Permanent Settlement
Our studies of the sex and age distribution of the Jewish immigrants have shown a family movement unsurpassed in degree. This in itself is sufficient indication that the Jews are essentially permanent settlers in this country and not transients, "who have no intention of permanently changing their residence and whose only purpose in coming to America is temporarily to take advantage of greater wages paid for industrial labor in this country."[108]
Equally convincing evidence is afforded by a survey of the facts regarding the outward movement of Jews from this country.[109] The figures of Jewish immigration are obtainable only from 1908, the law of 1907 having required all steamship companies to furnish information regarding their emigrant passengers.
The relative stability of an immigration may be determined by contrasting the departure of the aliens composing the immigration with the arriving immigrants of this group for the same period. From 1908 to 1912, 33,315 Jews left the United States—an average annual emigration of 6,660 Jews. This is a strikingly low number, especially when compared with the large Jewish immigration for the same period, which numbered 417,016, and averaged annually 83,400 Jewish immigrants. Thus, for every hundred Jews admitted, only eight Jews left the country. This average proportion was largely exceeded only in 1909, not, however, because of any great increase in the absolute numbers of the Jewish emigrants, but because of the great fall in the number of Jewish immigrants of this year.
The part that is taken by the Jewish emigrants in the total emigration is insignificant and is in striking contrast with the great part taken by the Jewish immigrants in the total immigration.[110] From 1908 to 1912, the Jewish immigrants constituted 9.7 per cent of the total immigrants. In the same period, the Jewish emigrants constituted only 2.3 per cent of the total emigrants. Moreover, while the proportion that the Jewish immigrants constituted of the total immigrants exhibited a considerable and significant variation, fluctuating from 7.7 per cent to 13.2 per cent, the proportion the Jewish emigrants constituted of the total emigrants remained around 2 per cent and showed practically no variation. Relatively both to the number of Jewish immigrants and of total emigrants, therefore, the number of the Jewish emigrants is exceedingly small and practically negligible.
How great the relative stability of the Jewish immigration is may be seen when its return movement is compared with that of the total immigration and of other peoples conspicuous in the immigration to the United States.[111] Whereas, from 1908 to 1910, for every hundred admitted in the total immigration, thirty-two departed—the outward movement thus approximating one-third of the inward—in the case of the Jewish immigration, only eight departed, an outward movement only one-quarter as large, relatively, as the total. This was the smallest outward movement, relatively to the inward, of any immigrant people, except the Irish, whose outward movement was 6 per cent of the inward. Relatively to the inward movement, the Jews had an outward movement one-seventh as large as the South Italians, almost one-fourth as large as the Poles, and less than one-half as large as the Germans.
In the total immigration for these years, the Jews were the third largest group with 236,100 immigrants, which constituted 10.2 per cent of the total immigration. To the outward movement for this period, however, they contributed 18,543 Jews, which constituted only 2.5 per cent of the total number of emigrants, one of the smallest contributions. The Poles, who constituted 11.7 per cent of the immigration for the three years, contributed practically the same proportion, 11.4 per cent, to the outward movement. Even more striking is the contrast with the Italian movement. The Italians contributed 19.8 per cent of the inward movement for the period and 35.7 per cent of the outward movement for the three years. Though their immigration for these three years was only twice as large as that of the Jews, their emigration was more than fourteen times that of the Jews. In other words, no people combined in an equal degree as the Jews so small a number of emigrants with so large a number of immigrants.
It is interesting to determine what is the emigration tendency of the Jews coming from Russia, Roumania and Austria-Hungary. This may be gathered from the number of emigrants returned for each of these countries, from 1908 to 1912, as compared with the number admitted.[112] From 1908 to 1912, 294,813 Jews from Russia entered the United States and 20,546 Jews departed for Russia; 11,246 Jews from Roumania entered the United States and 546 Jews departed for Roumania; 60,408 Jews from Austria-Hungary entered the United States, and 8,513 Jews departed for Austria-Hungary. In other words, for every hundred Jews entering from Russia seven departed, for every hundred Jews entering from Roumania five Jews departed, for every hundred Jews entering from Austria-Hungary fourteen departed for their respective countries. The emigration tendency was thus smaller with the Roumanian and the Russian Jews than with the Austro-Hungarian Jews. This held true for each of the five years. Relatively twice as many Jews from Austria-Hungary as from Russia returned. The Roumanian Jews showed the smallest tendency to return.
Of importance is the question of the relative stability of the Jewish movement from Russia and Austria-Hungary and that of their close neighbors in these countries, the Poles, who contributed almost as large a current of immigrants to the United States as the Jews, and who, since they constitute the most important Slavic group, may be taken as the type of the Slavic movement to this country.
From 1908 to 1912, 265,964 Polish immigrants from Russia were admitted to the United States and 60,290 Poles departed for Russia, this constituting an average emigration of twenty-two per hundred admitted.[113] As, for every hundred Russian Jews admitted in this period, only seven departed, this constituted a relative emigration one-third as large as that of the Poles. For the same period, 214,931 Poles were admitted from Austria-Hungary and 88,994 Poles left for that country, which constituted an average emigration of forty-one per hundred admitted. The average emigration of the Jews from Austria-Hungary was fourteen per hundred admitted or practically one-third as large as that of the Poles. Thus, the Jewish immigrants from Russia and Austria-Hungary present relatively three times as stable a movement as the Polish immigrants from these countries.