The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1896-07-25


factured articles, for instance, than it
can consume, and so long as there is
an outlet for this surplus of manu-
factures the movement toward immi
grafton is stayed. But once let every
country put up the bars in the shape
of high protective tariffs and immi-
grafton laws, and each country is
practically reduced to the necessity
of taking care of it's own excess of
population. To do this in Europe,
already over-populated, is difficult
if not impossible thing without the
scourge of war, to which excess of
production and population directly
tend.
AS yet, however, the question of
immigration is one for America rather
than for Europe. Europe may have
forebodings of what may happen
under certain contingencies, but
America has the problem of actual in
crease of immigration to deal with.
The latest statement of the commits
sioner of immigration shows that for
the year ended June 30, 1896 the
number of immigrants who arrived in
this country was 343,2 3,267 as compared
with 25S,526 in the fiscal year 1895,
an increase of nearly 100000. 1t is
interesting to note the countries from
which these immigrants come, as de-
noting those which may in turn have
the immigration question to deal
with. The following are the figures
of the report: Austria Hungary, 65,-
103; Italy, 6S,500; Russia, 52,136;
Germany, 31,SS5; United Kingdom,
64,627; all other countries 81, ,446.
France, it will be noted, is absent
from the above list, her quota of i'm
migrants being but small for reasons
already stated. What these leading
countries will do with their over
crowded and discontented popula-
tion (for discomfort with conditions
at home is presumed by immigra-
tion) when once America ceases to
offer promising field for Europe's
overflow is question they must
solve for themselves. 1t is apparent
that in America this vast annual in
crease of population from immigra-
tion can no longer be promptly as
simulated and that it is already Civ
ing rise to new social and indus
trial conditions. As one result the
spirit of organization has spread
rapidly in America in recent years
and labor not infrequently finds
itself engaged in struggle with
capital that bodies i'll for the perpe-
tuity of republican institutions. The
great insurrection in this city in 1898,
and the present labor war in Cleve-
land, Ohio, where the militia of the
State has found it necessary to
charge upon the unorganized masses
of laborers, may be taken as indica-
tions of the industrial overturning
upon which we seem to be entering.
Revolutions, it is said, do not go
backward, and we need but scan the
political horizon in America for evil
dence to that effect. Certain ques-
tions and issues are to be faced in
the present political campaign that
are, to great extent, the result of
the immigration policy heretofore
pursued by our government. This
may not be generally recognized, but
little reflection will, we think, con-
vince any one of its truth. In the
Old World for half century it has
been true that
EVERY gate is thronged with suitors. all the
markets overflow
and the same is at last true of the
New World also. The only solution,
but that is noble one, for this rest
lessness and eager and fierce compe-
tition, lies in the recognition of a
higher law and broader love of
humanity, such as Tennyson saw in
his
"Vision of the world, and all the wonder that
would be-"
when the battle (and-we may add
the trade) flags are furled "In the
Parliament of man, the federation of
the world"
CHICAGO, ILL.
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