Wheeling Sunday register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1882-1934, 1882-08-13

intellectual capitai COLOSSUS VI uetio0sion
and denunciation, men who trade upon
the ignorance and fears Of the people,
and whose sole hope Of recognition and
advancement consists in the infiamma-
ton of prejudice and passion. When,
however, an American clergyman,
eminent for his gifts and
piety, fit to be the teacher
Of nation, viii, upon our National An
niversary Day, sound the note Of warn
ing, and, C AssANDRA-like, prophesy that
there are sharp rocks just ahead, 1t be-
comes thoughtful men to look into some
of the perIls assumed to be menaeing
over national life.
One of the alleged perils is the vast
influx of foreigners. Are we Justified in
assuming that this fact endangers the
Republic? The question of health is not
to be determined solely by the quantity
of food introduced into the system, but
by the power of the system to digest and
assimilate it. If man with digestive
and assimilative power of half pound
eats one pound of meat, he is overload
ing, but a stronger man may safely eat
his pound OF meat, his power to digest
and assimilate it being twice that of his
neighbor. A nation of fifty millions Is
prepared to do twice the work Of a ma
ton of twenty-five millions in the way
of receiving andassimilating the foreign
element. There are more foreigners
coming among US now thantwenty-five
years ago, but we are in every way
stronger, bigger nation now than then.
Nor is it just to estimate the value Of
this foreign element, as many do, from
its worst and most conspicuous specl-
mems, as they obtrude themselves upon
our notice in the great cities. One
of the Commissioners of Foreign
Immigration in New York, is
authority for the statement that IS per
cent. of the immigrants go at once to
the agricultural regions of the West,
Northwest and South, and that this ele-
ment is decidedly superior in every re-
spect to the Is per cent. which seek the
cities. The immigrants who seek the
soil become producers almost immedi-
ately, they build houses for themselves,
they send their children to the district
school, they are speedily and inevitably
Americanized, and after two or three
generations their descendants form one
of the best elements in American life.
II is grossly unfair to the majority of
foreigners, who seek these shore, ANNA
ted by strong purpose to improve their
condition and give their children a
chance in life, to estimate their charac-
ter and their influence upon our customs
and institutions by the conduct and
tendencies of the immigrants who make
up the city contingent.
Are these foreign-born citizens after
all so dangerous to the Republic? Were
they wanting in patriotism and courage
when the nation battled for life score
of years ago? Were there no German
regiments, no Irish brigades, no Swedes
and Danes who helped us to fight the
battles of liberty and union? When
the siren ofrepudiation was abroad in the
land, the German was not lured by
her wiles, but stood unmoved on the
side of national honesty. Two Presi-
dents have been assassinated within
quarter of a century, but neither of the
assassins was a foreigner. The fierce
spirit of partisanship, the voracious appe-
tite for spoils, the peculiar and obnoxi-
Gus product known as 'bossism"-these
are native, not foreign, growths! AS a
class, the cities excepted, do not the
foreign-born citizens keep the laws, till
the soil, diversity the industries, increase
the wealth, maintain the integrity of
the country, quite as we'll as those who
boast of being "natives?" And who
are 1--WE nativesT" Are we not the
descendants of foreigners? Scratch some
of us, and a German will be found,
other some, and 10! an Irishman, other
some, and a Scotchman emerges to
view. Scratch the majority of us, and
John Bull makes his appearance. There
is but one native in the country, the
poor Indian, and we have all conspired
to drug him with vile whisky, to cheat
him out of the land of his fathers, and
if he would not quietly consent to be
robbed after the most approved Chris
tian fashion, We killed him withou'
ceremony. There are two sides to the
question of foreign immigration.
And so there are two sides to the
question of danger, so far as the great
cities are concerned. Great cities have
never exercised on this continent the
large, the almost supreme influence
they have been able elsewhere to exert.
Paris may be France, but New York is
not America. The first twenty cities Of
the country will not aggregate popula-
ton often millions, and the forty mil
lions found elsewhere ought to be equal
to the task of maintaing the national
health and vigor, even if the cities were
utterly corrupt. But are they com.
pletely enervated? Careful inquiry dis
closes the fact that Of every five