Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 87.djvu/273

Rh thing as a pure-blooded German or Frenchman. "Norman and Saxon and Dane are we" of England. Likewise are we Briton and Welsh and Cornish; also Scotchmen, Highland and Lowland, Manxmen, Ulstermen and Irishmen.

That the crossing of the closely allied European races in America has, of itself, brought no disaster to our republic is a matter of visible observation. That wide crosses necessarily work always for evil is not proved. Apparently the mulatto in America, as a whole, is superior to the pure African negro. And the ultimate fate of the negro race in America is apparently to become mulatto, even though the introduction of white blood is relatively much less frequent now than in the days of slavery. But, in all these matters, we are much in need of scientific, that is, exact and systematized information.

However, it can be clearly seen that the introduction of black blood has not been a gain to the republic. And we may also admit that much of our later immigration from Europe and Asia has lowered our own average. The original impulse to America was that of escape from paternalism and oppression, two words for the same thing. America was a haven of refuge from senseless tyranny. Immigration thus brought to the new world a wealth of initiative and adaptability, such as no nation ever inherited before. But in later days tins current has changed. Wider opportunity has opened before the common man in the more progressive nations, and the incentive of freedom has been less acute. Moreover, while still "America means opportunity," this is not always to be had for the asking.

The demands of manufacturers, the operations of steamship companies and the possibilities of earning money without economic freedom, and later, the ruinous cost of war are drawing another type of immigrant from other parts of the world. Among the immigrants of to-day there are some with magnificent personal possibilities, men of the stuff that makes republics. But most of them are not such, and, while their presence adds to our material wealth, they constitute, as a whole, a burden on our democracy. Only a man who can take care of himself and have something left over for the common welfare is a good citizen. It is hard to maintain the principle of equality before the law among people who have never felt and never demanded such equality.

The claim is sometimes made on an assumed basis of science, that all races of men are biologically equal, and that the differences of capacity which appear are due to opportunity and to education. But opportunity has come to no race as a gift. By effort it has created its own environment. Powerful strains make their own opportunity. The progress of each race has depended on its own inherent qualities. There has been no other leverage. Physical surroundings have played only a minor part. To say that one race as a whole is inferior to another is only to