Preble County Democrat. [volume] (Eaton, Ohio) 1857-1859, 1857-03-05
Does Immigration add to the
Wealth of the COuMtrYl

Of all the causes OF agencies which
can effect the industry and production,
and consequently the civilization and
well-being of any people, the most dis
astrous and destructive is that which ari-
scs from public oppression or unjust leg
islation. ut drinks up" says an emf
nent writer Oh political economy, "the
spirit of a people by inAicting wrong
through means of an agency which was
created for the sole purpose of prevent
ing wrong, and which was intended to
be the ultimate and faithful refuge of
the friendless.
A notable instance of the effect of IN
just measures on the part of both gov
eminent and people in p~aralyzing the
energies and arresting the progress Of a
whole nation, may be found in the in
tolerant and fanatical persecution of the
Jews and Moors ofSpain, which result
ed in their expulsion or voluntary i'm
migration from that country. These
two classes composed the bulk of the in
tclligent industrial population of Spain,
the artiicers, the mechanics, the mer-
the capitalists engaged in trade or COM
merce. The result of such impolitic
measures as was foretold at the time, has
been to cripple the resources of the coun-
try, and convert fourishing districts in
to u~ninhabited wastes, to dry up the
current of trade, and to diminish CAPT
tai; to no other single act of policy is
Spain moro indebted for herpresent i'm
poverished and degraded condition, than
to the treatment of her Moorish and
Jewish subjects in the fifteenth and six
teenth centuries. We find another stri,
king instance of the effect of oppression
on the part of the state on the people,
in diminishing national production and
wealth, in the expulsion of the French
Huguenots from France, by the revoca'
ton of the Edict of Nantes. This act
while it inflicted a most severe blow up
on the Industrial u and power
of France, augmented the capital ane
skill of the neighboring nations which
received the fugitives.
There was a time when the people o
England were very inferior to those Of
the Low Countries, of France, and Of
Germany, in various productions o
manufacturing industry. What frs
gave an impulse to the wooden trade
which for several centuries was the grea
staple of England, was the procuring o
foreign workmen to teach the Englisl
people their craft.
The adoption of any measure by tn
government or people of the Unite
States which could in any degree ten
to prevent, or divert the great tide Q
emigration of labor and of capital to GU
shores from Europe, would only find
parallel in its disastrous effects with tn
instances above. In the year 1949, tn
whole number of foreign emigrants al
irving at the different ports of the I'm
ted States was 296, 1000. If we estimat
the value of labor, the skill, and the cal
ital of each of these immigrants at onl
one hundred dollars we have an aus
mentation of the national wealth in
single year of more than twenty-nir
millions. When VIC reflect, howeve
that the great majority of these EN-
grants are able-bodied men and wome.
accustomed to hard, ~persevering labor
many to skilled labor-that numbers a
so possess, in money or implements, v
rying amounts of capital, the estimate
value of each to the country, which Y
have given, will appear too inconsider
bic. Estimating the value at five hu
dred dollars, We shall have the. enc
nous sum of s14e, 900, 900 added to t
wealth of the United States in a sing
year, from foreign emigration alone.