GENERAL CONCLUSIONS
Certain inferences and conclusions seem to be warranted on the whole by the examination and analyses in this chapter and that preceding it, of the compilations of the United States Census, the Immigration Commission of 1907, the Naturalization, Bureau and the Americanization Study.
First, and most important, is the destruction of the legendary presumption of some change for the worse in recent years in the inherent character-quality of immigration to this country, and in the attitude of the typical immigrant of those years toward American citizenship. There has been no such change; indeed, if there is any substantial difference in “quality of assimilability” between the “older” races and the newer, it is in favor of the latter.
Second, it is evident that such difference as exists among races is not an inherent racial quality, but a difference between the political, social, and economic conditions at the time of migration in the country of origin. Those nations whose people are most free from tyranny and oppression and most contented with the conditions under which they live at home, send the fewest immigrants to America; their emigrants come at a later age, and when they do come they retain longest or altogether their original citizenship.
Third, and broadly corollary, is the fact that the major, not to say exclusively, controlling factor in the political absorption of the immigrant is length of residence. The longer the individual lives in America the more likely he is to seek active membership therein.
Fourth, the interval between arrival and petition for naturalization—or even the original declaration of intention—is much longer than has generally been supposed. The average immigrant, regardless of racial extraction, does not concern himself about political privileges or activities until after long years of residence and the attainment of a considerable degree of permanent social and economic status.
Fifth, knowledge of the English language at the time of arrival is not a material factor in determining the rapidity with which the individual seeks citizenship. On the contrary, those of other tongues who have been in the United States as long as those whose mother speech is English show even greater interest and a higher rate of naturalization. In the ordinary case, by the time the immigrant of any race has been in this country long enough to reach the normal stage of interest in naturalization he has acquired a good working knowledge of the language.
Sixth—and from the common-sense point of view it ought to occasion no surprise—is the evident influence upon the display of “civic and political interest” as shown in the desire for citizenship, of social and economic conditions in this country as they practically affect the individual. Whether from northwestern or from southeastern Europe, whether from the so-called “recent” or “older” immigration, the racial groups show a slower desire for citizenship and a lower rate of naturalization while they are employed in the more poorly paid industries; both the individual interest and the rate increase as the individuals toil upward in the social and economic scale.
The inherent thing in the racial quality, experience, and character of the immigrant that leads some to seek citizenship earlier than others, the essential element in the “quality of assimilability,” in the display of “civic and political interest,” is a human thing, which lies, and always has lain, broad upon the face of nearly all of the statistical tables over which students have labored so intricately and pontificated so solemnly—in some instances so absurdly. It is a thing so obvious that it is difficult to understand why so many of them have overlooked it.
[IX]
CITIZENSHIP VIA MILITARY SERVICE
We do not yet realize—perhaps we never shall fully realize—the profound effect upon the whole structure of our political life, and especially upon the quality of our citizenship, wrought by the World War. One effect, however, stands forth clearly: the war has destroyed the underpinning of the great structure of hand-picked citizenry which, during twelve years of arduous labor and scrupulous straining of technicalities, was built up by the Naturalization Bureau and the courts on the basis of the Naturalization Law of 1906, and turned into solemn farce most of the pontifical preachments by which that policy was justified. Almost overnight the whole long campaign for the establishment of an educational standard of admission, the system of technical exactitude of papers and microscopical scrutiny of the antecedents, length of residence, and even the personal opinions of applicants, and of the competency of their witnesses, and so on, was nullified. Aliens, helter-skelter, hit-or-miss, were swept into full citizenship to an aggregate well-nigh half as large as the whole number admitted previously during the entire period of the existence of the Naturalization Service.
When the United States entered the war, early in 1917, the instant necessity of raising a stupendous army swiftly out of our heterogeneous population injected an unprecedented factor into the question of naturalization. The body of native-born citizens, even together with the great mass of those among the foreign-born who were naturalized, was not sufficient. Aside from that, there were considerations of another character; such, for example, as were set forth by the Provost Marshal General of the Army:[120]
As soon as the estimates of population made by the Census Bureau had been received, it began to be apparent that the rule of the Selective Service Act, which based the apportionment of quotas on total population, and yet drew the quotas from citizens and declarants only, would operate quite differently upon communities having largely differing percentages of aliens in their population. In certain local-board jurisdictions, in which the element of alien population exceeded 30 per cent of the total, the burden placed upon the citizen population was very great.... If in two communities of equal population the citizen population of one were 100 per cent of the whole and in the other 50 per cent, the remainder being composed of aliens, the two communities, though equal in population, in resources, in industries, and in need of labor, the efforts, and the enterprise of men of military age, would fall under a very unequal tax upon their man power. The all-citizen community would be required to furnish twice as many men as the half-citizen, half-alien community.