The Minneapolis journal. [volume] (Minneapolis, Minn.) 1888-1939, 1905-01-20
THINKS AMERICA
HOLDS OUT HOPE
JUDGE FAHLCRANTZ GIVES HIS
VIEWS OF THIS COUNTRY.
Thinks Norwegians and swedes Should
Be Encouraged to Come to America,
that They May Catch the Spirit of
the Country, to Transplant It in Their
Native Lands. 80

Judge Gustaf Edward Fahlcrantz,
whom readers Of The Journa /
will remember as visitor to Mime
apolis last fall, has directed semi
official report to the king of Sweden
and N orway, in which he departs from
the traditional views of -. America
formed by foreigners who make a hasty
tour thru the country. Like Thoralv
Klavenes, the Norwegian author and
journalist, he has been able to see be-
meath the surface and note the process
of creating in the new world a new
race, which, by it's own strength and
thru example, can regenerate the world
A summary of Judge Fahlcrantz s
interesting letter is as follows:
Don t. discourage people from going
to America, but try your best to get
fair percentage of those who 90 to
come back after having gained econom-
ic independence out there. 1t is not
their money we want. It is their en-
ergy and broader way Of looking at
things, and their American methods and
spirit. 1t we can get them as leaven
for our own population, a new time
may dawn for the old country :
The Swedish jurist expresses the
opinion that such restoration to his
country Of sons and daughters who haye
become lmbued with new-world ideas
would prove the surest means Of end
| ing the long hostility between the two
sister nations on the Scandinavian pen
| insula 49,
! Everywhere in America,' he says
in his letter, ~ found Swedes and Nor
wegians living side by side in undis-
turbed harmony and perfect under
standing: Therefore I believe that a
naturalization Of my ideas would also
have a beneficial influence on the prob
/ tnl q
two Kingdoms. [ have always found
that those problems were brought near
er to a solution whenever number of
individuals of both nations were brought
in direct contact with each other I'm.
der conditions that carried with them
commences of interests.''
| The European Attitude. .s.
Judge Fahlcrantz speaks in plain
words of the European attitude toward
the emigrant, which has been hostile
from sentimental as we'll as practical
reasons. The governments have viewed
the departure Of masses of young and
healthy men for foreign shores merely
as q loss Of military material and of OBJ:
fleets for taxation. The more fortunate
ly situated compatriots of the emf
grants have often shown contempt fol-
the latter whenever chance offered, on
the ground that anybody who preferred
another country to his own, no matter
how little the country did or cared fol-
must be treated as deserter.
The result has been, Judge Fahlcrantz
points out, that the visitors, offended by
the distrust and scorn bordering on open
enmity toward them, have hurried back
to their adopted country as soon as pos
sible. Those visits, with their disap
pointments. and establishments, he
says, have served not to tie the wander
ers to the land where they were born, al
every Englishman is tied to the British
isles as his real home, no matter where
fate may plant him, but instead, to cut
the last ties between the emigrants anc
the old country,
patient. and overbearing when facing
man who has gained his position by hi
own strength. We are unnecessarily
sensitive in regard to the form under
which that self-feeling finds expression
There is no doubt in my
mind that it would be fortunate if som,
of that equality between all men anl
classes that appeals to him SO strongl,
over there were introduced among our
selves.
America Broadens Them.
q He then goes on to say in speaking O
the men who have been subjected t,
the process of Americanization: How
J, much of wide-awake mind, Of practica
;: initiative, Of properly directed poWe
do we not find represented among a fey
5 hundred farmers who, some fine summe
s day, arrive here on an ocean liner for in
3 lspection of the old land. They ar