The negro in America is the gravest of our population problems. In large portions of our land it overshadows every other public question. Yet the negro is here because men of the seventeenth century ignored the complexity of the labor problem and thought only of its economic aspect. The landowners wished cheaper labor and, reckless of other consequences, they imported slaves from Africa to get it. They gained for themselves and a few generations of their descendants a measure of comparative ease, but at a frightful cost to our national life—a cost of which the Civil War now seems to have been merely a first installment on account rather than a final payment.
§ 3. #Economic aspects of the negro problem.# The negro as a wage earner is found very little outside of the least skilled branches of a limited range of occupations. Of these the principal ones, as is a matter of common knowledge, are farm work, domestic service (including janitor service in stores and factories and work in hotels), and crude manual outdoor labor. Repeated attempts to operate factories with a labor force of negroes have proved unsuccessful. In some of the better-paying occupations in which large numbers of negroes were found in the North soon after the Civil War, such as barbering, waiting on table in the best hotels, and skilled manual work, they have been largely displaced by European immigrants. Negroes are a disturbing and unwelcome influence in labor organizations, and even when nominally eligible to membership are in fact rarely accepted. They very frequently are employed as strike-breakers and this fosters race antagonism both immediately and permanently.
The negro problem is, from our present outlook, insoluble. The most laudable of present efforts, that for industrial training, represented by Hampton and Tuskegee Institutes, and the work of Booker T. Washington, leaves the dire fact of two races side by side and yet unassimilated socially, politically, and, in large measure, economically. Two other possibilities, race admixture and caste, are both so repellent to white American thought, that they cannot be looked upon as solutions. Segregation in a separate state, or separate states, is a thorogoing proposal, but is practically impossible. Finally there is the conceivable, but improbable, event of the decrease and extinction of the negroes in America, Their relative number has declined since 1800,[2] but their absolute number still continues to increase. It seems probable that if European immigration were to be stopped that a very large migration of negroes from the South to the North and the West would occur to take places hitherto filled by unskilled immigrant workers. In the year 1915, following the check to immigration as a result of the European war, a very marked movement of this kind set in. If this occurred on a much larger scale it might result in greatly reducing the negro population in some portions of the South, and as the "natural rate of increase" of the negroes in the North is a negative quantity, it might cause the total negro population of the country to begin absolutely decreasing.
§ 4. #Favorable economic aspects of earlier immigration.# Regarding the immigration problem we are not confined to futile expressions of regret as in the last case. For by the "immigration problem" is meant primarily and mainly the coming of immigrants, and we can by legislation limit or stop their coming, if we will. The question at issue is whether their coming really is an evil or, on the whole, a blessing to the country.
The historic American attitude toward immigration has been highly favorable to it. The early settlers on these coasts were led by various motives, some political, some religious, but far the largest part economic, the motive of bettering their worldly condition. Land was plentiful and all men of any capacity could easily become landowners. An inflow of laborers was favorable to the interests of all the influential elements of the population, especially to landowners and active business men. Increase of numbers, favoring division of labor and the economies of production in manufacturing, and reducing the dangers from Indians and from foreign enemies, seemed an unmixed blessing. Many of the newcomers soon became landowners and employers, and in turn favored a continuance of the movement. Thus was hastened the peopling of the wilderness. The interest of these classes harmonized to a certain point with the public interest; but likewise it was in some respects in conflict with the abiding welfare of the whole nation. It led to the fateful introduction of slavery from Africa, and it encouraged much defective immigration from Europe, the heritage of which survives in many defective and vicious strains of humanity, some of them notorious, such as the Jukes, the Kallikak family, and the Tribe of Ishmael.
§ 5. #Employers' gains from immigration.#. The immigration from Europe has furnished an ever-changing group of workers, moderating the rate of wages which employers otherwise would have had to pay. The continual influx of cheap labor aided in imparting values to all industrial opportunities. A large part of these gains have been in trade, in manufacturers, and in real estate as the cities have taken and retained an ever-growing share of the immigrants. Successive waves of immigration, composed of different races, have ever been ready to fill the ranks of the unskilled workers at wages somewhat lower than the current American rate.
The lower enterprisers' costs that resulted from immigration surely did not accrue to the advantage of the employers alone. Bearing in mind the fact that the employing-enterpriser is a middleman,[3] we may see that the lower costs must, in most cases, be passed on to the consumers in the form of lower prices of products. And often the consumer, as the employer of domestic service at lower rates than otherwise would be possible, gets this advantage directly. This increases the number of those whose self-interest, at least when narrowly judged, leads them to favor the policy of unrestricted immigration, Tho perhaps less general than it once was, this sentiment in favor of immigration is still potent. The continuous inflow of immigrants has in many industries come to be looked upon as an indispensable part of the labor supply. Conditions of trade, methods of manufacturing, prices, profits, and the capital value of the enterprises have become adjusted to the fact. Hence results one of those illusions cherished by men whenever they identify their own profits with the public welfare. Without immigration, it is said, "the supply of labor would not be equal to the demand." It would not at the wages prevailing. But supply and demand have reference to a certain price. At a higher wage the amount of labor offered and the amount demanded would come to an equality. This would temporarily curtail profits, and other prices would, after readjustment, be in a different ratio to wages.
§ 6. #Pressure of immigration upon native wage-workers.# There must always have been cases where the labor incomes of workers were somewhat depressed by the incoming of immigrants. Indeed, that must to some extent always be so when the natives continue to work alongside of the immigrant at just the same job. But before the Civil War living conditions were simple, wages comparatively high and (more important) pretty steadily rising, and the wage-earning class not yet a large share of the population. Moreover, this conflict of interest was minimized and often quite avoided by the native changing to another occupation. In the old days there was always the outlet of free land on the frontier, now closed. Always there has been a better opportunity for natives to move into higher positions of foremanship or as employers of immigrant labor.
As the wage-earners have become relatively more numerous, many of them have felt more keenly the pressure of competition from immigrant labor. Moreover, the immigration since 1890 has been increasingly from southern and southeastern Europe, from countries with much lower standards of living, and has been of enormous proportions. Here are some significant figures as to immigration since 1820.
———————————————————————————————
| | | Immigration,
| Immigration | Increase of | per cent of
Decade | in the period | population | population-
| | | increase
————————-|———————-|——————-|———————
1820-30 | 124,000 | 3,300,000 | 3.8
1830-40 | 528,000 | 4,200,000 | 12.3
1840-50 | 1,604,000 | 6,100,000 | 26.3
1850-60 | 2,648,000 | 8,200,000 | 32.3
1860-70 | 2,369,000 | 8,400,000 | 28.2
1870-80 | 2,812,000 | 10,400,000 | 27.0
1880-90 | 5,246,000 | 12,700,000 | 41.3
1890-1900 | 3,687,000 | 13,100,000 | 28.1
1900-1910 | 8,795,000 | 16,000,000 | 55.0
Total, 90 yrs. | 27,800,000 | 82,400,000 | 33.7