Waterbury evening Democrat., 1904-06-11

tic1an who Is just as often naENe-
born as foreign.
The Republican assumes what Il
does not prove, viz That these for
eigners are the average city dwellers,
THE pauperized, unintelligent, disease
laden, degenerate offscouring of the
slums' of southern and eastern Eu-
rope 4 quote once more the
words of a former American consult
"Of those coming TO us from Italy
4 Austria Hungary. Bohemia aud Po-
land a great many--in fact by far
the larger purt--are farmers. The
! editor beats the air with gilt
tering generalities of abuse. Here
are caustic facts As to the
q pauperized, | have already given
the fairest kind of statistics. AS to
the want of intelligence, LET me again
quote our consul at Naples: 1T can be
said that the average enigrant from
this port is fair representation OF the
italian peasant" (RemarlS the word
peasant. not city dweller nor of the
slumsl. He goes on to say that in
tellectually he Is quick and willing TO
learn, but Is deplorably ignorant.
Ignorance and lack Of intelligence are
not conversible terms. A man may
have a naturally fine intellect and still
W isshOAAII OSCdQSC ne ndS sIOl AdN
the opportunity to learn. Then they
are disease-laden. Are they so when
they land? If SO. then our officials.
who, / venture to say, are in great
measure native-born. are at fault. If
the object is to make them better,
attend to business then. / say, God
prosper 1t.
Those already disease-laden have
no business here. But the question
arises, what proportion of these I'M
: migrants are disease-laden7 They are
certainly doing work here that the
disease-laden could hardly do, even
in the wheat fields Of the west, where
by the way, so many of our college
athletes cut such sorry figure last
, summer.
The Republican speaks of the big in
terests to be fought, the large inter-
national steamship companies, and
the trans-continental railroads. It viii
. hardly be necessary to say that Ital-
ians and Slavs and Greeks have any
large amount Of stock In the steam
ship lines and trans-continental rail.
roads. If there are. the country
should by all means get rid of them.
Do away with the corruption where
it begins, right here at home But
just wait till the attempt is made and
see how many Of our native-born leg
islators will get the itching palm"
; and will want to have the itching
soothed by bribes from these same
pestiferous steamship and railroad
companies.
Again, the Republican remarks that
there Is fear that some interests here
at home may be offended, etc" Until
he uses some more specific Tan
guage than this I am left to conjec-
ture what the words may signify
Let me say a few words on
graft" 1t is no new evil in the land.
In the days of Jim Fisk and Jay Gould
it existed but in our day 1t has come
into special prominence I would
like to cite here the words Of Lincoln
Steffens. who says:
when set out on my travels an
honest New Yorker told me honestly
that the Irish were at the bottom OF
. 1t everywhere. The first city | went
, to was st Louis. q German city. The
next was Minneapolis. q Scandinavian
city with a leadership of New, Eng
landers. Then / went to Pittsburg,
! Scotch Presbyterian. Ali, but they
!, are all foreign population. I heard.
The next city was Philadelphia, the
foremost American city of all, and
! this was the most hopeless And
then he adds: 1.-THE foreign element
excuse is one of the hypocritieal lies
: that saves us from clear sight of
ourselves"
OF truth. the italian and the Slav
are corrupting our great American
: commonWeal 1t may be, but Mr.
! Steffens in his researches did not find
it SO.
One has but to read Mr. Steffens'
!. book. "The Shame Of Cities,'' with It's
: sickening tale OF graft. Doodle. politi-
cal crimes and moral corruption, to
understand who are the corruptionists
and whence cometh the menace. New
! er an Italian or Slavic name does he
: find. but whole litanies of names that
bespeak the native-born-"Doc" Ames
! Fred Ames, King, Gardner, Till Ed
wards, Crossman. Bracket, IN Mime
, apolis: Quay, Ashbridge, Hopkins,
! Warwick and a host of others in Phil
!. adelphia including in both places mer-
, chants. bankers. etc. AS one reads
on and the shameful fact is gradually
nnfolded he asks himself: Is this the
United States that sends its millions
and its missionaries to convert the
/, heathens, that a few years ago was so
concerned about the "henighted" in
hahitants OF the Philippines. and con-
, verified them by teaching them crimes
, they never knew? Is this the United
States with it's vast array of educa-
tional institutions of which so many OF
these men are the product? Truly 1t
has realized the ideals OF its founders.
Nit.
The only redeeming feature OF the
nasty. filthy. disgusting tale is that the
, reform where started was begun by
men who, like Hovey Clarke and ID.
Percy Jones. have names that. l am
, happy to say. smack. too. of the native
born But who shall tell the tale OF
these years? Echo responsive answers,
Who? If the crimes committed in
these last ten wears could be published
the foreign criminal list would look
white In comparison. Perhaps, after
all. the editor OF the Republican is
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