Page:The Economic Journal Volume 1.djvu/250

 fortune in the new. There was a time, indeed, as Mr. Smith shows in his second chapter, when conquest of fresh dominions, or colonial expansion, prompted the migrations of peoples; but these were the incidents of an early period, and emigration, 'as a modern movement,' has, until recently, been directed by the influences we have mentioned above. This emigration has been on the one hand a loss to the European nations, and on the other a benefit to the United States and other countries. Mr. Smith is quite ready to allow that, besides the free land and the railroads of the United States, the foreign immigration has been largely responsible for their 'astonishing growth.' 'In one sense,' indeed, as he remarks, 'all the inhabitants of the United States are immigrants or their descendantz.' But now, he contends, the position of affairs is reversed. The States are no longer able to assimilate the foreign elements which are continually being added to their population. Formerly the economic prosperity of the country, the exercise of political rights, the dominance of the English speech, and the intermarriage of foreigners with natives and with each other, proved to be assimilating forces of sufficient power, taken together, to incorporate the foreign with the native elements; and the classes of which the immigrants consisted were needed to develop the latent resources of the country. Now the means of communication allow of the immigrants sending back for their friends, and the means of transportation no longer present the wholesome hindrance of an initial obstacle to overcome, and a preliminary expense to discharge. The British Government has assisted paupers to emigrate, and, in Italy especially, the agents of steamship companies tout for customers. 'Emigration is now largely under artificial stimulus,' and the classes of which the immigrants consist have altered. They are those of which the countries of the old world wish to rid themselves; and they can scarcely be arrivals on which America will look with any great favour. They are, Mr. Smith contends, to the extent of some three-fourths of their number, unskilled labourers, with a lower standard of living than the native workmen. They tend to congest in the cities, and, by learning the easier trades, to displace American labour, and degrade the positio and manner of life of American workmen. The econonic gain derived from this source is accordingly insignificant, or a minus quantity; and the political and social injury is considerable. Their number exercises a severe strain on democratic institutions; for the large proportion of adults amongst them gives them, with the merely formal tests of the liberal naturalisation laws of the States, very great voting power. The deaded municipal administration, which has made Anerica a by-word, and the recent outbreaks of anarchisn and socialism, which appear such strange phenomena in the midst of the abounding general prosperity of American life, are, Mr. Snith contends, due to this foreign immigration. It is, however, not so easy, he allows, to gauge its true social effects, for with the low classes of which the immigrants consist, and the large proportion of adults, it would be natural to expect high rates of mortality, vice, and crime; but the American statistics of