Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1920-09-27
THE NEW IMMIGRATION

ne NEW ININliSffH lON
WE ALL know by this time that Mile
w rand and Clemenceau Foch and Wey-
gand, Lloyd George and Sir Robert Cecil,
Pilsudski and his generals and all other ex
ated folk like the writer's Of books and the
speakers in forums think about the war and
its effects on the Europe of today. These
are the gentlemen who have had the floor
since the armistce was signed. They have
the gifts and the habits Of speech. But
what are the plain people thinking and feel
ing these days in all the big and little ma
tons which seem doomed to perpetual tur-
moil? They have few spokesmen who may
be called representative and they themselves
do not know how to address themselves to
tho busy world 1t has been a common habit
to forget these people altogether or to fancy
them reconciled to their fate. But current
reports from Ellis Island and other ports of
entry to the United States show how wrong
q popular assumption may be.
It seems that all of the poor in Europe
who are able to fee are fleeing from the
lands In which they were born. from the
shadows of new disasters. And they turn
for the most part to the United States. The
exodus from Europe indicated in the present
crush at Ellis Island is perhaps without
precedent. What the poor in the conti-
mental nations have been thinking is ex-
pressed in a peculiarly significant and NOV
ing way-in crowded ships and a jam at
the immigrant stations that has almost
paralyzed the federal service established to
observe and regulate these incoming tides
The rush to America has significance apart
from its surface meanings. On one day last
week 1910 immigrants were detained in
quarters built to accommodate 1000 souls
In June approximately $4,000 foreigners
landed in New York OF these, about 2000
proved utterly unfit to enter the country and
countless others were in dire poverty or
utterly pennileSS. There was an appalling
increase in the number of immigrants who
arrived with contagious or infectious dis
eases of peculiarly repellent character, and
as a class the new arrivals were physically
and mentally below standards established by
the statistics Of other years.
These people are tragically at sea. They
are bewidered and afraid and embittered.
And it is safe to suppose that many bring
with them the crowding suspicious and
smoldering hatred of authority that war
and hunger and misrepresentation govern
ment left in so many parts Of Europe, and
willingness to strike out blindly at any one
who may seem to represent laws and govern
ment. They are not like the ambitious and
They are refugees torn from their anchor
ages largely against their will, and in many
instances they are not of the sort that can
be easily trained in a new language, new
ways and a new system of ethics. They are
past trying.
1t is true that the outward flow OF the
foreign born has been very great since the
armistice was signed, but immigrants of the
new type cannot be expected to fully replace
those who are leaving. Most of the men and
women outward bound were pretty thor
oughly Americanzed. They were far more
healthy in mind and body than the majority
of the new arrivals And the rush to Amer
ica is far greater than the rush away from
it. Here, then, is a new question that ought
to engage the serious attention Of the gov
ernment and every one who aspres to have
part in it.
No desire for cheaper labor should blind
the authorities to the dangers that arise from
large and stagnant groups of people in COM
munities where they cannot be properly abb
sorbed. We have had some opportunities
in the last year or two to observe what can
happen when immovable alien minds and
prejudices are modified and opposed In j.
stinctively to forces of law and enlighten
Inent. And the worst of it is that the new
food Of immigration seems to be only at its
beginning. Certainly it will increase as the
conflict Of governments continues to hinder
economic reconstruction in Europe.
The people at Washington seem to have
been caught unaware by this new problem
| The system at Ellis Island is wholly made
| quate to cope with the throngs of eager
| aliens And since that is the case, it is
| plain that no one in authority has formu
lated a plan to deal with the larger question
of an invasion by people who are cropping
bindly for escape from misery unutterable
rather than for a chance to work hopefully
for better future. This country may YET
know by actual experience what life wat
| like in the path Of tramplng armies that
drive hordes of dazed and helpless noncom
| batants ahead Of them and into communities
utterly unprepared for them. We may ye
have to face the problem Of war refugees al
over again in new and astonishing form.
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