Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1921-04-09
Lead the Immigrant to the Land
BY Frederic J. HaSkin
wy ASHINGTON, D. c., April 4.-The prob
w lens of what to do with the immi-


farm lands can all be in measure solved by
project for giving the immigrant every OPP
portunity to obtain farm soon as he ar
rves in America, in the opinion of the new
commissioner general of immigration. Mr.
w w. Husband, as expressed i an exclusive
| interview
Mr. Husband has not yet perfected his plan
| for doing this, but will soon begin holding
conferences with his colleagues for that pur-
pose His general idea is to use uncultivated
! lands in private ownership, under some COM
mercial arrangement, with government super
vision or cooperation. The immigrant is not
| to be given a ready-made farm but aid and
instruction in clearing waste land as the
pioneers did. The farm is to be paid for IN
| long installments.
While there is wide disagreement to
how the thing should be done, all students
of the agrarian problem of this country agree
with Mr.. Husband that the great need is for
some system by which the man with little
or no capital, who is capable of farming, may
get hold of land on such terms that he can
make living out of it.
1.-The immigrant according to the new
commission general, fought to be the logical
element in population to restore the bal
ance between rural and city population A
considerable part of the normal immigration
of the United States is a farming population
that knows nothing but farming. These peo-
pie hold the love of the soil as a native in
heritance, and their hope is to own few
acres of land and some stock. [ have visited
the peasants of various countries of Europe,
I have eaten with them, and slept in their
houses, and | know that land is their dream
and ambition That is one big thing. You
have not got to teach the immigrant to love
the land
Mr. Husband went on to explain that this
desire for land ownership does not lead the
immigrant to seek a farm for himself when
he n this country. because
years friends and relatives who have pre-
coded him have not gone to farms. The I'M
migrant comes here more or less dependent
on others of his race to help him. He follows
the example of these others, and settles down
INF New Yorks East Side, in a New Eng
land factory town, and starts vending or
working in factory. No matter what his
race may be, the foreigner is timidly clan
nish and clings to the program mapped out
by those who came ahead of him.
Aliens Willing to Farm
| Mr. Husband holds that the qualities that
make these immigrants follow the leadership
of others will attract them to the farms, once
the tide is DETECTED from the cities to the
land.
'When immigration was largely from
northern Europe" he says "the alien who
| landed here made straight for the farm.
Then southern and eastern Europe began to
! send more immigrants coincident with the
enormous industrial development of the
United States, beginning about 1880. In
1880 7O.5 per cent of the population of this
country was rural, and then began the drift
to the cities from the farms and from ELL
rope, until last year the rural population was
only 486. The trend toward the city would
have existed anyway. But the millions who
have come from Europe since it started have
very largely contributed to it.
"In this period have developed won
derful industrial system and the immigrant
has been a big factor in its success. we owe
him good deal. But more immigrants con-
tinue to pour in from Europe, and there is
constantly decreasing opportunity for them
in the cities They are merely increasing the
difficulty of an already difficult situation
I'VE will ,,robably have immigration in the
future as in the past, and we must soon do
something to attract the aliens to sections
where they are needed and where they can
make a fair living"
The remedy proposed by the commissioner
lies in the millions of acres Of waste land in
this country. There are no longer enough
desirable homesteads on government land to
supply many immigrants. 1t will have to be
commercial proposition based on the utll-
lied lands in private ownership.
With hard work this land can be converted
into good one man farms. But there must
be hard work. because the farmer who takes
the land must begin the homesteader does
He will probably have to build his house and
barn. He will have to prepare the SOIL But
this is more than pioneers, immigrants
and native born Americans, have been doing
al, over the country in the years when it was
being developed. The job should be easier
now with parcel post, mail order systems,
railroads. and practical government assist
ance.>
Government Must Help
Mr. Husband feels that if the government
does decide to help the immigrant get start
on farm, the work should be carried fur
Their and an extra effort made to help him
achieve 7uccess. That is, he thinks the county
agent and the home demonstration branch OF
the department of agriculture should give
the foreign farmer and his wife special atten-
ton. The children's bureau can also help
him, and local and state agencies can look
out for the sanitation OF his farm' ana inc
education of his children.
First ALL however, Mr.. Husband teels
that the foreigner should not be shunted OH
to a piece Of land where he can only eaten
sight of the smoke from his nearest nelgn-
bor's house on a clear day. This isolation
has heen a discomfort that many homestead
ers have had to endure. Isolation IS espe-
ciallv distasteful to the immigrant and Will
undoubtedly be avoided in planning the new
homestead project. Waste land can be found
in the crowded east as we'll as in the west
A large tract of land at a considerable dis
lance from existing farms would probably, II
turned over to the immigrants, be divided
among number of them, so that they would
not feel shut out from other people whole
colony of foreigners, however, is not so de-
sirabie from the Americanization point of
view. as a few mixed in with American
farmers
People in different parts of the country
have begun to write to Mr.. Husband saying