Immigration

by Henry Pratt Fairchild

We turn now to a closer study of the life conditions of the immigrants after they have been admitted to this country, and have become a part of our body politic. These conditions affect all the life interests of the alien, and must, in the end, have a determining influence upon the desirability of immigration, both from the point of view of the immigrant and of the United States. They are manifestly so diverse and complicated as to make it difficult to frame any classification which will not overlap, and confuse rather than clarify. In general, however, we may divide these conditions into two categories, which are not absolutely exclusive and definite, but will serve the purposes of arrangement. These are as follows: (1) Those conditions which are primarily individual to the immigrant himself, and affect the general life of the nation only indirectly, because the immigrant is a resident of that nation. (2) Those conditions which have to do directly with the life of the immigrant as a member of society, and immediately affect the interests and welfare of others besides himself. To the first category belong such matters as housing conditions, food, and standard of living in general, wages, recreations, religious life, certain forms of vice, education, etc. To the second, pauperism, crime, sex vice, insanity, contagious diseases, industrial efficiency, trade-union affiliations, political activities and affiliations, money brought into and sent out of the country, and anything which increases or lightens the burdens of the average citizen of the country. In each of these two classes, there are conditions which may be considered as political, religious, economic, and social. Many life interests belong partly in one category, and partly in the other. This is especially true of that great class of facts having to do with marriages, births, and deaths, which affect first of all the immigrant, but through him the general population of the country.

Among those conditions which are primarily individual, many of the most important come under the head of the economic. And many of the most significant economic conditions may be considered under the head of the standard of living. It has been said, with a great deal of truth, that the immigration problem in this country is largely a matter of a competitive struggle between different standards of living.

Probably no other department of the standard of living of the immigrants has received such careful study in recent years as the matter of housing. As a result, we are now able to draw more accurate general conclusions in regard to this matter than is possible in respect to almost any other phase of the standard. Particularly is this true in regard to conditions in the compact colonies of our large cities, which, as we have seen, constitute the characteristic home of the new immigrant, and where the problem is the greatest. There is also a mass of reliable information in respect to another characteristic home of the immigrant, the residence portions of mining camps, and the smaller manufacturing cities.

Up to the present the slum, in spite of all the attacks upon it, has maintained itself as a permanent feature of most of our large cities. But the population of the slum is not a permanent but an ever changing one. The unsuccessful, unfortunate, and incapable individuals remain, but the more ambitious, progressive, and successful move on to other and better sections. Nevertheless, the slums are always full; and grow rather than diminish. There is a never failing supply of new recruits, in the body of recent immigrants, to take the places of those who move up. Thus the slum becomes the great sifting ground of the foreign-born, and tends to become more and more the abode of the poorest classes of our population. Not only is there a progression of individuals through the slum, but some of our cities have witnessed a most interesting and significant succession of races along the same course. The natives were displaced by the Irish; they in turn were crowded out by the Italians and Jews, and now the Greeks, Syrians, and allied races are driving out the Italians. Races may come and races may go, but the slum goes on—forever?

The character of the modern tenement has been sufficiently described by many writers to obviate the necessity of going into any detailed account of it in the present connection. Our main concern is the life of the immigrant within this tenement. The most recent and reliable information upon this point is that furnished by the Immigration Commission in their report on Immigrants in Cities.[^[200]] The agents of the Commission made a detailed study of the most densely congested districts of New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, Boston, Cleveland, Buffalo, and Milwaukee. They found the population of these districts to consist mainly of members of the recently immigrating races. In all seven of these cities Russian Hebrews and south Italians are among the principal races represented in the congested districts, while in the cities on the Great Lakes Poles, Bohemians, and other Slavic races are relatively more numerous than in the Atlantic coast cities. Very few families whose heads were native-born of native fathers were found in these districts. Nearly one half of the foreign-born heads of households had come within the last ten years, and over one fifth within five years. Not only were there very few native families, but only the remnants of colonies of Germans, Irish, and Swedes were found.

The first point to demand our attention in regard to the life of the foreign-born within the tenements is the amount of congestion. Among the households studied by the Immigration Commission, the average numbers of rooms per apartment was 3.72. The average number of rooms per apartment for the households whose head was native-born white of native father was 4.47, of the native-born of foreign father 4.34, of the foreign-born 3.64. The average number of persons per household for the native-born white of native father was 4.14, for the native-born of foreign father 4.39, for the foreign-born 5.16. An interesting indication of the habits of life of some of the newer immigrating races is given by the fact that while, among the Greeks, 32.7 per cent of the households consisted of two persons, and 18.4 per cent of three persons, 8.2 per cent consisted of ten or more persons. Among the Servians 18.2 per cent of the households consisted of ten or more persons, and among the Slovenians 11.2 per cent. This is the result, as will appear later, not of large families, but of the tendency on the part of the male representatives of these races to group themselves together into large coöperative “households” (pp. 21, 22, 23).

The average number of persons per room in the households studied was as follows: native-born white of native father, .93; native-born of foreign father, 1.01; foreign-born, 1.42 (p. 24). Only 51.9 per cent of the native-born white of native father had one or more persons per room, 54.7 per cent of the German households, 68.5 per cent of the Irish, south Italians 91.9 per cent, and Greeks 98 per cent. Of the Slovaks, Slovenians, and Syrians, 90 per cent or more of the households had one or more persons per room. Two per cent of the Greeks, 2.6 per cent of the south Italians, and 3 per cent of the Syrians had four or more persons per room. The number of occupants, per sleeping room, is of course somewhat higher. The total average number of persons per sleeping room in the households whose heads were native-born white of native father was 1.93; of the foreign-born, 2.39. Two per cent of the Greek households studied had six or more persons per sleeping room, as did 2 per cent of the south Italians and 5.2 per cent of the Slovenians. Fourteen per cent of all the foreign-born households slept in all the rooms in their apartments, and 41.1 per cent in all the rooms except one, while among the native-born whites of native fathers 2.3 per cent slept in all the rooms, and 20.2 per cent in all the rooms but one.

The foregoing figures may be taken as giving a reliable summary of the amount of congestion in the crowded districts of the seven great cities mentioned. It is painfully evident that conditions exist on a wide scale in these centers, which are a disgrace to any civilized country. A large proportion of the lower classes of our cities are living under conditions which render self-respect, cleanliness, and even decency almost impossible. Moreover, it is apparent that the native-born whites of native fathers, studied in this investigation, although representing the lowest portions of that class, rank decidedly above the foreign-born as far as can be judged by the degree of congestion. The native-born of foreign fathers stand between the other two classes. A more vivid and vital aspect may be given to the picture by taking some specific instances of life conditions among various groups of the foreign-born.

Among the Italians extreme congestion had manifested itself as long ago as the decade of the nineties. The average density of population in the Italian quarter of the North End of Boston was said to be nearly 1.40 persons per room.[^[201]] In the Italian quarter of Philadelphia investigators found 30 Italian families, numbering 123 persons, living in 34 rooms. In some of the Italian tenements in this city, lamps were kept burning all day in some of the rooms, where day could scarcely be distinguished from night.[^[202]] The Jews at this time were only a little less densely crowded than the Italians. In 1891 nearly one fourth of the whole number of Jews living in two of the precincts of the North End of Boston were living with an average of more than two persons to a room and were found to be very uncleanly in the care of their homes. Among the Irish an average of 1.24 persons per room was found in Boston in 1891. On the whole they kept their tenements cleaner than did the Jews or Italians.[^[203]]

Since the beginning of the twentieth century, interest in the slum population of our cities has centered itself about the Slavic and other races of southeastern Europe, even more than about the Italians and Jews. About one sixth of the entire population of Buffalo, or 80,000 individuals, is Polish. Of these, about 4000 families, representing 20,000 persons, own their homes. They are said to be thrifty, clean, willing, and neglected. Nearly all the Poles live in small one and two story wooden cottages. Good tenement work thirty years ago avoided the serious structural conditions which prevail in most cities. The principal evil now in the Polish section is room-overcrowding. The two-story cottages hold six or more families, while the older one-story cottage was built for four families, though the owner is likely to occupy two of the rear apartments. There are 15,000 of these cottages, all subject to the tenement law. A Pole was recently made health commissioner, and gave promise of being the best incumbent of that office that Buffalo has ever had. That there is plenty of work for him to do may be judged from the description of some of the conditions which prevail.