The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1903-08-16
MIXED, but ALL AMERICANS.
CONFU SION OF THE RACES Found
IN LOUISIANA.
An Answer to Those who Doubt if America
Can Assimiiate Immigration Given
by Americans with German Names
French Speech and spanish complications

y
NEW ORLEANS, Aug. 15.--The present
| large immigration to the United STATES
has caused some people to wonder whether
the immigrants can all be amalgamated
| and Americanized. Such doubters should
| come TO Louisiana.
There is the little Vacherie settlement, LOT
instance. It is only forty miles away rom
| New Orleans, but so isolated that 1t might
| be a thousand miles away from the CITY
Vachefie has 1000 or 5000 inhabitants.
| If any ethnologist should wander to Vacferle
he would be puzzled by people VINO pear
German names. speak French, have spanish
compilations, and yet, in their IDEAS are
distinctly American. Their story Is one
of q mixture of boods, not to be found
any where else in this country. but well
illustrating the wonderful power OF race
amalgamation here.
One hundred and eighty years ago Nach-
erie was settled and the names of the people
there to-day tein, Weber Uhey Ga Ii 'Ze
ii into Webrel. Steit, Brock, &c show
that the original settlers were Germans.
This calls for some explanation,f for Louisiana
at that time was French.
A famous Scot Gilman, who played big
part in the worlds history, John Law,
was just then amusing Paris with his
Mississippi scheme, or bubble as they after
ward called it when it burst. He proposed
to establish new French empire in the
valley of the Mississippi, and for that pur-
pose needed colonists. In those days the
small German Princes we're willing to sell
their subjects either as colonists or soldiers
to any one who wished to trade. Mr.. Law
obtained a large number of German colon
lists. whom he brought over to Louisiana
and settled along what became known
as the Cote DIES Allemands. or German
Coast, and also as the Cote dor, or Golden
Goa ST, because of the prosperity which
the industry or the Germans brought about
The leader Of commander of the coast was
a Chevalier d Arcnsbourg, who in spite
of his mixed German and French name
was neither, but a Swede.
Forty years afterward the colony of
Louisiana passed from France to Spain,
whereupon the Germans of the Cote dor
rose in rebellion against the Spanish Govern
ment and demanded to be at once returned
to their beloved France" Remember
that as a matter of fact, neither they nor
their ancestors had ever been in France.
But they had become Frenchmen in a
generation in ideas language, in everything
but their names.
The Spaniards, under command Of an
Irishman, Count Alexander O'Reilly, who
figures in Don Juan" took possession of
the colony. and the German leaders of the
revolt, were shot in the Place d'Armes,
now jackson Square, New Orleans.
Realizing that their occupation Of the
country would be merely military unless
they could induce Spanards to come in as
colonists, the Spanish Governors made
reouisition on the home Government for
several thousand Spanish colonists. Spain
had been pretty well drained of colonists
at the time by its other American colonies
and turned to the Canary Islands for set
tiers,
The Canary Islanders thus brought over
have a race history Of their own. They
spoke Spanish and were partly OF Spanish
blood, partly Of the race inhabiting the
Canaries when the Spanards reached the
islands. That race supplies one of the
mysteries Of ethnology. The best opinion
is that the original Canary Islanders came
from Africa and were not negroes, but a
mixture of Berbers and Vandals Thus
the Spanish stock which came to Louisiana
had left Europe nearly a century before the
discovery Of America TO mingle with Berber
and Vandal tribes from Africa Some of
them wandered over to the German Coast
and contributed the Spanish complexion to
the French speaking, German-named popu-
lation. Some twenty years afterward came
in considerable Acadian population from
Nova Scotia with Evangeline, still further
to mix matters, for they brought Breton
blood with them
Thus. you have a composite race, repre-
senting perhaps a dozen races beaten into
one and finally Americanized by the public
schools.
Other changes have occurred since then.
The German and French and Spanish colo
nists lived on the Mississippi River. When
slavery came along and cane and cotton
became the staple crops, the planters be-
lieved the negro 10 be the only labor, and
the white farmers were gradually crowded
out OF their rich river lands and driven
back to Vacheric, in the swamps.
Then it was that the river lands, devel-
| oped by white labor, fell to the negro, I'M
| til the German Coast had five and ten
| negroes to one white man; and in the
neighborng parish of St. Charles there were
| no WHITES VA tllc Save lne over
seers. In the last five years, however, this
| has been changed, for new tide of immi-
| grafton has poured in, and the Sicilian
| peasants who have crowded into Louisiana
| by thousands are ousting negro labor from
| the sugar plantations.
Whether other parts of America boast
| of similar experiences il doubtful. but here
race has followed race. In Europe such
a state of things would leave problems
! such as face Aust ria- Hungary in Transyl-
| vania and Croatia. Here the amalgamation
| of races--all save the negro--has been
rapid. and single generation has been
| sufficient TO change nationality, its ideas
and its language, and to AmericaniZe it.
The rapidity with which the Acadians
of southwest Louisiana have been Ameri-
canzed should convince all of the rapid
work done in this direction. A race con-
stituting 90 per cent. of the white popula-
ton, separated from others because s
language is a dialect, with reason, because
of past i'll treatment, to oppose the Anglo
Saxon, becomes in less than generation
stalwart Americans in ideas and lines
of thought, speaking English. and going
into politics with distinctively American
vim and ardor Louisiana sends two Of
them to Congress- this fall, while one Of it's
candidates for Governor Ia a descendant
of those islenos who came here from the
Canary Islands; and all of them, although
without drop of English, American or
! Anglo Saxon blood in their veins, are good
Americans.
| A Tory Suggestion Of English Protective
Tariff