The Newberry herald and news. (Newberry, S.C.) 1884-1903, 1890-01-30
PUBLlSHEDI
UNDESIRABLE IMMIGRANTS
Scenes at Castle Garden.
Mail and Express.l


Mail and Exprcss.l
"rhe United States Government de-
cIines to receive you as citizen, even
in intent"
"What must I do?'
"Return to your native land. You
cannot remain on these shores"
This conversation occurs, or an
average, twice day, at the big stone
portals of Castle Garden. It is rem
dered into every language under the
sun, and differs in tongue almost as
often as uttered. 1t is always addressed
to an undesirable immigrant. The i'm
migrants who are not permitted to
land would, in a year, make good
sized regiment.
Through that gateway has passed
more than one-tenth Of the population
of the United States" said an official
yesterday, as he pointed to the.iow' not
very broad arched door leading from
the docks to the inside Of the sombre
old barracks that once echoed with the
throbbing strains of the Swedish night
ingale, Jenny Lind. The gateway is
an old sallyport of the fort, and affords
the only means of access from the
water to the garden. On the docks
Just without the walls, the immigrants
are landed, and every newcomer who
has stepped for the first time on Amer
lean soil at New York has. passed
through that low, broad gateway.
Over six million souls have emerged
from under its narrow arch to the light
of freedom; or, as the official said, more
than one-tenth -of the entire popula-
ton of the United States. They are
now scattered from Maine to California,
from Florida to Washington Terri
tory.
INSPIRED TO DO GOOD.
Of the vast number who have stood
outside this gate there have been thou
sands who left homes Of ahiect poverty
and even vice, and who, seeing the
shores of liberty for the first time, felt
better impulses and new strength, but
who were downcast and utterly dis
heartened by being refused admission
in the solemn words quoted above.
It has teen sad and bitter-hearted
procession that has tramped disconso-
lately for years out of Castle Garden,
back through the gate by which it en-
tered. They were the Immigrants who
could not stay.
Unless the good were separated from
the bad, comparison would be impos-
sible and virtue indistinguishable from
vice. All the immigrants go through
big sieve established by law, and the
same law orders that the sieve shall be
called the Emigration Commission.
There are just seven holes in this sieve
and they are all different in shape.
They are respectively, President Ridg-
way of the commission, and Messrs.
Wyland, Stephenson, Stagg, Hauselt,
Rourke and Uhlrich, members. 1t is
for these gentlemen to decide whether
the Immigrant may turn his face west
ward toward the land of plenty, or turn
his head and sadly retrace his steps out
through the big gateway and on board
the steamer that will land him again
on the shores he quilted for Americas
soil,where rest was denied him. The
majority of the immigrants bring some
nrima facie evidence of their indepen-
denee and are readily passed by the
representatives of the commission; but
whenever there is a doubt the immi-
grant is held to appear before the COM
mission for their decision as to his fit
ness for American citizenship.
There sre three classes Of undesirable
iro,niorants for whom the sieve natu-
rally holds many terrors, and it IS for
these that the Commissioners are main
" on the alert. France and Italy, AID
even industrious and frugal Switzer-
land have not hesitated at different
times within few years to permit the
shipment to these shores Of known
criminals in the guise OF ''desirable i'm
migrants"
On one occasion i was shown that a
jail-delivery in Switzerland had been
effected mainly for the purpose OF get
ting rid of the occupants by transfer
ring them to this side Of the Atlantic.
Poor, ignorant Italians, penniless and
contract bound to native employers;
contract-laborers from Scotland, En-
gland and Belgium; paupers from the
almshouses of many districts in Ire
land, and vagrants from the London
slums, of whom the English police
were glad to have a riddance, were
s'assisted" here in order that they
might begin life anew as American
citizens.
HOW THE SIEVE WORKS.
This is where the sieve comes III.
The immigrant makes affidavit to his
name, age, nativity, luggage, trade or
whatsoever proof he may be able to
bring to demonstrate that he is neither
a criminal nor lunatic, nor yet likely
to become a public charge upon the
county in which he may find himself
when his immediate financial resources
have been exhausted. Then he Is put
into the sieve. If he gets through one
or the other Of the holes-all right; but
if he can pass through none, why then
he must return home.
i II, ri