By a girl in the sixth grade: The American government is governed by the people by means of voting. If people do not vote it is their fault that we have poor officials.... The anarchist and the other people who ignore our government are both destroying it, only the anarchist destroys it violently and the people who ignore it, slowly. Some aliens come here to enjoy all our privileges without becoming citizens. They save their money and go back to their old country. But some aliens appreciate our government, and are now of the best citizens we have.... Join hands with the American government. Mother, do not let Dad do it alone!
There is plenty of direct testimony as to the effect of this enterprise in the home, not only of the American citizens, but of the aliens. Thousands of mothers who otherwise might have remained prisoners to indifference and drudgery have been fairly driven out into the liberation of social contacts and into a broader life of interest in all the things that make for responsible citizenship by the interest of their children.
It is in their homes that the foreign-born women must be reached with inspiration and enlightenment as to their part in the process of self-government and the privileges, duties, and responsibilities—and activities—which are essential to anything worthy to be called American citizenship.
[XI]
THE FOREIGN-BORN VOTER IN ACTION
There is not and never has been in the United States anything that could be segregated as the “labor vote,” although such a thing has been the dream of many labor leaders, the bugaboo—or rather the ignis fatuus—of politicians of many parties, and a permanently legendary figure in the popular speech. The absence of such a vote is the principle reason for the political futility of most of the efforts of the Socialist parties.
Time and again, since the beginning of our existence as a nation, efforts—some of them with a measure of success promising or menacing according to one’s sympathy and point of view—have been made to get united political action on the part of citizens who worked with their hands as supposedly distinguished from those who worked with their brains. The effort never has come to other than temporary local success; although it may be conceded that, in some measure, the issues upon which the efforts were predicated afterward came to be those upon which the great parties fought out their battles; or, more likely, came slowly to substantial acceptance through economic development or sometimes as the direct fruit of campaign agitation.
The reasons for this failure to precipitate and organize the mythical “labor vote” are many and diverse, but certain of them are essential and fairly evident:
First, the fact that in this country social and industrial conditions have hitherto been, and probably for an indefinite period will continue to be, such as to emphasize individualism. It is true, despite any denials or theories, that industry, initiative, enterprise, always have won, still win, and will continue to win advancement above the herd. The top is still open for those who can win to it by their own inherent qualities. There has been here, there is now, no permanent industrial or social caste classification to circumscribe ambition and create either a persisting intellectual leadership of “labor” or a stable body of hand-workers susceptible of political coherence or direction. All efforts to crystallize “class consciousness” for political action have failed, and probably will continue to fail as long as the social bars are down so that individuals can pass freely from one class to another.