The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1884-03-29
AMERICAN HoMoaINEITY.

such claim for them. America is, as has
been urged, very young yet, and in years
hardly measures up to the knees of nations
across the Atlantic. We will doubtless i'm
prove as the centuries roll around, but all
history demonstrates that time will never
evolve perfection in human institutions. No
well-balanced man expects Arcadian sim
plicity and perfection anywhere, and in meas
uring peoples we cannot use the standard OF
perfection, but must compare nation with
nation. In such comparison America and
American institutions will not unduly suffer.
A new. country, born in the heart of a wilder
ness, our progress in all that goes to make
nations great has been simply marvellous
England and Holland, Denmark and Sweden
early planted colonies on American soil.
Spain held Florida, and France had its Louis
lana possessions Here were all the elements
needful to perpetual warfare, not between the
mother countries only, but between the en-
vious little colonies that had found precarious
foothold along the coast. On this incOn-
gruent foundation was laid the superstructure
of the American republic, the enemies of
which confidently predicted its speedy disso-
luton Not only this but Norway and Sweden,
Prussia and Austria, Switzerland, Italy, France,
Holland, England Scotland, Ireland and Wales
have sent millions of their polyglot people to
these shores to become citizens, and with us
to enter almost at once upon the business of
law-making Added to these strange elements
the iungles of Africa furnished slaves and the
Orient contributed a race of voluntary serfs.
Out of all this mass has been made our eoun=
try. Despite the conflicting prejudices of the
millions who have crossed seas to find
homes in America the founders and
perpetrators of the republic have
maintained practical harmony - greater,
indeed, than that prevailing among
the peoples whence they severally came.
This of itself is an achievement of statesman
ship unsurpassed in all the diplomacy of the
worlds history.
There are those who profess to view the
situation with alarm. They deplore that for
eigners have been given so much license in
our most vital affairs, and from these adopted
citizens they predict danger to our peculiar
institutions 1t may be admitted that a GER
tain amount Of unhealthful influence is ex
erted by certain elements imported among US;
but it is not and never will be of sufficient
Il
men will take the trouble to reflect on
what is known personally outside of books and
of written history, they will discover that
Americas greatest enemies have come from
within and that the only people who were dis
loyal to the nation were American born. The
South has been in close communion from
earliest times. Outsiders were not invited to
come among them nor welcomed when they
did. The fountain-head of Democracy has
been kept clear of Irish and German immi-
grants; there has never been respectable
place there for the working man of any ma
ton In the war for the Union our foreign born
population was largely represented in the loyal
the malign influences of reasonable Democ-
racy in our larger cities, they were true to the
welfare of their adopted country.
1t is to be regretted, not that dangerous men
leave other countries for this but rather that
an American political party exist depend
ing for its life upon catering to the passions of
desperate men. But the danger from this
source is growing less year by year The per
cent. of native population, by the natural
order of things, is steadily increasing The sec
ond and third generation of Irish American
and German American citizens are not known
as such. We are constantly and rapidly
amalgamatng into one people, with one Ian
guage. German and French melt away and
disappear. Schools cannot keep them alive
in America, and the descendants of these two
great peoples have no desire to keep them
alive. 1t is gratifying to know that Ameri-
can-born children almost universally regard
this country as their fatherland, to which
alone they owe allegiance The small body
Of imported malcontents are vastly outnum-
bered by natives, aided heartily by all the bet
ter elements that come among us from abroad.
It is a sorry libel to put the faint of sus-
picion upon all foreigners because of the do
ings Of few evil men. II were as reasonable