companies to bring them and depend on any opportunity at any price to make a living after they come here. Now. what is the difference in the class of immigrants we then received and receive now? I wish to call the attention of the House to the difference in the class of immigrants who have come into the country. In the first place. in the early part of the century almost the entire immigration into this country came from Great Britain and Ireland. Germany. Sweden. Norway. France. and northern Europe. Today we are receiving the larger portion of our immigration from AustriaHungary. Italy. Poland. and Russia. In 1869 the immigrants from the latter countries equaled only about one onehundredth of the number that we received from the United Kingdom. France. Germany. and Scandinavia. In 1880 the immigration from eastern Europe amounted to about onetenth of the number coming from northern Europe. In 1894 it nearly equaled the number coming from northern Europe. and in 1901 it was three times as great as the immigration coming from northern Europe. In other words. the immigration from northern and western Europe in 1899 amounted to 130.000 immigrants. or 41 per cent of the total. and from eastern Europe 175.000 immigrants. or 56 per cent. The next year the immigrants from northern and western Europe amounted to 149.000. or 33 per cent of the total. and from eastern Europe 276.000. or 61 per cent. The next year. 1901. the immigration from western Europe amounted to 164.000. or 33 per cent. and the immigration from eastern Europe amounted to 309.000. or 62 per cent. Of thesethat is. of those coming in from eastern and southern Europethe larger percentage were as follows: In the year 1900. southern Italians. 115.000. Poles. 43.000. Slovacs. 29.000. So. of the immigrants that came in in that year. you can see that the greater proportion were from southern and eastern Europe. Now. to determine what class of immigrants we want. we all know that it is much more difficult for us to assimilate the Slovac and the Pole and the Italian from southern Europe than it is to assimilate and build up the country with the Irishman. the Englishman. the German. or the Frenchman. people of our own blood and our own kin.