New-York tribune., 1920-04-11

particular controversies between
labor and capital-and into these
we must not enter with prejudgmen,
it is clear that not all the danger:
or the time arise from the direction
of radicalism. Those who contro
capita! are rot readily coming to q
full and uNgrudging sense Of the
full rights CT labor and of the pub
lie in the productive organization OF
industry. The plain citizen occu-
pies no happy station when he finds
himself between the neither mill
stone of those who hold that labo,
IS the sole creator Of wealth anc
the upper milestone of those who
hold that labor is merely a commod.
ity. We may we'll ask which is the
graver error and which the source
of the greater social injustice.
The Plain Citizens Dilemma
Other current problems of the
hour are complex as American life
has never known complexity. Many
OF them are world wide. Our prob
lens of finance, of international re.
latlons, are entangled with geo
graphical, historical, racial, political.
international factors that demand
on the part of the citizen who would
exercise his responsibilities with in
telligence breadth and a detail of
knowledge such as has been required
of no body polite since the begin
ming of human history. Liberty,
happiness, life and the continuity
of civilization hang upon their solu-
ton. Every one of these representa-
tive problems contains it's own spe-
cific need for sounder and more wide
spread education in the fundamen-
tails of economics, finance, history.
geography and everything that per-
tains to the organization of human
society.
/ wish to speak briefly of a spe-
cial problem of great difficulty that
IS confronting the Americanizing
work of the great universities in
our great cities. For years we have
permitted unrestricted immigration.
We have allowed social problems to
grow up within our cities by neglect
ing all consideration of the distli-
button of our immigration. In con-
sequence, in our great cities at the
present time, there are masses of
hundreds of thousands of people
from this or that European center
of civilization which are in some
cases little more Americanzed than
they were when the individuals from
which they were made up left their
foreign homes. Boston and New
\ ork are primarily cities of foreign
population, and The SOUS Of unass;n,-
liated or partially ossimilated IN
migrants are now filing our urban
They are coming in
such masses to the institutions G..
our great cities rs to dominate The
life.
Don't Teach Americanizat;on
Many of our institutions of hiene,
learning, especially urban ones. are
to-day confronted within their wallis
~ problem that is the product of
The last decade. Some of them have
discovered that .Americanization
goes on slowly or not at all under
in which great masses OF
forelgn-born students retain their
social Identity ON the campus and in
The city while they are undergoing
merely formal instruction in the
classroom. They have discovered
hat formal instruction in the class
'oom in the ordinary subjects of aca-
1emlc study does not of itself accom-
dish the Americanization Of the
,lass that is instructed There is
need for something warmer, some
hing more human, something more
spiritual, that shall permeatc the
mass of the student body and BY
1rlnging understanding and sympa.
,hy into every part Of it accomplish
an assimilation in terms of the kind
# instruction for which our Amer,-
AN universities stand.
A grave condition, however, af-
Fects the efficiency of the entire
process Of training when we find re-
peated in the composition of our
metropolitan universities the prob
EN- Of the undistributed masses of
foreign population that occupy our
great cities; when the student BODY
s made up Of large masses Of stu
tents who segregate themselves into
groups exactly aa IL tie city outside
nd tend to divide upon matters of
policy, according to
acial OF national origin. Some in
'titutions have found issues arising
II the form Of clashes between So
tents WAo represent ti-a .Au.ea.csa
and these other masses of