Old World Traits Transplanted
Chapter 7: The Immigrant Community
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THE community comprised of a number of families is the simplest form which society has assumed in the universal struggle against death. All the primary human needs can be satisfied in the community. Polish peasant communities, before 1860, lived as practically self-sufficient groups. They knew by report that there was a great world, and they had some relations with it, through Jews and manor owners; they had a priest and the religious-magical traditions of Christendom. But practically the extent of their world was the "okolica," "the neighborhood round about," and their definition of this was, "as far as a man is talked about." Their life was culturally poor, and they showed no tendency either to progress or to retrograde, but they lived. The peasant did not know he was a Pole; he even denied it. The lord was a Pole; he was a peasant. We have records showing that members of
( 146) other immigrant groups realize first in America that they are members of a nationality: "I had never realized I was an Albanian until my brother came from America in 1909. He belonged to an Albanian society over here." [1]
The immigrants here tend to reproduce spontaneously the home community and to live in it. Letters show that they frequently reply to inquiries from home for a description of America, "I have not yet been able to see America." There are immigrants on the lower East Side of New York who have been here for twenty years and have never been up town. Even the intellectual immigrants feel painfully the failure to meet cultivated Americans. (See document 33, p. 46.)
THE ITALIANS
Among the more important immigrant groups the Italians show perhaps the strongest wish to remain in solitary communities. They settle here by villages and even by streets neighbors in Italy tending to become neighbors here. Map 3 shows the concentration of immigrants from different Italian provinces and Sicilian towns in a section of lower New York.
( 147) The colony, from the village of Cinisi, Sicily, in the vicinity of East Sixty-ninth Street and Avenue A, New York, may be taken as typical. There are more than 900 families at this point, and there are other groups from Cinisi in Brooklyn, Harlem, and on Bleecker Street. (See Map 10, p. 9.42.)
102. The colony is held together by the force of custom. People do exactly as they did in Cinisi. If some, one varies, he or she will be criticized. If many vary—then that will become the custom. It is by the group, collectively, that they progress. They do not wish the members of the colony' to improve their economic conditions or to withdraw. If n woman is able to buy a fine dress, they say: "Look at that villana [serf]! In the old country she used to carry baskets of tomatoes on her head and now she carries a hat on it." "Gee! look at the daughter of so and so. In Cinisi she worked in the field and sunburnt her black. Here she dares to carry a parasol."
So strong is' this influence that people hesitate, to wear anything except what was customary in Cinisi. Everywhere there is fear of being "sparlata"—talked badly of. A woman bought a pair of silk stockings and the neighbors talked so much about her that her husband ordered her to take them off.... To dress poorly is criticized and to dress sportily is criticized. In this way one had to conform or be ostracized.
A number of families moved from the central group of Brooklyn. There they have combined and rent a whole two-story house. They are living
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better than those in the other groups and I often hear the East Sixty-ninth Street people say: "Look at those paesani in Brooklyn. When they were here they were in financial straits. One of them had to flee from the criticism here. He did not have the money to pay his moving van and crowded all his furniture into a small one-horse wagon. He even put his wife on to save car fare. He left a pile of debts and now he dares come around here with a horse and buggy."
If a wife is spied by another Cinisaro talking to a man who is known as a stranger that is, who is not a relative—she is gossiped about: she has the latent willingness to become a prostitute. They say: "So and so's wife was talking with an American. Eh! She has the capacity to do wrong."
Nothing in the American women surprises them. They have already made an unfavorable judgment. My mother, for instance, was about to say that my wife, who is an American, was an exception to the rule, but when my wife went to Central Park with the baby she said, "They are all alike."
The colony has no newspapers, except one woman who is known as the "Giornale di Sicilia," or the "Journal of Sicily." She carries the news and spreads it as soon as said. She has now gone to
' Italy and the one who takes her place is a gossiper who is known as a "too-too"—referring to the "tooting" of a town-crier's horn. She is, moreover, malicious, and gives a version of a story calculated to ' produce ridicule. She not only talks about the breakers of customs, but about those who are financially low. To be financially low is looked down upon, and the Giornale di Sicilia warns people to look out for such and such a person, as he may ask
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for a loan. To be willing to lend means that one has accumulated money and thus the secret of the lender is out. So this is the reason they refuse to lend to one another and if one is down and out he would rather get money from a Jew than from a paesano. So deceptive are they as to their financial standing (partly through fear of blackmail) that it is customary to figure out a Cinisarian's fortune not by what he says, but by how many sons and daughters are working.
Now and then some Cinisarian takes his chances in the business world. He writes to his relatives in Cinisi, has oil, wine, and figs, lemons, nuts, etc., sent to him, and then he goes from house to house. He does not enter in a business way, but goes to visit some family, talks about Cinisi, then informs them that he has received some produce from the home town. And sure enough, the people will say, "You will let us get some, eh?"
"Of course. Tell your relatives. I can get all you want."
In this way the business man makes his sales. He progresses until he gets a place opened and then come his worries. He must forever show that he is poor, that he is barely making a living, for fear of some attempt to extort money from him.
Not many men of the Cinisi group are in business in New York, the reason being that one Cinisarian will not compete with another in the same line of business.
The central group is closely united and there is little possibility that they will adopt any customs of the neighboring peoples, who are mostly Irish and Bohemians. The Irishwomen are considered wives of drunkards and, as all of the husband's salary
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goes to the bartender, the wives are believed to earn a living in prostituting themselves. The Bohemians are libertines; the girls are free; and, moreover, Bohemians and Hungarians are looked upon as bastard peoples.
In the Cinisi colony there are no political parties. The group has not been interested in citizenship. Of 250, one or two were citizens before the war and now all those who returned from the war are also citizens. These young men sell their votes for favors. The average Cinisaro, like all foreigners, has the opinion that a vote means $5. The Cinisaro knows of corruption at home. in Cinisi there is very much of it. Money is raised to build a water system for Cinisi year after year, and it gets away without a water system coming in exchange.
The Cinisi group are more interested in Cinisarian politics than in American. They talk of the parties of the artisans, of the gentlemen, of the villani, of the hunters, in Cinisi.
Most of the Cinisari in the Sixty-ninth Street group intend to return to Sicily. The town of Cinisi is forever in their minds: "I wonder if I can get back in time for the next crop?"—" I hope I can get back in time for the festa "—" I hope I can reach. Cinisi in time to get a full stomach of Indian figs," etc. They receive mail keeping them informed as to the most minute details, and about all the gossip that goes on in Cinisi in addition; they keep the home town informed as to what is going on here. They write home of people here who have transgressed some custom: "So-and-so married an American girl. The American girls are libertines. The boy is very disobedient." "So-and-so who failed to succeed at college in Palermo, is here. He has
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married a stranger"—that is, an Italian of another town. In this way they blacken a man's name in Cinisi, so that a bad reputation awaits him on his return.
The reputation given them in Cinisi by report from here means much to them, because they expect to return. Whole families have the date fixed. Those who express openly their intention of remaininghere are the young Americanized men.
When the festival of Santa Fara, the patron saint of Cinisi, was planned (partly as a reproduction of the home custom, partly as an expression of gratitude to Santa Fara for the miracle of ending the war), there was some opposition on the ground that all funds should be sent to Cinisi for the festival there. The festival was held (April 26 and 927, 1919), but was so disappointing that it is said to have increased the desire to return to Cinisi and see the original.[2]
103. Until 1914 the Sicilian colony in Chicago was an absolutely foreign community. The immigrants were mostly from villages near Palermo, though nearly all of the Sicilian provinces are represented. The most important of the village groups are those from Alta Villa Milicia, Bagheria Vicari, Cimmina, Termini-Imarezi, Monreali, and the city of Palermo. These groups retained their identity, living together as far as possible, intermarrying and celebrating the traditional feasts. Immigrants who settled in Louisiana came up to join their village colony.. Those who had been leaders in Sicily retained their power here and, having greater force and intelligence, made contracts with local politicians, police officials, labor agents, and real estate dealers, and
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became the go-betweens for their colony and the outside-world labor agents.
Women continued to live as they had in Sicily, never leaving their homes except to make ceremonial visits or to attend mass. The presence of several garment factories in the district made it possible for them to earn by doing finishing at home. In later years hundreds of women went into the garment factories to work, some taking the street cars out of the district; but they went to and from work in groups, their shawls carefully wrapped about them.
In the entire district there was no food for sale that was not distinctly foreign; it was impossible to buy butter, American cheese, sweet potatoes, pumpkin, green corn, etc., but in season artichokes, cactus fruit (fichi d'India), pomegranates, cocozella, and various herbs and greens never sold in other parts of town were plentiful. There were no bookstores. Italian newspapers had a limited circulation, and the Chicago daily papers were sold at only two transfer points on the edge of the district. There were no evidences of taste in dress or house decoration. This group seemed to have had no folk music, but took great pleasure in band concerts when spirited marches and melodies from Verdi's operas were played. There was no educational standard; the older people were almost all illiterate; they accepted this as natural and explained it by saying, "We are contadini, and our heads are too thick to learn letters." Some of the younger ones had had a little elementary training, but with very few exceptions no one in the colony had gone beyond the "quarto elementario." Few had seen military service or learned trades except, of course, the tailors, barbers, and shoemakers. One heard of an occasional cabinet maker, harness
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maker, solderer, carpenter, or mason, but none followed his trade here, as the training did not fit him to American methods. Many who had worked in the orchards in Sicily found their way to South Water Street and worked as truckers and fruit packers and, becoming familiar with the way produce was handled, started their friends out as fruit and vegetable peddlers, thus establishing a wholesale business for themselves. Most of the men, however, were sent by their leaders to the railroads and building contractors as laborers... .
Individually, Sicilians seem to vary as much in their manner and ideals as Americans, but as a group they have certain very marked characteristics—reserve, suspicion, susceptibility to gossip, timidity, and the desire to "fa figura." Intense family pride, however, is the outstanding characteristic, and as the family unit not only includes those related by blood, but those related by ritual bonds as well (the commare and compare), and as inter-marriage in the village groups is a common practice, this family pride becomes really a clan pride.
The extent to which family loyalty goes is almost beyond belief; no matter how disgraced or how disgraceful a member may be, he is never cast off, the unsuccessful are assisted, the selfish are indulged, the erratic patiently born with. Old age is respected and babies are objects of adoration. The self-respect of a man can be gauged by the number of his children, and the women seem to accept the yearly bearing of a child as a privilege. Both children and adults seem satisfied with the social opportunities offered within the family itself. The births, baptisms, chrisms, betrothals, marriages, and deaths furnish the occasion for ceremonial visits and festivities.
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Traditional religious forms and superstitions are observed on these occasions, but the church and the priest seem adjuncts rather than the center of the various rites.
The leaders of the village groups organize brother-hoods for the purpose of perpetuating the feast of the patron saint and to arrange the elaborate funerals with which they honor the dead. The societies meet each month, collect dues, have endless and excited discussions over the petty business that is transacted, with, however, most serious regard for rules of order. Some of the fratellanza have women's auxiliaries, but they are directed entirely by the men, and the women seem to have no voice in the conduct of affairs; they pay dues and march in the processions. The annual feast is the great event of the year, exceeded in importance by Easter only. The group responsible for a feast put up posters announcing the day and the program, and through committees arrange for all of the details of the celebration; electric-light festoons are strung across the streets, concessions for street booths are sold, bands are hired, band stands are erected, and the church is paid for a special mass and for the services of the priest who leads the procession. The whole community participates to some extent, but those from the village whose patron is being honored make the most elaborate preparation in their homes. . . . Those who have been ill or suffered physical injury during the year buy wax figures of- the part that was affected—legs, hands, breasts, etc., to carry in procession; others carry long candles with ribbon streamers to which money is affixed by a member of the brotherhood who rides on the shrine and exhorts the crowds to make their offering.
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The shrine is lowered to the street every hundred feet or so and little children are undressed, their clothes left as an offering, and they are lifted to kiss the lips of the saint. Sometimes a blind or lame child is carried about on the shrine in the hope of a miraculous cure. The climax is the flight of the angels. The shrine is set in the middle of the street in front of the church, and two children, dressed as angels and bearing armfuls of flowers, are lowered by strong ropes so that they are suspended just over the figure of the saint, where they sway while chanting a long prayer.
The offerings made during the most important of these feasts amount to from four to six thousand dollars. This money goes into the treasury of the fratellanza and is used for the expense incurred by the festa and for the death benefit. There are those who say that tribute is paid to certain individuals as well.
These feasts are not approved by the priest, and people say that trouble is started by the jealousy aroused when one village tries to outdo the other. It certainly is true that at these festas there is often a shooting.
The position of women in the Sicilian homes in this district is hard to define. The general impression is that women are slaves to their husbands, but this is far from true except in the cases of very ignorant and primitive types. The head of the family takes the responsibility of protecting the women and girls very seriously, and for this reason women have little life outside their homes. It is a mark of good breeding for a man to show "la gelosia" regarding his wife and daughters, and it would be a sign of disrespect to them if he did not guard
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them carefully. Within the home, however, the wife directs the household and it is not unusual for her to take the lead in family affairs, such as the expenditure of money, plans for the children, or the choice of friends.
When a girl reaches the age of twelve her freedom comes to an end; she is considered old enough to put away childish things. Until she is married she is not supposed to have any interest outside her home except school or work, and with these two exceptions she is not supposed to be out of her mother's sight. A family that fails to observe this rule is subject to criticism.
A marriage is arranged by the parents as soon as a suitable young man of their village presents himself. The girl is not consulted and often does not even know whom she is to marry until the matter is all settled. After a girl is promised her fiancé must be consulted before she can go out, and she never appears in public without her mother or father in attendance. It has become the custom to have a civil ceremony performed shortly after the betrothal. This does not constitute a marriage and often it is several months or even a year or two before the actual marriage takes place. Meanwhile the engaged couple meet only in the presence of their parents or attend various family ceremonies together, always suitably chaperoned.
Sometimes a girl is coveted by a man considered undesirable by her parents, or by one who did not know her before she was engaged. In such a case the man may try to force his attentions on her in the hope of attracting her in spite of her parents or her promise. If she does not respond and will not elope voluntarily, it is not unusual for him to try to
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take her by force, either carrying her off himself or getting his friends to kidnap her and bring her to some secret place. When a girl becomes engaged her family is on the lookout for just such occurrences, and if they have any suspicion that she is being pursued she is kept a prisoner until she is safely married. If the man is known he is dealt with in no uncertain way—told to stop or take the consequences.
If a girl permits herself to be kidnaped the affair is usually ended with the blessings of all concerned, though the jilted one sometimes makes it necessary for the couple to move to another part of town, at least until he consoles himself with another wife. If a girl is carried away entirely against her will there may be bloodshed as a result.
Not all kidnapings occur in this way; often impatient men, tiring of the long and ceremonious period of betrothal and failing to persuade the fiancée to elope, try to carry her away. A well-bred girl will put up a good fight to escape, and if she succeeds the engagement is broken; but if she is forced to submit the family accept the situation and all is forgiven. There are, of course, many voluntary elopements by young people who are attracted by one another and who, because of family differences, could never get the consent of their parents.
Seduction is an almost unheard-of thing among the foreign people and in the few instances where a girl has been wronged it has meant certain death to her betrayer. Not long ago a man seduced a young girl and left town when he discovered that she was pregnant. Her family moved from the district and after a few months the man, Piazza, returned. The girl's brothers met him and seemed friendly, so he agreed to visit their new home. Shots were heard
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by neighbors, and when the police arrived they found Piazza and the girl's oldest brother dead. The bodies were seated on opposite sides of the table and it is supposed that both drew and fired their revolvers simultaneously.
During the last four years there has been a great change, the colony is slowly disintegrating, old customs are giving way. Contacts with the outside world, through work and school, have given boys and girls a vision of freedom and new opportunity. They are going to night schools and making their friends outside the old circle. They are out of patience with the petty interests and quarrels of the older group and refuse to have their lives ordered by their parents, whom they know to be ignorant and in-experienced. Families are not being broken up, the deep affections still persist, and though the old folks have misgivings, in their indulgent way they -are letting the new generation take the lead and are proud of their progressive sons and daughters. Young married couples are making their homes north of the old district, within easy reach of their parents, but away from the old associations. Evidences of refinement are seen in their homes and in their manner, and their children are dressed and fed according to most modern standards.[3]
It appears from these statements: (1) that the Sicilian heritages are so different from the American that the members of this group feel no original interest in participating in American life; (2) that this dif-
( 159) -ference is accepted in America as a natural fact, somewhat as an, outlying herd of animals would be accepted and tolerated or exploited, without thought of its social incorporation; (3) that this solitary group is almost as inaccessible to superior individuals of its own nationality who might be its leaders as to American influence (see document 82, p. 104) ; and (4) that, nevertheless, the mass begins to dissolve and change, owing to informal contacts with American life, made especially by the younger generation, and certainly largely through the public school, which is the one point at which contact is formal and inevitable.
THE CHINESE
The personality of the individual is always more impenetrable to the student than are the institutions which represent him. While it is difficult, for example, to understand a Chinese, there is nothing mysterious about Chinese institutions. The more data we secure on them, the more we are impressed with their resemblance to our own.
The Chinese are pre-eminently a democratic and a village people. The different provinces are only loosely bound to the central government, and the people have
( 160) made many local alliances. There are in China (1) about 450 clans, the general purpose of which is defense against the central government, mutual aid in business and other affairs; (e) trade organizations, or guilds, with objects similar to those in Europe; (3) town and district councils, resembling the peasant communes and town councils of Europe and America.
In America the Chinese is even more help-less than the European immigrant. He finds more strangeness and prejudice, and the Chinese do not bring their families, and consequently cannot live in complete colonies. The result is the formation of communities of, men. The Six Companies and the various tongs represent the form taken by the community when not based directly on the. family. The following document, if read with reference to its provision and prohibitions, illustrates the character which Chinese community life tends to assume under these conditions : -
104. . . . People of the three districts of Heangshan, Tung-yuen, and Tsang-shing are required to report themselves at the company's room; otherwise the company will exercise no care for them in their concerns.
The entrance fee shall be ten dollars; if not paid within six months, interest will be expected... .
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No fees will be required from those proved to be invalids or from transient persons. . . . Disputes will not be settled between persons who have not paid the entrance fee. Members purposing to return to China must make the fact known to the agents, when their accounts will be examined, and measures will be taken to prevent it if the entrance fee or other debts remain unpaid. Strangers to the agents of the company must obtain security of persons who will be responsible for their character and debts. Members leaving clandestinely shall be liable to a fine of fifty dollars; and the security for a debt, for helping one thus to abscond, shall be fined one hundred dollars.
In the company's house there must be no concealment of stolen goods; no strangers brought to lodge; no gunpowder or other combustible material; no gambling; no drunkenness; no cooking (except in the proper quarters) ; no burning of sacrificial papers; no accumulation of baggage; no filth; no bathing; no filching of oil; no heaps of rags and trash; no wrangling and noise; no injury of the property of the company; no goods belonging to thieves; no slops of victuals. For the heavier of these offenses complaint shall be made to the police of the city; for the lighter, persons shall be expelled from the company. Baggage will not be allowed to remain longer than three years, when it must be removed; nor more than one chest to each person.
Invalids that cannot labor, are poor and without relatives, may be returned to China at the expense of the company for their passage money; but pro-visions and fuel and other expenses must be obtained by subscriptions. Coffins may be furnished for the poor, but of such a careful record shall be kept.
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Quarrels and troubles about claims in the mines should be referred to the company, where they shall be duly considered. If any should refuse to abide by the decision of the company, it will nevertheless assist the injured and defend them from violence. If, when foreigners do injury, a complaint is made and the company exerts itself to have justice done without avail, it ought to be submitted to. What-ever is referred for settlement to the assembly of the five companies conjointly, cannot be brought before this company alone.
Where a man is killed a reward shall be offered by the company for apprehension and trial, the money being paid only when he shall have been seized; the members of the company shall subscribe each according to what is just. If more than the anticipated amount is required, the friends of the deceased shall make up the deficiency. Complaint shall be made of offenders to the civil courts, and proclamations for their arrest shall be placarded in the principal towns; but anyone found guilty of concealing them shall pay all the expenses to which the company has been put. Difficulties with members of other companies shall be reported to the agents of this company, and, if justice demand, shall be referred for the judgment of the five companies conjointly. Offenses committed on shipboard, upon the sea, shall be referred to the five companies conjointly. Difficulties brought upon men by their own vices and follies will not receive attention. Thievery and receiving of stolen goods will not be protected; nor will troubles in bawdy houses nor those in gambling houses; nor debts to such; nor extortions of secret associations; nor the quarrels of such associations; nor those who are injured in
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consequence of refusal to pay their licenses; nor smuggling; nor any violation of American laws. The company will not consider complaints from a distance, of a doubtful character, or without sufficient proof. No reply will be made to anonymous letters, or those without date and a specification of the true origin and nature of difficulties. Names must be carefully given in all complaints from the interior. No payments of money will be made in the settlement of cases where the rules of the company are not complied with. Where the conduct of an individual is such as to bring disgrace on the company and upon his countrymen, he shall be expelled, and a notice to that effect be placarded in each of the five companies' houses; nor will the company be responsible for any of his subsequent villainies, or even make any investigation should he meet with any violent death. Costs connected with the settlement of disputes shall be borne by the party decided to be in the wrong. In difficulties of a pressing and important character in the mines a messenger shall be sent thence, and a judicious person shall at once accompany him to the place. In any quarrel where men are killed or wounded the person who originated it shall be held accountable. Any defensive weapons belonging to the company shall be given to individuals only after joint consultation, and the registry of their names. Those requiring such weapons of defense shall give security for their return. If any shall take them on their own responsibility they shall be held accountable for any consequences.[4]
105. The Chinaman only knows the company
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which brings him here. He does not know what he could do. He looks to his company for the food he eats when he lands here; he is taken care of by them; he is sent to the country by them here and there in the reclamation of swamp and submerged land.[5]
In addition, the Chinese have formed various more intimate associations or tongs, The word "tong" means "a society," but in China the term was restricted to the kin-ship group. Here it has become a term of general application. Thus the Hong Tuck Tong is the cigar makers' union, the Hong Wo Tong, the gold and silver workers' union. Three facts—(1) the absence of the family as a factor in community life; (2) the method of immigration (document 105), which is not arranged, in general, by correspondence with relatives and friends already in this country, and so does not result in the formation of settlements here based on kinship and acquaintance, as in the case of the European immigrants; and (3) the lack of all participation and prospect of participation in American life—have contributed to the formation of certain notorious and positively antisocial Chinese associations. Thus, the Hip Ye Tong and the Po Sang
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Tong have been connected with gambling and traffic in women, and the "highbinders," the Chi Kung Tong, have a general resemblance to the Italian Black Hand. We see here, as we shall see later in studying the Black Hand activities, that when the attitudes of a group are so far different from ours that it is neither willing nor able to participate in our society, its members tend to become a predatory element.
106. In general the highbinders . . . exist on. blackmail, on pay for protecting gambling houses and disreputable places in general. I know that they take it upon themselves to try cases, to review judgments of our courts with utter disregard for our laws. I know that they nullify our decisions. For instance, if an American court had rendered a decision, they would intimidate the witnesses so that when the cases go into a higher court everything would be changed. They defy our courts by ways. and means of their own. I know that they impose their own sentences upon offenders from their own standpoint. They levy fines in some cases and death in others. I know that they have in their service paid men to do the killing, and so long have they had this service that the men have a particular name; they are called "hatchet men." I know they control our judicial oaths; that they can say an oath shall or shall not be taken. I know them as organized societies of crime. . . . They distribute revolvers to their members . . . and I know they use our courts, if necessary, to enforce their decisions . . . by laying a charge against a certain
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Chinaman and having our judge pronounce the sentence. I know that these highbinders furnish witnesses for anything wanted at so much a head. I have had cases in which men have come forward to testify, and when the time came they were spirited away. I know that the headquarters of these societies are in San Francisco, but they have branches in Canada. Speaking approximately, I would say that there are as many as from 1,500 to 2,000 highbinders in San Francisco.[6]
107. To Lum Hip, salaried soldier:
It has been said that to plan schemes and devise methods and to hold the seal is the work of the literary class, while to oppose foes, fight battles, and plant firm government is the work of the military.
Now, this tong appoints salaried soldiers, to be ready to protect ourselves and assist others. This is our object.
All, therefore, who undertake the military service of this tong must obey orders and without orders you must not dare to act. If any of our brethren are suddenly molested, it will be necessary for you to act with resolute will.
You shall always work to the interest of the tong and never make your office a means of private revenge.
When orders are given you shall advance valiantly to your assigned task. Never shrink or turn your back upon the battlefield.
When a ship arrives in port with prostitutes on board and the grand master issues an order for you to go down and receive them, you must be punctual and use all your ability for the good of the commonwealth [or state].
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If in the discharge of your duty you are slain, we will undertake to pay $500 sympathy money to your friends.
If you are wounded, a doctor will be engaged to heal your wounds, and if you are laid up for any length of time you will receive $10 per month.
If you are maimed for life and incapacitated for work, $250 shall be paid to you and a subscription taken to defray costs of your journey home to China.
This paper is given as proof, as word of mouth may not be believed.
Furthermore, whenever you exert your strength to kill or wound enemies of this tong and in so doing you are arrested and imprisoned, $100 a year shall be paid to your friends during your imprisonment.
Dated 18th day of 5th month of 14th year of Kwong Sui, Victoria, B. C.
(Seal of Ches Kong Tong).[7]
THE JAPANESE
The Japanese in America have been treated by their home country as colonists here. The Japanese Empire has the bureaucratic type of efficiency, and the Japanese Association in America, with its various branches, is practically a department of the Japanese government. The accompanying map shows the cities in California having Japanese associations. It acts as a bureau of
( 168) information for the Japanese immigrants, registers and regulates them, and advises the home government as to problems arising
here. The Japanese are consequently the most efficiently and completely organized among the immigrant groups.
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108. The Japanese government has evinced an unusual interest in the whereabouts and activities of its subjects. The immigration companies developed out of it; emigrants have been treated, it would appear, almost as colonists. Certain obligations were laid upon the emigration companies to care for those emigrating through them, and under certain circumstances to provide for their return to the native land. Appeals to the government at home have been frequent and the response has been quickly made. The closeness of the relation between the government and its subjects, and the solicitude of one for the rights and welfare of the other, have been important in explaining the situation which has developed in the West.[8]
109. The Japanese Association was organized in 1900, at the time of the threatened outbreak of bubonic plague, when the Japanese and Chinese, being Asiatic races, were dealt with in a different manner from other races. The organization was effected to protect the "rights" of the Japanese. When the crisis due to the fear of bubonic plague ended, the Japanese organization was continued in existence, because of the strong anti-Japanese movement which had sprung up in San Francisco. Upon the renewal of this agitation in 1905 the association was reorganized and extended its activity to the entire state of California. Local associations were soon organized in no fewer than thirty-three different places. The general nature of the association is indicated by these details relating to its organization and reorganization. Its objects, as set forth in its constitution, are: (1) to elevate the character of the Japanese immigrants; (2) to promote association
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between Japanese and Americans; (S) to promote commerce, agriculture, and other industries; and (4) to further Japanese interests. The indefiniteness of this shows the general and elastic character of the association. It interests itself in whatever concerns the Japanese. In addition to this, the association has recently received recognition from the Japanese consulate, and has become an administrative organ of the consulate in issuing certificates of various kinds and in related matters.
110. In every community with which we are here concerned the Japanese have been well organized under so-called bosses. At Rialto four camps of Japanese were found, numbering about 100 in all. At Highgrove there were 110 under one boss. At Riverside there were some 700 Japanese under 7 bosses, one of them controlling 160, another 174 men, at the time of the agent's visit. At Redlands there were 175 Japanese in four camps. They were similarly organized at Colton and various other places.
The camps of Japanese are assembled by the boss or contractor from Los Angeles's lodging houses, Fresno, and other places where work is slack, and are made available for any kind of work on the most convenient terms. The offices are provided with telephones, by means of which orders are taken. Each day the required number of men is sent out to fill such orders as were received the night before. The ranch owner (and sometimes packer) pays the contractor for the work done and is not put to the inconvenience of paying each man employed as the work is completed or his employment ends. In some cases the employer receives at the end of the month
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a statement not unlike that submitted by a grocer or butcher.
This organization is very convenient for the small rancher, whose need for men varies greatly from week to week or even from day to day, and in the absence of which he must go to a village or elsewhere to hire the number of men required. It goes far in explaining the real preference of the small rancher or packer in many communities for Japanese laborers.
Another advantage in employing Japanese is that the majority of the pickers of that race own bicycles, so that they can easily reach work at a distance from their camps and can be transferred from one grove to another at a distance with little loss of time. The agent of the commission met several gangs of about fifty Japanese, all riding bicycles, in process of transfer from one place to another a mile or more away. Very few white pickers own bicycles, and so must walk to work or be provided with transportation.[10]
In the cities of the Pacific Coast the organization of the Japanese communities is much like that of an American community, as is indicated by document 111, showing the organization of business in Seattle, and the map showing the location of business and residence quarters in San Francisco. (Map 5, on p. 172:)
111. (1) Forty public and social institutions (e.g., Japanese Commercial Union, Tea Dealers Union,
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12 Prefectural Societies); (2) 14 schools and religious organizations; (3) 13 newspapers and magazines; (4) 5 banks; (5) 5 shipping corporations; (6) 40
trading companies; (7) 6 book dealers and printing houses; (8) 12 physicians and 1 hospital; (9) 8 dentists; (10) 11 midwives; (11) 6 masseurs; (12) 10 drug stores; (13) 18 contracting and commission
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agencies; (14) 9 interpreting insurance and general agencies; (15) 13 provision dealers; (16) 1% dealers in watches and phonographs; (17) 9 photograph, sign, artists'and sculptors'studios; (18) 5 manufacturers; (19) 22 general merchandise stores; (20) 7 ten-cent stores; (21) 31 tailors and dressmakers; (22) 138 hotels; (23) 4 moving picture theaters; (24) 40 grocers; (25) 83 fruit dealers; (26) 52 restaurants; (27) 22 shoe stores; (28) 5 furniture stores; (29) 24 express and taxi offices; (30) 74 barbers, etc.[11]
The map on page 174 shows the number and location of the Japanese cultural institutions in San Francisco. The latter include 27 provincial societies, 4 Buddhist churches, 2 consulates, 4 branches of the Japanese association, 1 manufacturers' association, 4 associations of business proprietors, 3 associations of agriculturists, 16 trade unions, 3 associations of professional men, 18 schools, 8 clubs, 7 newspapers, and the following branches of American organizations: 11 religious organizations, 1 boy scouts, 2 women's patriotic societies.[12]
The thrift, cleanliness, quickness, sobriety, industry, adaptability, eagerness to learn, of the Japanese are everywhere recognized.
112. In all cities of the West with more than a few hundred Japanese, there are schools the primary
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object of which is to teach adult Japanese the English language. The number of these institutions and the many Japanese who attended them at an earlier
time when many immigrants were arriving, are the best evidence of the ambition and eagerness of the members of this race to learn Western civilization. No adult immigrants in the West, unless it is the
(175) Hebrews, show as great desire to learn the English language.[13]
113. Mr. ——— came to this country eleven years ago. Nine years ago he purchased a farm and was joined by his wife and two small daughters. He now owns a walnut and fig ranch of thirty-six acres, which was bearing when he purchased it, and leases a vineyard besides. He occupies a cottage of five rooms; the house is in good repair, and it and the premises are well kept. The floors are well carpeted and as a part of the furnishings of the living room are four leather-seated oak chairs and a few well-framed lithographed pictures—all American. In the back parlor is a piano, and among the conveniences in the kitchen is found a standard washing machine. The two daughters had just begun to take music lessons from an American teacher. One of the girls was in the eighth grade, the other in the sixth. Both are thoroughly American in every respect save that they are more gracious and more polite than the average native child. Their Americanism had extended even to insisting upon having American dolls with blond hair and blue eyes.[14]
The efficiency of the Japanese is directly connected with the type of organization at home. We have pointed out that they had developed the principle of allegiance to an extraordinary and even fantastic degree. In the feudal period, for example, men committed suicide when the fortunes of their political leaders fell, and at one time this
( 176) practice became so prevalent that the government could counteract it only by decreeing that the wife and children of a man committing harakiri should be crucified. In this connection was developed that subordination of the individual to authority and that capacity for organized action which still distinguishes the Japanese, particularly in war. At the same time the treachery developed toward enemies in their local wars was as extreme as the allegiance within the group. There are many incidents in the wars between the Japanese clans which for treachery read like chapters from the life of Caesar Borgia.[15]
When, eventually, the isolation of the Japanese was broken down and they entered into commercial relations with the larger world, they showed the same bad faith and treachery in foreign business that they had used toward their domestic enemies. If, for example, a cargo of pig iron was ordered from England by a Japanese firm and the price of pig iron declined before the boat landed, the firm refused to accept the shipment. They had had none of that trading experience which makes the Chinese so notable for business integrity.
The Japanese displayed this same attitude in their first American contacts:
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114. The Chinese are entirely honest in all contractual relations. The confidence in them is so great that they usually pay no rent until the crops are harvested. The fruit-shipping houses frequently make loans to them on their personal unsecured notes. They do not abandon their leases. The standing of the Japanese, on the other hand, is much lower. They are usually required to pay a part of the cash rent in advance, the loans made by fruit shippers are secured by mortgages on the crops, and the loans are limited in amount to the value of the work done. In rather numerous cases they have abandoned their leases, with the result that in some instances there are two or more out-standing leases for the same land covering the same period, the land being leased to new parties as abandoned by others.
There is widespread complaint that the Japanese are unsatisfactory in other respects. It is commonly said that they neglect the orchards and teams furnished them and that farms leased to them are permitted to deteriorate rapidly. That there is some foundation for these complaints is shown by the very general preference shown for Chinese and the fact that leases are made to them for less rent than required of Japanese.[16]
115. The Mexicans were employed in thinning along with the Japanese, and worked on the same wage basis of so many cents per 1,000 feet, the rate varying according to the difficulty of the work. At first the Mexicans worked carefully and were content to make $1.50 a day. The Japanese, on the other hand, were able, by much less careful work,to make from $2.50 to $3 per day under
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advantageous conditions. The favor with which the growers naturally regarded the Mexicans alarmed the Japanese. Their leaders accordingly went to the Mexicans, it is said, and told them that they were foolish to be so careful with their work, pointing out the fact that they were making only $1.50 a day, while the Japanese "boys" were making twice as much. The Mexicans accepted the suggestion and are now regarded in this community with as little favor as the Japanese.[17]
116. The question as to whether a contract shall be kept or broken is apparently, in these cases, a commercial one, the answer depending upon the amount of money involved. If the contract prices, less advances already made by the growers, is greater than the expense of completing the work the contract will be fulfilled; if it is less, the contract will be broken. One instance is reported where a bond was required from the contractor for the faithful performance of his agreement.[18]
But precisely because of their historical traits of allegiance and organization the Japanese are capable of transforming their lives and practices more rapidly than any other immigrant group, and under the direction of the Japanese Association they are acquiring a reputation for business integrity. Because of their historical trait of allegiance also they are inclined to make more far-going concessions than any other group in
( 179) order to overcome American prejudice and secure status here. Like other immigrants they had the very natural practice of sending home for wives (called "picture brides"), but in response to American sentiment they have abandoned this practice. They have even gone so far as to undertake to limit their efficiency here in order not to provoke the resentment of Americans:
117. It is the sense of the Board of Directors of the Japanese Association that the so-called "picture marriage" which has been practiced among certain classes of Japanese residing in this country should be abolished because it is not only in contravention of the accepted American conception of marriage, but is also out of harmony with the growing ideals of the Japanese themselves. With this belief in mind the Board of Directors will make the utmost efforts to carry out this resolution. . .[19]
118. . . . The majority of these Japanese [criticized for working long hours] lacked educational opportunities at home. Recognizing this, it impels them to work very hard so that they can give their children a chance to get education. It is a well-known fact that the Japanese will do anything to get an education or to enable their children to obtain it... . We are advising them, as best we know how, not to work so hard as to cause their neighbors to criticize them, and to create some leisure for self-development. At the same time, it appears rather strange even to
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us that the Americans should complain of Japanese industry. . . .[20]
While these opportunistic concessions are not to be praised, they nevertheless indicate that the Japanese are making extraordinary efforts to be assimilated. They are not citizens, but their children are and they wish them to be. They are anxious to break up their own colonies, to engage in all sorts of occupations, to acquire American manners, and to get educational with the motive of adapting themselves to this country. Whether we like them or not, no other foreign-language group is so completely and intelligently organized to control its members, and no other group has at all equaled them in the work of accommodating themselves to alien conditions.
THE MEXICANS
There is an undetermined quantity of immigration from Mexico to the United States. The total Mexican population within our borders may be as much as 600,000,[21] and contains two elements :
(1) The old colonists in New Mexico,
( 181) southern California, and Texas, representing the population settled there before the Americans arrived. These retain their original culture and are still powerful in politics. The present governor at New Mexico is of Spanish-American descent.
(2) The immigrant labor coming in at present. About 50,000 Mexicans come northward annually, and perhaps 20,000 of these remain. There are Mexican colonies of recent origin in Austin, San Antonio, and Los Angeles. Documents 119 and 120 are characterizations of this element, by a track-master who has worked various kinds of labor in southern Kansas and by a railroad official, respectively :
119. Mexicans are better than Greeks or Italians, and next to the American hobo. They must be well fed, and want fresh beef and mutton, but don't eat so much pork. They don't have feuds and disorders like the Italians, who are always fighting unless the whole gang is from the same town in Italy. We send a man every spring to the Rio Grande to get our men for the summer. We have to keep our engagements with them or we can't get any men the next year. Though they are used to low pay at home, they want as much as anybody when they get to this country.[22]
120. We have worked Mexicans out of El Paso for several years, and since 1903 have substituted
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them for Italians, who were disorderly, and for negroes in northern Texas, nearly to Texarkana. They suit us better than any other immigrant labor we can get. They are better than negroes at ballasting, laying ties, and ordinary trackwork; but the negroes can beat them laying rails, and will work better long hours or at rush jobs, as in case of washouts or getting a track around a wreck. Our chief difficulties are due to ignorance of the language and to the rough ways of our foremen, who sometimes frighten the Mexicans so they won't work. Mexicans are not very regular, and we have to carry about 50 men on a payroll to be sure of 30 to 35 men working every day.[23]
The Mexicans are the least organized of all the groups. At the same time they show an easy adaptability to American habits and a surprising interest in education:
If Mexicans are an inferior people how is it that thousands of them are leaving their country where the booze flows freely and coming to a foreign country where it flows not at all? Isn't it a sign that the Mexican wants a chance to prosper where prosperity is for all? . . . They come to Texas, to Arizona, New Mexico, and California; they work, they buy red and blue clothes, they eat, they smoke, they drink coffee and tea, and chew ice-cream cones, they invest in large white hats, nickel cigars, and other unwonted luxuries. In short, they emerge promptly on a higher plane of living than they ever before experienced. Furthermore, they obey the
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laws, respect authority, and prosper according to their capacity.[24]
122. . . . Since childhood, I have always had a peculiar affection and a profound admiration for those who impart instruction—those who, by shaping the intelligence, brighten up the future, and allow a clear background for life's struggle; but since I have become a mother I realize the magnitude of so difficult a task, and even more than ever hold these privileged ones in love and veneration. With such a concept, is it any wonder that I feel moved, that I admire, that I hold to-day more than ever, unlimited gratitude toward this blessed institution in which I receive, in company with many other mothers and young women, the incalculable benefit of its instruction to us? By this instruction we are allowed to take another step toward progress and an open future for ourselves and our children. Where can we find wise counsel in perfecting our intelligence so that we may be able to develop and cultivate that of our beloved children, and how else can we discover a worthy and honorable means of aiding and advising our families when necessary?
I do not know how to express the thousand thoughts which crowd my mind and echo from the bottom of my heart! Words fail me—this subject which concerns me is so great, so beautiful and so sublime—KNOWLEDGE ! A magic word which, with its few letters, embraces a world of happiness; a glorious word which, as "Let there be light" to the uncreated, scatters the shadows of this horrible darkness which
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abandons us without a guide on the edge of a precipice. . .[25]
In transmitting the address of which document 122 is an extract, the secretary for non - English - speaking women, South-western Field Committee of the Y. W. C. A., says:
123. These sentiments are quite typical for hundreds of Mexican women in Texas. Now and then our workers have to win the support of their husbands, but for the most part the men are eager to have their wives study. We do not use our efforts on the very poor peon-class women, unless they come to us or stay by the things we start. The middle class is very much more worth while, and Mexico's greatest need is the development of this class as rapidly as possible. The aristocrats are most in need of socializing, but, as with the peon class, the effort spent is too great, considering the scarcity of qualified workers, unless they come fairly easily. Our hands are full helping those who crave—we simply cannot keep up with the demand for English, American cookery, home nursing, etc.[26]
There is in the state of New Mexico a Mexican community about three hundred years old, of peculiar interest to our study because it shows how long an alien group
( 185) may remain on American soil without change or improvement if it brings a low level of culture, no leaders, no institutions for pre-serving and developing its characteristic culture or appropriating the surrounding American culture, no channels of communication with the culture of the mother country, which in this case is also low. These conditions and a particular geographic and psychic isolation characterize the Spanish-Americans of New Mexico.
We have selected the county of Taos and the towns of San Juan and Chamita for special investigation.
124. In New Mexico the Mexican is less industrious and less thrifty than the Indian. Every self-respecting Indian has good clothes put away which he can don on occasion, but the Mexican, if he has good clothes, cannot resist the temptation to wear them. Both gamble, but the Mexican far more than the Indian. Of the two, the Indian is more likely to have a bank account. The Indian is less likely to run in debt and the storekeeper, who has been here fifty years, says he has never lost an account with an Indian, even though he has had to wait many years, but he cannot trust a Mexican very far. A Mexican is disposed to consider that an account liquidates itself by long standing. [27]
125. About 20 per cent of the Mexicans at Chamita can read their own language. Less than 5
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per cent can read or speak English (in other districts the percentage is much higher, in some lower). They have no knowledge of politics outside their own locality and have strong Mexican sympathies. They are inordinately ignorant and superstitious about common things. Though less prejudiced than Indians, they are even less provided with the means of production and add nothing to the country's wealth. The literary and musical instincts are strong in them, but so little known to the public that I can name but one collection of their songs, half a dozen, translated and published by Charles Lummis in The Land of Poco Tiempo. Naturally handicraftsmen, all their crafts are in abeyance.[28]
126. Of the 13,000 present population of Taos County, it is estimated that 10,000 speak Spanish by preference. There is one county high school in Taos County with nineteen pupils enrolled. There are forty-four school districts, employing eighty-three teachers. The names of all these teachers except twelve are Spanish. . . . Only four of the twelve are, to my personal knowledge, without any Spanish strain, and two of these four are Sisters of the Order of Loretto—Sister May McGinnes, and Sister Ann Gartin (French)... .
None of the public schools in Taos County have libraries. Aside from the books on the teacher's desk, there is not a book available to school children in the whole county. There are no town libraries, and it is possible to travel the whole day in some districts, visiting every house en route, and not find any book of any description other than a mail-order catalogue or an occasional Spanish prayer book....
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The Mexican is not really an agriculturist, but a handicraftsman. He is patient in craft and a shrewd and ready trader in things. But he has never learned to manage money. . . . The chief economic reasons for the discontinuance of the handicrafts among them is their inability to take the measure of their work in money. Curio dealers and others lie in wait to purchase their beautiful things at the moment of their greatest need. They have no way of finding out what these hand-made things are worth. All they know is that the Americans give them less for the things than they can live on. They begin to feel that these things are of no value because the Americans always cheapened them to the utmost.. . That is one reason why certain of their old crafts survive only among the convicts. I have seen a convict take half a silver dollar and spend three or four hours working it into a bracelet such as would sell at Tiffany's for three or four dollars, and then some passing tourist will beat the convict down to selling his work for sixty or seventy cents. But a convict's time is not worth anything. I have seen some Americans who has "spotted" a blanket, or a beautiful old hand-carved chest, wait until sickness or want forces its sale for less than the purchaser could buy a "store" blanket or new lumber to make another chest. Then the Americans rail against the shiftlessness of the Mexican... .
One of the reasons why few Mexicans grow rich is the ineradicable spirit of communism. If a man kills a sheep and his neighbor has no sheep to kill, still the neighbor has a piece of mutton. If a man knows a good wild pasture, or a woman a nice thicket of wild plums, they tell the others. The idea of personal advantage is of very little effect among them.
(188) In the old days, if a Mexican found a silver mine, all his friends went along and dug out a little bag of ore apiece. This sort of communism is now principally confined to the family. There is scarcely such a thing as a rich relation, because the thrifty relation seldom has enough, after dividing with the other members, to be called rich. This economic interest probably has something to do with the importance attached to kinship, and particularly to the parental relationship. There is no doubt that family claims prevent private ambition. Many Mexican men have told me this. They wished to go to school, to go away into other towns, to big cities or more prosperous places to live, but they have yielded to the plea of their parents, especially of the mother, to keep the family intact.. .
The great lack in the life of the Spanish-speaking New Mexican is imaginative literature. During the Spanish pioneer period this lack was supplied partly by the last wash of that wave of creative literature which was sweeping through Spain at the time, Calderon, Lope de Vega, and the great Spanish romanticists. It was supplied in part by the dramatic and stimulating history of their own achievement in New Spain. There are traces, too, in the folklore of New Mexico, of the rich, and at that time unsubmerged, field of native Mexican literature. By the time of the American occupation all these streams of imaginative life had been attenuated, if not actually dried up, and nothing has been done since to remedy the situation.
. The County Superintendent of Schools told me that 50 per cent of the adult Spanish-speaking population of New Mexico ought, in view of the history of public school education in this locality, to be able
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to read the local Spanish newspaper. I hardly think this is actually the case. I have seen groups of men listening to one of their number reading the paper aloud, and the reader was almost always a young man. Of the two Spanish newspapers published in Taos, El Bulletin has a circulation of about 800, and La Revista has about 3,000, one-third of which are out of the county. La Revista was once the leading Spanish newspaper in America, and still has exchanges all over the world. . . . But even if they could read Spanish, very little reading matter finds its way here. The church is exceedingly negligent in this matter. A little literature from Old Mexico finds its way here, but is naturally expensive. The better-class Spanish families all read English and have no books in Spanish in their houses.
When it comes to English reading matter the case is scarcely better. At this time there is probably not a Spanish-speaking family which has not some member with enough English to read the newspaper, the mail-order catalogue, and such practical necessities. But the number who would be able to read and understand English literature is even less than the number who can appreciate Spanish literature. A glance at the school reading explains this. There is nothing whatever in any Taos County school to read except the textbooks. There is nothing what-ever in any textbook which would create in any child's mind the least suspicion that reading is a method of coming into touch with its environment. This country has a beautiful and dramatic mythology, but there is only Greek mythology in the school readers. On his way to school the child is confronted with an abundant and beautiful flora, but the references in the reader are to English daffodils and New
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England Mayflowers. He reads about Bunker Hill, but nothing about Black Mesa. Fray Marcos and De Vargas are not even names to him....
The most outstanding conclusion from all this is that in our handling of our Spanish-speaking population we have violated all the fundamentals of folk growth. First of all, the best thing in the Spanish-American peoples is their pride of race. It is the one thing more than another by which we could have laid hold of and awakened their pride of citizenship. Instead of which we needlessly wounded and poisoned it at every step. Through our earliest representatives we made a mock of their love of ritual, of dignity and ceremony in personal relations. "Americans," said Don Amado Chaves to me, "think dignity and ceremony belong only to the rich."
We have ignored their racial contribution of fine deeds—the early history of New Mexico is crammed with gallant and adventurous exploits—and overlaid them with the achievements of the Anglo Saxon strain, thus destroying all the power of their past over their ideals of conduct. And even if it were possible to substitute the past of one people for the past of another, we have made an utterly inadequate attempt to do so, for we have hardly so much as succeeded in interesting them in the facts of our Anglo-Saxon past. It is not a paradox to say that a people with no past is a people without a future, it is a simple statement of fact, like saying that a tree with no roots produces no fruit... .
Not the slightest attempt was ever made to find a market for the sort of thing that is being constantly imported from Italy and Spain. There were no fairs, exhibitions, prizes, honors, none of the things that we know very well are the medium in which artistry
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flourishes. And on the other hand, there have been all sorts of mean trickery used to buy their products for less than their worth, smuggle them out of the country, and sell them for many times what they cost. An American woman in Taos who insists on paying something like a reasonable price for hand-made products is accused of "spoiling" the trade of the other people.
That has been one end of the process. At the other end is the destruction of the source of art in the suppression of their native stock of myth and symbol from which their designs were derived. More and more, as I study New Mexican, Indian, and Spanish groups, I discover design to be a language of profound experience.
The way in which certain beautiful things are shown to be peculiar to certain localities or even to certain families, the way in which these designs sink out of sight and reappear after generations in times of spiritual distress, indicates that the things them-selves have grown up out of experience as an expression of that experience, and perish with it... .
These people do not need missionaries. All they need is to have the burden of their isolation lifted, to have the stopped currents of their imaginative life freed on the one side by giving them access to their own history and traditions, and on the other by giving them markets for the products of imagination and industry.[29]
127. The organization known as Los Hermanos Penitentes (The Penitent Brotherhood) is the most important society of the Spanish-speaking population of the Southwest, and the only organization
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discoverable among the Mexican population of San Juan. It has some 50,000 members in the state of New Mexico, and spreads into Colorado and Old Mexico. Although a religious organization, it exercises great influence in politics and in the social life of the communities where it is found. . . . [Discountenanced by the Catholic Church in 1896,] the society continued to flourish, applied for and obtained a charter from the legislature, which permitted it to exist on the same footing as other secret organizations. As late as thirty years ago it is estimated that 95 per cent of the adult male population of New Mexico belonged to it... .
The avowed object of the society is to keep alive the "passion and sufferings of Our Lord." Special saints' days, the first and second days of May, and funerals of brother members, are celebrated with penitential exercises. The whole of Lent is kept with prayers and lashings, and Holy Week is celebrated with all manner of penitential practices, including crucifixion. Formerly the crucifixion was actual, and deaths as a result were not uncommon. But since 1886 it has become the custom simply to tie the victim to the cross, instead of using nails. And lately the practice of using an effigy, life size, has been general. Even where the brother is still tied to the cross the time has been reduced from three hours to about forty-five minutes.
Among the penitential practices are the carrying of heavy crosses in procession, walking on trails strewn with cactus, carrying heads of cactus on the bare back or clasped to the bare breast, hugging a post wrapped with cactus, cutting the back and lashing it with braided whips of yucca fiber. Penitential pilgrimages made on hands and knees are
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also a favorite mode of expression. Formerly these practices were all as public as possible, but the attitude of the Church and unfavorable comment in the non-Catholic press have led to secrecy. The crucifixions still take place at the prescribed afternoon hour, but whipping is done in the lodge or at night, when most of the processions take place. .
Besides the special services for saints' days, the processions begin with the first Friday in Lent. These are whipping processions, when the heavy crosses, weighing several hundred pounds, are dragged to and from the Calvarios by men half naked and wearing crowns of the wild-rose brier. Every penitent is accompanied by a brother who eases him to the ground at each one of the fourteen stations. But when a man staggers and faints he is whipped to his feet. . . . Aid is furnished to sick members and funeral expenses are borne when necessary... . Political aid and legal aid in difficulties are also rendered, but not openly or officially. Formerly the solidarity of the Penitentes made the society a refuge for outlaws of every description, and aided the Spanish-speaking population to maintain its isolation from the American régime. As nearly every adult male is a member, it is natural that the whole community should be more or less involved... . Brotherly service in sickness and affliction is rendered, and the rules of the order act occasionally as a social corrective. . . . A married man was expelled from the order for misbehavior with a young woman. These are offenses against the families of brother Penitentes. When the offense is against the law of the state, however, there seems still to be a disposition to regard the offender as simply unfortunate.
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Commenting on the small number of civil cases in one of the communities where 90 per cent of the population was Spanish-speaking, I was told: "You see, they are all Penitentes up there." On inquiry, I learned that most disputes between Penitentes came before the Hermanos Mayor and that there was seldom any exception to his decisions. The following was a partial list of the matters that had come: before him: (1) damages caused by a cow in neighbor's garden; (2) quarrel about wood purchased; (3) several cases of small debts; (4) young man forbidden to marry a girl by her father on account of personal prejudice, settled in the young man's favor; (5) widower with small children reproved for neglect of them; (6) mother whose son was in France (a Penitent) helped to get her allowance which she was too ignorant to apply for.
In spite of the alien attitude toward the law, and the fact that that no Penitent on a jury will convict another Penitent, there was a large percentage of voluntary enlistments among them, and at the Holy Week celebrations this year, in the processions, were numbers of young men in uniform with foreign-service stripes.. .
Thus the Penitentes, with its religious fervors, its ritual and mystery, its friendly offices for the dead, its annual processions and dramatic performance of Holy Week, has grown deep into the life of the people.[30]
There are old and cultivated Spanish-American families in New Mexico, still powerful in politics (the present Governor is a Spanish-American), and the state has
( 195) modern schools, industries, political administration, but these institutions mean that the country is being settled by Americans. The mass of the Mexican population remains as little adapted to these institutions as the Indians of the state.
The whole situation shows what may happen to an immigrant group when it neither participates in American life nor continues to draw its culture from the mother country. We shall notice later that even when an immigrant community does keep up its cultural intercourse with the home country, if it does not participate in American life, its level of culture tends to fall below the level of culture of the home country.
At present the situation in New Mexico is ripe for a nationalistic movement, if the leaders appear.
THE JEWS
The Jews tend even more than other immigrant groups to settle in cities. It is estimated that there are 3,320,000 Jews in America, and of these 1,500,000 are in New York City.[31] The accompanying diagram compares the number of Jews in New York
(196) with those in other countries. If we include Newark, New Rochelle, and other near-by towns, then within a district equivalent in size to thirty square miles will be found fully one-half of the Jews in the United States.
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128. No doubt this figure will cause astonishment. to many. One million and a half Jews is an extraordinary community. The next largest Jewish community in the world—that of the city of Warsaw is estimated to have been between 800,000 and 330,000 Jews, about one-fifth as many as we estimate for New York. All of the countries of western Europe, together with the countries of South America, Canada, and Palestine combined, do not have as many Jews as live in this city. If we accept the estimate of the number of Jews in the world as about 14,000,000, one Jew out of every ten resides in New York.[32]
It costs the Jews of New York $3,19.0,000 a year to eat kosher meat, over and above the normal cost of meat,[33] and they spend annually on Yiddish newspapers alone, $2,097,453.[34]
129. This estimated 1,500,000 constitutes over 25 per cent of the whole population of New York City. This is by far the largest proportionate group among any of the 10 largest American cities; in the 9 next largest cities, the average proportion which the Jewish group, constitutes of the general population is slightly under 10 per cent. In the 69. remaining cities which have a population over 100,000, the respective Jewish populations average 4.5 per cent of the total group. For cities of the second class (those having a population between 50,000 and
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100,000) the average proportion of Jewish inhabitants is shown to decline quite evenly as the population figures for the respective cities are ranged in decreasing order, from 3.3 per cent for cities of from 90,000 to 100,000 each, to 2.4 per cent for those of from 50,000 to 60,000 each. Continuing this curve, the average percentage of Jewish population in cities of between 20,000 and 50,000 falls to a trifle over 2 per cent, in still smaller localities to a little over 1 per cent, and in places having less than 1,000 inhabitants to 1/2 to 1/4 of 1 per cent.[35]
The Jews come to this country more definitely as settlers than any other group, but they come from many countries: Russia, Rumania, Poland, Galicia, Germany, Turkey, etc. Most of them speak Yiddish in addition to the language of the country from which they come (Russian, Polish, Rumanian, Hungarian, and so forth), but there are various dialects of Yiddish, and the Jews from the Near East do not know Yiddish, but speak Greek, Ladino (Judaeo-Spanish), Turkish, Arabic, and so forth. In their religious ritual they may be orthodox, conservative, or reform. There are among them members of the pietistic, mystical, magical Chassidic sect; and at the other extreme are the freethinkers. Consequently the differences and mutual prejudices between
( 199) different groups of Jews may be as great as those between members of different nationalities, and these inner divisions affect both their institutional life and their personal relations:
130. The Spanish and the Portuguese Jews found it difficult in the first half of the last century to admit whole-heartedly the German Jew to a close kinship with them—a difficulty which the German Jews experienced almost half a century later with the Jews hailing from Russia, and the Russian Jews in their turn only a decade later with the Jews coming from Galicia and Rumania. Because of this clannishness, several Jewish communities sprang up practically side by side in New York City; a Spanish-Portuguese community, a German community, a Russian community, an Oriental community, and a Galician, a Hungarian and a Rumanian community. Almost every one of these communities was self-sufficient, with its own synagogues, charitable and educational institutions, and, what was inevitable, with its own politics. Under such conditions, the least untoward act, fancied or real, on the part of one group, led inevitably to strong separatistic tendencies in other groups. So, for instance, did the ascendancy of the German community result in the struggle of the so-called Downtown against Uptown, a struggle in which the combatants were mainly Russian and German Jews. In the same way did the sense of grievance which the Galician, Rumanian, Russian-Polish, and Bessarabian Jews felt against the ascendancy of the Russian Jewish community find its outlet in the formation of separate Verbands. For the Verbands, in spite of their voluble protestations of good intentions, were invariably organized as
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offensive and defensive alliances, a sort of Verein sur Abwehr des Anti-Galizianerismus or Anti-Rumanieriemus, as the case might be. Only subsequent conditions changed their Original plans and induced a new course of development.[36]
131. The Levantine Jews are very much isolated from the great Yiddish-speaking mass of Jews all about them. According to one of their spokesmen, Joseph Zedalicia, president of the Federation of Oriental Jews, the Levantine Jews "feel more discrimination from the other wings of the Jews than they do from the non-Jews." Part of the problem is that the Jews themselves, especially those of the lower East Side communities—at least up until recently—did not actually realize that these very new immigrants were also Jewish. They looked on these "Spanioles" among them as "dagoes." Instances of street disturbances and neighborhood disputes and complaints have been numerous. Some years ago a group of residents in one section petitioned the mayor at the time, Mr. Gaynor, to remove the "Turks" in their midst. When they found that these people were Jews they hastened to settle the matter "among themselves."[37]
132. I am a Galician Jew and . . . God destined me to have a Russian [Jewish] wife and it is a misfortune for me—not because she feeds me with their Russian dishes, which are not bad, but the Russian company she brings up to our house is unbearable .. .
[detailed complaint] .[38] —
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( 202)
The preceding map indicates the Jewish synagogues in a section of New York, showing the wide diversity in origin of their founders. Only the Jews themselves appreciate how profound are these differences. While their spiritual life is based on the same historical traditions, the different groups have lived in different ghettos as separate, self - governing communities, suspicious of any intrusion whatever into their affairs. The group of Jewish leaders who organized the Kehillah, of which we shall speak later, have recorded this separatist attitude :
133. . . Quite a number of societies actually succeeded in withholding the information from us. The history of this huge canvass is full of episodes which are of great interest to the communal student. Here is a typical case. A congregation in Williams-burg is written to for information. No answer. It is written to again, with the same result. A canvasser is detailed to the job. He finds the beadle and states his errand. This dignitary is noncommittal. An inquiry for the home address of the president elicits the doubtful information that he, the beadle, does not know it. The card is then returned to the office with the brief narrative. A special investigator is sent. He uses strategy, spends an hour in fraternizing with the disgruntled old beadle, treats him to an extra-fine brand of tobacco, and finally obtains the address of the president. This gentle-man is too conscientious to impart any information
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whatsoever without the consent of his fellow-members. After the next meeting the information will be forth-coming. But it does not. The congregation fears a trap. You may fool some people, but you cannot fool them. The congregation is ultimately listed among those marked "no information available. ..."[39]
The Jew, like the peasant, first settled here in a colony, the ghetto. This is not a new experience. Indeed he may have lived in several ghettos, Vilna, Budapest, London, before he makes his way to America. We call the territories in which the Jews and other immigrants first settle here areas of first settlement. The lower East Side, the upper East Side, in the neighborhood of 110th Street and Central Park, Brooklyn,, Brownsville, East New York, are such areas for the Jews.
134. Within an area of first settlement are found the customs and institutions of the home country; language and social ritual, dress and food habits, the familiar notions of neighborly relations, the traditional sanctions in family and personal conduct. Here are set up in their essential forms the patterns of community and family organization under which the individuals of the group lived in their European homes; the synagogue as it exists in the towns of the Pale, the primitive forms of burial and mutual aid societies, unmodified by the transplanting to a new geographical environment. Spiritually, the old
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environment itself is transplanted. The greater number of the synagogue and benefit society groups, among all of the several divisions of the. Jews of the East Side, are organized on the basis of common origins in Europe. The name of such a synagogue or aid society indicates that it has been formed by a group of persons who emigrated from the same village or city in the Old World'; its purpose and organization is the same as it would be in the home village; coming together to pray, visiting the sick, caring for the burial of a member who has died, etc. The pattern of action is the same as it would be in the home village, and the feelings which keep it alive are those traditional sentiments of neighborly kinship and religious responsibility to which the same organization in Europe answered.[40]
As the Jews become more prosperous they begin to move to better quarters of the city, and the neighborhoods of Fourteenth Street and Second Avenue, the Bronx, are areas of second settlement. Finally the Jew may separate himself completely from his original colony and repudiate it. The contempt of the ghetto Jew for the allrightnick (see documents 44 and 81, pp. 52 and 102), is connected with this movement.
135. . . . I visited a friend of mine in Riverside Drive--a Russian-English Jew who spent the last few years in Palestine. We took the bus. He .. . began to talk to me in Jewish and in a loud voice... .
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At Thirty-fourth Street and Fifth Avenue we changed busses. My friend continued his loud conversation in Jewish. "Please, do not speak Jewish around here," we heard a voice behind us. . . . It was the transfer agent of the bus company. . . . And he repeats his request in Jewish this time. "Why?" my friend asks him. "Just so. They won't have it." "Who won't have it?" "These people," and he points to the great crowd who daily pass this corner in the afternoon. . . . But they consist of many Jews. . . [41]
Although it has lost its hold upon great numbers, the synagogue, including the activities associated with it, remains the most important feature in the life of the Jewish community as a whole, with the possible exception of the newspaper. The "synagogue Jew" is passing away. He has be-come a descriptive phrase and a literary type, but the attitudes created by the synagogue remain. The character of the Jew is the joint production of the hostility of the Gentile world and the communal life of which the synagogue was the center. The fact that the Jews pay the amount mentioned above for kosher meat is proof that the old attitudes are alive.
136. The function of the synagogue was not limited to that of defense. Like the moated mediæval
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castles, which outwardly with their bastions and moats have all the appearance of fortresses, but which from the inner courts present the aspect of palaces intended to house and enrich a life of peace, so the synagogue not only protected the Jewish faith from a hostile world, but was also for the Jew a home for the development of his strivings and ideals. It was a house of prayer, a "beth tephillah," a house of study, a "beth ha'midrash," and a meeting house, where communal undertakings were formulated, and where all plans for the communal good were discussed and adopted. The synagogue rendered possible the cultivation of the spiritual life in the Diaspora, and thus gave point to the truth that wherever the Jewish people went it was accompanied by the "shekhina," or Divine Presence.
Establishing a synagogue or being affiliated with one was not considered a matter of option. It was an accepted principle that wherever there were ten Jews they were in duty bound to form themselves into a congregation, and to carry on all the customary Jewish communal activities. While the Jew is in a position to discharge most of his religious duties by himself, it was realized that detachment from communal life could not but eventually lead to complete severance from the faith. Hence the designation of "evil neighbor" for one who, though living near a synagogue, kept aloof from it. That accepted principle it was which, enforced by the sanction of public sentiment, brought every Jew within the influence of-the synagogue.[42]
137. The total number of permanent synagogues in Manhattan, by actual count from the list given in the Communal Register (pp. 544 ff.), is 597; the
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total count for all the boroughs of Greater New York, from the same list, is 843, those of Manhattan constituting, therefore, about 70 per cent of the number in the greater city.
The area within which the synagogues in lower Manhattan are concentrated falls within the boundaries of three conjoined Kehillah Districts—the Tompkins Square District (Dist. VII of the New York Kehillah), the Delancey District (Dist. VIII), and the East Broadway District (Dist. IX). Within these districts fall also the areas of greatest density of Jewish population [see Map No. 7 p. 201]. This is also the region of greatest concentration of the mutual aid societies. Out of the 968 organizations of this character listed in the Communal Register, 823 are located in these three districts of the lower East Side. The next largest number, 83, belong to the West Side and Harlem District. East Harlem has 28, Central Manhattan, 19; Yorkville, 9. Only 7 are given for the two districts of the Bronx. Among all the districts the East Broadway District makes second largest provision of synagogues -12.2 per 10,000 of population; the Delancey District, which has the largest population, making also largest synagogue provision—i.e., 15.3 per 10,000 of population.[43]
138. The synagogue has lost hold on more than one-half of the largest Jewish community in the world. The estimated Jewish population of this city is about 1,500,000, which is a very conservative figure. But' taking into consideration the 30 per cent who constitute the child population up to the
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age of fourteen, and allowing 10 per cent for adolescent Jewish girls, who, unfortunately, have hardly any place in the synagogue, we should expect at least 900,000 seats to accommodate Jewish worshipers on the high holidays, when the maximum attendance is reached. We find, however, the total seating capacity to be 381,000. If we add to that the 30,000 to 35,000 seats to be found in the 120 small synagogues not yet investigated, we see that out of 900,000 Jews only about 415,000 are synagogue Jews.
Secondly, we observe the remarkable unevenness in the per cent of the population affiliated with the synagogues, when judged by districts. Whereas in the Delancey District 44 per cent are synagogue Jews in Bushwick and in Richmond only 7 per cent, in West Queens only 2 per cent, worship in synagogues. It is evident that the density of population, economic conditions, and length of stay in this country have so rapid an effect upon synagogue affiliation that we cannot but infer that the synagogue owes its existence more to the momentum of the past than to any new forces created in this country that make for-its conservation and development.[44]
In 1908 the more self-conscious Jews of New York, recognizing that the old community agencies were no longer adequate to control the moral life of the vast Jewish population, that the various Jewish communities and agencies in New York did not know one another and were not known by
( 210) the Americans, realizing the value of organization both for the regulation of their community life and as a power for influencing American opinion, and aroused by a statement of Commissioner Bingham that the Jews contributed 50 per cent of the criminals of New York City,[45] undertook to unite all the Jewish communities and organizations into one Kehillah, or Jewish community. The first step was to make an inventory and an impartial interpretation of all Jewish community activities in New York City, and the result was published in 1918 as the Jewish Communal Register. This volume of 1,536 pages lists and describes 3,637 organizations: synagogues, burial societies, immigrant aid societies, employment bureaus, loan societies, mutual aid societies, lodges, relief societies, day nurseries, child-caring agencies, hospitals and convalescent homes, old-age homes, institutions for defectives, correctional agencies (prevention of delinquency, after-care of inmates of prisons), research bureaus, technical, religious, and private schools, and so forth. The total amount spent annually by the Jewish communal agencies in New York City for Jewish purposes is approximately $17,657,000, not
( 211) including social clubs and theaters, but including the Yiddish newspapers.
THE POLES
In Polish-American society the parish is the center of community life, but the formation of the colony precedes the formation of the parish. Wherever Poles are collected for work, other Poles join them from the old country, and the colony grows spontaneously. The first organization is a mutual aid society. It is only when the colony has grown in numbers that a priest is called. But when the parish is established in America, it has a much larger social function than it has in Poland. It assumes, to a degree, the character of a commune.
139. Just as the benefit society is much more than a mutual insurance company, so the Polish-American parish is much more than a religious association for common worship under the leadership of a priest. The unique power of the parish in Polish-American life, much greater than in even the most conservative peasant communities in Poland, cannot be explained by the predominance of religious interests, which, like all other traditional social attitudes, are weakened by emigration, though they seem to be the last to disappear completely. The parish is, indeed, simply the old primary community reorganized and concentrated. In its concrete totality it is a substitute for both the narrower but more coherent village
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group and the wider but more diffuse and vaguely outlined okolica. In its institutional organization it performs the functions which in Poland are fulfilled by both the parish and the commune. It does not control the life of its members as efficiently as did the old community, for, first .of all, it seldom covers a given territory entirely and is unable to compel everyone living within this territory to belong to it; secondly, its stock of socially recognized rules and forms of behavior is much poorer; thirdly, the attitudes of its members evolve too rapidly in the new condition; finally, it has no backing for its coercive measures in the wider society of which it is a part. But its activities are much broader and more complex than those of a parish or of a commune in the old country.[46]
The priest and the parish committee are careful to select a site for the church as close as possible to the centers where Poles work, and in a locality where rent is low and land is cheap. There follows a further territorial concentration of Poles. The original population—Italians, Germans, Irish—slowly moves out as the neighborhood be-comes predominantly Polish. The parish thus becomes the community. Polish business is developed, associations of the type enumerated in document 140 are formed, affording their members economic advantages, social entertainment, a field for
( 213) economic co-operation, educational opportunities, help in expressing and realizing their political ideals, and a congenial social , milieu in which the desires for recognition and response are satisfied. Even Poles who are not religious are thus drawn into the parish institutions.
The following document, 140, is an enumeration of the organizations connected with the largest Polish parish in America St. Stanislaw Kostka, in Chicago; document 141 characterizes one of these organizations.
140. Zuaves of St. Stanislaw Kostka; Society of the Virgins of the Holy Rosary; Brotherhood of the Young Men of St. Joseph; Citizens' Club of Thaddeus Kosciuszko; Theater and Dramatic Club; the Parochial School; the Parish Committee; the Association of Altar Boys; the Marshals of the Upper Church; the Marshals of the Lower Church; the Arch-sorority of the Immaculate Heart of Mary (two groups); the Women of the Holy Rosary (four groups) the Arch-brotherhood of the Saints; the Third Order of St. Francis; the Choirs of the Upper Church; the Choirs of the Lower Church; the Club of Ladies of Queen Labrowska; the Society of the Alumni of the Parish School; the Musical and Literary Society of Leo XIII; the Needlework Club of St. Rose of Lima; the Polish Roman Catholic Union (central office); the Society of St. Cecilia (No. 14 of the R. C. Union); the Society of King John III Sobieski under the patronage of the Most Holy Virgin Mary; Queen of the Polish Crown (No. 16 of the R. C. Union) ;
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the Society of the Most Holy Name of Mary (No. 2 of the R. C. Union); the Society of St. Stanislaw the Bishop (No. 81 of the R. C. Union) ; the Society of St. Walenty (No. 847 of the R. C. Union); the Society of the Heart of Jesus (No. 32 of the R. C. Union); the Society of St. Stefan (No. 318 of the R. C. Union) ; the Society of St. Nicholas (No. 42 of the R. C. Union) ; the Society of Polish Women of God's Mother of Czestochowa (No. 53 of the R. C. Union); the Society of Priest Wincenty Barzynski (No. 91 of the R. C. Union); the Society of Polish Women of St. Cecilia (No. 219 of the R. C. Union); the Society of St. Bernard the Abbot (No. 320 of the R. C. Union) ; the Society of St. Andrew the Apostle (No. 233 of the R. C. Union); the Society of Polish Women of St. Agnes (No. 256 of the R. C. Union); the Society of the Polish Crown (No. 296 of the R. C. Union); the Society of Polish Women of St. Lucia (No. 378 of the R. C. Union) ; the Society of Polish Women of St. Anna (No. 480 of the R. C. Union); the Society of Polish Women of St. Apolonia (No. 482 of the R. C. Union) ; the Society of St. Helena (No. 924 of the R. C. Union); the Society of Polish Women of Queen Wanda (No. 525 of the R. C. Union); the Polish Alma Mater (central office); the Branch of St. Kazimierz the King's Son (No. 1 of the Alma Mater) ; the Branch of St. Kinga (No. 12 of the Alma Mater) ; the Branch of St. Monica (No. 25 of the Alma Mater) ; the Branch of St. Clara (No. 26 of the Alma Mater); the Branch of St. Cecilia (No. 92 of the Alma Mater); the Branch of St. Joseph (No. 49 of the Alma Mater); the Court of Pulaski (No. 482 of the Union of Catholic For-esters); the Court of God's Mother of Good Advice (No. 91 of Catholic Foresters) ; the Court of St.
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Vincent of Ferrara (No. 174 of Catholic Foresters); the Court of St. Stanislaw Kostka (No. 255 of CatholicForesters); the Court of Priest Barzynski (No. 995 of Catholic Foresters); the Court of St. Walenty (No. 1,001 of Catholic Foresters); the Court of St. Irene (No. 445 of Catholic Foresters); the Court of Frederic Chopin (No. 1,891 of Catholic Foresters); the Court of St. John (No. 864 of Catholic Foresters);the Court of Leo XIII (No. [?] of the Catholic For-esters); the Court of St. Martin the Pope (No. 1,143 of the Catholic Foresters); the Society of the Guardianship of St. Joseph (Group 115 of the Palish Association in America) ; the Society of St. George the Martyr (Group 96 of the Polish Association); the Society of St. Roch (Group 71 of the Polish Association); the Society of St. John of Nepomuk (Group 26 of the Polish Association) ; the Society of the Heart of Jesus (Group 124 of the Polish Association); the Society Pearl of Mary (Group 152 of the Polish Association) ; the Society of St. Wojciech (Group 104 of the Polish Association) ; the Society of Young Men of St. Kazimierz (Independent Mutual Help Association) ; the Society of Ladies of Queen Jadwiga (Mutual Help Association) ; the Loan and Savings Association of St. Joseph No. 8; the Building Loan and Savings Association of Pulaski; the Building Loan and Savings Association of St. Francis; the Press Committee; the College of St. Stanislaw Kostka; the Novice's Convent of the Resurrectionists; the Convent of the Sisters of St. Francis; the Chicago Daily News (Polish)—74 in all.[47]
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141. Zuaves of St. Stanislaus Kostka. The Zuaves were organized into an association May 1, 1915, by Rev. Franciszek Dembinski, the present rector of the parish. They wear uniforms, helmets, and swords on the model of the Papal Guard in the Vatican. These little knights participate in large celebrations like New Year's, the Forty Hours' Divine Service, Pentecost, Christmas, the first communion of the school children; they stand on guard at the grave of Lord Jesus (before Easter), take part in the pro-cessions on Easter and Corpus Christi. The Zuaves drill in the school courtyard. The drill is taught by the well-known captain of the cavalry of Stanislaw, Mr. Franciszek Gorzynski. The Zuaves are composed of thirty members chosen from the Society of Altar Boys. . . . They are sons of parents who have belonged to the parish for many years and have been educated in the parochial school. They are obliged to shine as models of devotion, to partake regularly of the Holy Sacraments and thereby to be good sons of their dear parents, to know the history of their ancestors, the great men of Poland, to talk Polish among themselves and at home. In a word, the Zuaves are expected to be the guardians of every-thing that is divine and Polish in order to grow to be real Polish patriots and defenders of the Christian faith. [Picture of the group and names of members given.][48]
Document 142 illustrates the formation of a small parish, and document 143 shows the condition of the same parish after twenty-five years, under the leadership of an exceptionally energetic priest.
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142. The first Pole who came to New Britain was Mr. Tomasz Ostrowski. After him others began to arrive and in September, 1889, a mutual help society wider the patronage of St. Michael the Archangel was established. [All the officers enumerated. . . .]
In 1894 Priest Dr. Misicki, rector of the parish in Meriden, Connecticut, came every Sunday to celebrate the holy mass in New Britain in the old Irish church on Myrtle Street, at a yearly salary of $500. Then the society, together with other noble-minded Poles, began to think about establishing a Polish parish, which was organized under the patronage of St. Kazimierz... .
In September, 1895, Rev. Lucyan Bojnowski .. . was appointed rector of the parish . . . and a wooden church was built under the patronage of the Sweetest Heart of Jesus. . . . First of all Priest Bojnowski made efforts to turn the people from drink, from getting married in court, from indecent dress, from holding balls on Saturdays and nightly revelries, from playing cards, loafing in saloons, fighting in their homes, immoral life, conjugal infidelity, theft, bad education of children, indecent behavior on the street, and disorderly conduct at weddings and christenings. Instead, he encouraged them to go to confession' and communion, to participate in various divine services, to belong to fraternities, etc... [49]
143. (1) The old church now contains school-rooms and the rectorate. It is worth $25,000. (2) The new church (the largest in New Britain) cost $150,000 when built, and is now worth $300,000. (3) The new school was built in 1904 at the cost of
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$150,000. It is now worth twice as much. (4) A house for the teaching nuns is worth $15,000. (5) The parish has a cemetery worth $25,000. There are no debts on all of these buildings and lots. (6) In 1889 a co-operative bakery was established with an original capital of $6,000 contributed by 5 associations. At present its property is worth $60,000. (7) In 1904 a Polish orphanage was founded. It owns now 4 houses, 146 acres within the limits of the town, 107 acres outside the limits, 30 head of cattle, 7 horses, 70 hogs, 500 hens; total value over $200,000. No debts. (8) There is a parochial printing office. The lot, the building, and the machinery are worth $35,000. There is a debt of $5,000. (9) The Polish Loan and Industrial Corporation, founded in 1915, has a capitalization of $50,000, and owns $45,000 worth of houses. (10) The Polish Investment and Loan Corporation, founded in 1915, has a capitalization of $75,000 and real estate worth $10,000. (11) The People's Savings Bank, founded in December, 1916, has $496,000 deposited. (12) The New Britain Clothing Corporation, founded in 1919, capitalized at $50,000, has merchandise worth $100,000 and real estate worth $140,000. (13) The White Eagle Factory, established in 1919, capitalized at $25,000, produces cutlery. All of the above are co-operative organizations. (14) We gave 750 soldiers to the American army and 301 to the Polish army. (15) We have contributed to the Polish Relief Fund and to the Polish Army Fund, up to this moment, $110,672.86. (16) The parish counts now nearly 9,000 souls, including children. In 1894 there were only 700, counting Lithuanians, Slovaks, and Poles. (17) The
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parochial school has 85 teachers and an attendance of 1,736 children.[50]
THE BOHEMIANS
In contrast with the Poles, who, as we have seen, are very difficult from the standpoint of assimilation, the Bohemians are almost ideal material. They are democratic in their tendencies, have the settler psychology, own a larger percentage of their homes here than any other immigrant group, bring the smallest amount of illiteracy and the largest amount of skilled labor of any group from the former dual empire, not excepting the Germans.[51]
The feature of Bohemian life in America which has attracted most attention and caused most criticism is their freethinking organizations. They are a deeply moral people and every Bohemian has in him a bit of John Hus, but in America there has been a movement away from the Catholic religion toward rationalism. Their morality is here formulated in terms of the negation of religion. Perhaps half of the Bohemians in America are freethinkers:
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144. Professor Steiner in an article on the Bohemians in America in the Outlook for April 25, 1903, says that they are the most irreligious of all our immigrants and quotes Mr. Geringer, editor of the Svornost, "that there are in Chicago alone three hundred societies that teach infidelity, that carry on propaganda for their unbelief, and that maintain Sunday-schools in which the attendance varies from thirty to three thousand." This must count as one, each branch of all the organizations, in which case that cannot be far from correct. It must be borne in mind, however, that many of these organizations are aiming at something else, and in some cases directly prohibit discussion of religious subjects, but the sympathy of the members is such that they come to be recognized as free-thought societies by the members and by outsiders. . . . Probably the best articulated organization which openly advocates freethinking is the Bohemian-Slavonian Benevolent Society, generally known by the initials of the Bohemian name, C. S. P. S. This was founded in St. Louis in 1854, and now has 25,000 members. At first it was Catholic and for benevolent purposes. In September, 1909, it declared absolutely for free thought. This does not mean that all the members are interested in the propaganda of freethinking, but no one is a member who is not in sympathy with it, and through the official monthly paper, which each member must take, a great influence is exerted.
The object of the brotherhood, as expressed in its constitution, is "to endeavor to perpetuate the Bohemian language in this country and secure for both sexes the moral as well as the intellectual and material elevation of our countrymen; to foster
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brotherly love and intellectual freedom among the members; and to give mutual aid in sickness and death as well as in public life." Observation shows that this purpose is kept rather consistently, though there are many members whose only interest is the sickness and death benefit. The organization has the form of lodges, and in many towns in the country they have good halls. An interesting tendency which 'shows a reaction from the Church is the gradual dropping of forms and secrecy. Formerly it had three degrees, but now only the password, and many of the members object to even retaining that. Again; formerly they had elaborate badges, but these have become more and more simple, and the button which is worn as an insignia is very plain.[52]
THE SCANDINAVIANS
The Scandinavians bring a psychology which presents no particular obstacles to assimilation. They are not carrying on a nationalistic struggle here; they are not possessed of a mania of grandeur as representatives of states that are great, have been great, or will to be great. They are not the objects of exploitation by their own leaders. They are usually settlers, or have the settler psychology, represented in document 62, p. 84. In general, the Church is the center of their cultural activities, and they read and print much religious literature. They
( 222) have also a tender sentiment for their home country and language:
145. The Synod expresses its appreciation of the loyalty of our people toward our country and our government, its willing sacrifice of men and means for all governmental purposes, and the work which is being done in the army and navy by our chaplains, the National Lutheran Commission and the Lutheran Brotherhood; and reaffirms its fidelity toward our country, its constitution, laws, and government, and its purposes to place property and life, in the future as hitherto, at the disposal of our country and our government. The Synod is also gratefully cognizant of the fact that our Lutheran people of Swedish parentage in Canada, with great readiness, have placed men and means at the disposal of the British government in the present war.
In all our school activities—as well as in all other branches of our church work—it is incumbent upon us to meet existing linguistic needs. Our immigrants and our children must learn the English, the official language of the country, but the Swedish should also be retained as a valuable cultural heritage, as far as possible. The Synod is of the opinion that limitation in the study of foreign languages is a lowering of national educational ideals, and that the prohibition of the use of other languages than the English is at variance with American principles of liberty for which the nation has bled and is bleeding.[53]
The map on page 223 shows the distribution of Norwegian Lutheran churches in Minnesota.
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We shall speak later of the pauperization of culture which an immigrant group in America suffers when it fails to use the
[54]
general values provided by the larger American society (see p. 304 and document 168.) This has happened, in some measure, to the Scandinavians.
( 224)
146. In higher education the Scandinavians have allowed their denominational zeal to outrun their judgment. They have founded numerous seminaries and so-called colleges, but almost invariably as a part of the necessary equipment of a religious denomination, for how could a self-respecting sect, no matter how young or how slightly differentiated from its older brethren, permit its children to attend the schools of those whose denominational beliefs or practices had become objectionable enough to war-rant a schism in the church? A few of these institutions, like Luther College, at Deborah, Iowa, Gustavus Adolphus College, at St. Peter, Minnesota, Augustana College at Rock Island, Illinois, and Bethany College at Lindsborg, Kansas, have maintained an excellent standard of work and exercised a wide and beneficent influence. The great majority, however, have simply wasted resources by the multiplication of ambitious, struggling, poorly equipped, so-called colleges, with little or no endowment, and often dependent upon the congregations of the denomination which gave them birth.
One of the results of the excessive splitting up of the Scandinavian churches
is that the energies which ought to be concentrated are frittered away on
unnecessary schools. A separate denominational school and a family paper seem to
be indispensable parts of the machinery of every newly organized sect, no matter
how young or how small or how poor it may be.[55]
