Star.
London, England, 1820-01-07 00:00:00

EMIGRATION TO AMERICA.

• AUOSBURGH, DECEMBER 21.
The. 'benevolent efforts made by M. Maurice de
Furstenwaerter, to relieve the distresses of the Ger-
man Emigrants to the United States, are well known.
The following is the letter addressed to him on this
subject by M. John Quincy Adams, in the name of
the American Government :
•

" WASHINGTON, JUNE 14,1819.
" Stn—l have had the honour of receiving your
letter of the 221 of April, with the enclosure of the
Baron de Gagern, your relative, and a copy of your
printed report. I hope, and indeed entertain no
doubt, that the latter may be of great utility to such
of your countrymen as may have formed erroneous
ideas with regard to emigration from Europe to this
country: It has been clearly shewn to you, and you
have accurately seized the idea in your report, that
the Government of the United States has never takea
any steps to invite or encourage emigrants to come
from any part of Europe to America. It has never
held out any inducements to draw to this country
the subjects of a foreign State. Motives of humanity
have sometimes determined it to offer certain facili-
ties to some emigrants who may have arrived here
.with the intention of establishing themselves here,
and who had need of particular assistance for execute-
ing their intention. Neither the Government of the
Union, nor the differen: States that compose it, de-
spise or disdain the increase of strength and prospe-
rity which the nation might receive from a mass. of
new inhabitants, healthful, laborious, and temperate;
nor are they more indifferent to the great advantages
which this country has derived, and is still deriving,
from the concourse of adopted children coming from
Germany ; but there is one principle on whick all
the institutions of this Republic are founded, and
which is a permanent object in granting favours to
new comers. This is not a country of privilege, but
of an equality of rights. The Sovereigns ot Europe
grant to certain classes of individuals certain privi-
leges, which have some object of political utility ;
but it is the general opinion here, that privileges
granted to one class of people are necessarily an in-
jury to some other.
" Emigrants from Germany, or from any other
country, have not, on arriving here, any favour to
expect from the Governments; but in case they
should desire to become Citizens of the State, they
may flatter themselves with enjoying the same rights
as the natives of the country. If they possess pro-
pe.-ty, they may reckon upon finding the means of
increasing it with moderation, but with certainty ;
if they are poor, but laborious, honest, and know
how to be satisfied with a little, they will succeed in
gaining enough to support themselves and their fa-
milies ; they will pass an independent, but a labori-
ous and painful life, and if they cannot accommodate
themselves to the moral, political; and physical state
of this country, the Atlantic Ocean will always be
open to them to return to their native countries.—
'They must bend their characters to necessity, or they
will assuredly fail, as Americans, in all their schemes
of fortune; they must throw off, as it were, their
European skin, never more to resume it ; they must
direct their thoughts rather forwards towards their
posterity, than behind them to their ancestors ; • they
must persuade themselves that whatever may be their
own sentiments, those of their children will assuredly
approach more to the habits of the country, and will
catch something of the haughtiness, perhaps a littlel
contemptuousnes, which they have themselves
re-
marked with surprise in the general character of this
people, and perhaps still more particularly in the
individuals of German origin, who are born in this
country.—This sentiment ot superiority over all other
nations, which never leaves them, and which has been
so very displeasing to foreigners who have visited our
shores, prticeeds from the opinion entertained by each
individual, that, in quality of a member of society,
there is no person in this country superior to him.—
Proud of this feeling, he regards with some haughti-
ness, those nations among whom the mass of the
people are regarded as subordinate to certain privi-
leged classes, and where men are great or insignifi-
cant by the hazard of their birth. But from this it
also happens, that no Government ht the world has
so little means of bestowing favour as that of the
United States. The Governments are the servants
of the People, and they are regarded as such by the
People, who create and depose them. •
44 They are elected to administer the public affairs
for a short space of time, and when the People are
not satisfied with them, they cease to maintain them
in their functions. But if the means of the Govern-
ment to do good are limited, the means of doing ill
are limited also. Dependence, here, in the affairs of
Go/aliment, is precisely in the inverse ratio of what
takes place in Europe. The People here eo not de-
pend upon those that govern them ; but the latter, as
such, depend constantly upon the good will of the
People.
44 We know very well, that of the quantity of fo-
reigners who every year come to our country to fiz
their abode, none of them come from taste, or from
any regard to a country to which they are totally
strangers, and of which the Germans do not under=
stand even the language. We know that they come
here not for our advantage, but for their own ; not
to labour for our prosperity, but to ameliorate their
own condition. Thus we expect to see very few in-
dividuals of Europe who enjoy in their own country
ease, happiness, or even any gratification, come and
settle in America. Those who are happy and con-
tented remain at home, and it requires a principle of
motion not less cowerful than want, to remove a
man from his native country, and the place where
the tombs of his. ancestors are placed. Of the small
number of emigrants of fortune who endeavoured to
settle in our country, a considerable portion were dis-
satisfied with our singular customs, and, after a cer-
tain residence, returned home. There are certainly
some exceptions; and, in the most opulent and dis-
tinguished class of our fellow-citizens, we have the
good fortune to count some individuals, who would
have acquired fortune and distinctions, even had
they not passed into a new country, and another por-,'
tion of the world. We should feel great satisfaction
in seeing yourself among this number, and that it
would accord with your dispositions and sentiments.
41 I have the honour to be, Sir, &c.
" JOHN 43 INCY ADAMS."