CHAPTER IV

1820 TO 1860

The first act passed by the federal government of the United States which can in any way be called an immigration law was primarily designed, not to restrict or control the admission of immigrants into this country, but to make some provision for their comfort and safety while on the voyage—matters which had been shockingly neglected in the past, with the result of untold sufferings and horrors. These evils were largely due to the intolerable overcrowding on shipboard which was habitual. The act in question aimed to correct these evils by limiting the number of passengers which might be carried on any ship to two to every five tons of the ship’s weight. It furthermore provided that each ship or vessel leaving an American port was to have on board for each passenger carried sixty gallons of water, one gallon of vinegar, one hundred pounds of salted provisions, and one hundred pounds of wholesome ship bread. It is very doubtful how much good either of these provisions ever did to the immigrants. The clause in regard to overcrowding, based as it was merely on the ship’s total weight, was wholly inadequate to prevent extreme overcrowding in such parts of the vessel as might be assigned to passengers. And as far as the provision regarding supplies is concerned, it could have been of no help to the immigrants, as it applied only to ships leaving an American port. There was one provision of the law, however, which has been of permanent benefit. This was the stipulation that at the port of landing a full and complete report or manifest was to be made by the ship’s officer to the customs authorities, which was to state the number of passengers carried, together with the name, sex, age, and occupation of each. This act was passed on March 2, 1819, and in the year ending September 30, 1820, the first official statistics of immigration were collected. From this time to the present we have a continuous record of arrivals, increasing in detail with subsequent legal requirements. Thus the year 1820 stands as a fitting beginning for our third period.

The decade of the twenties was one of great industrial activity on the part of the American people. Manufactures increased. The Erie Canal was completed, others were commenced, and there was a fever of excitement about them. The first railroads were projected, and vied with the canals in arousing public enthusiasm. There was a vast movement of population westward, and the Ohio River was a busy thoroughfare.

All of these enterprises aroused a demand for labor, which, as we have seen, the native population would not readily supply. By the middle of the decade the stream of immigration had begun to respond, so that in 1825 the number of arrivals for the year reached the ten thousand mark for the first time since statistics had been collected. By the end of the decade the number had more than doubled. In the fifteen months ending December 31, 1832, there were over sixty thousand arrivals, and in the year 1842, 104,565—the first time the hundred thousand mark had been reached. Such an enormous increase in immigration as this could not fail to have its effect upon the social life of the nation, and to attract widespread attention. Coupled with the changing nature of industry, it brought many new problems before the American people—congestion, tenement house problems, unemployment, etc. Pauperism, intemperance, beggary, and prostitution increased.[59] For many of these evils it began to appear that the immigrants were partly responsible.

Yet during the twenties it seems that the immigrants were, on the whole, in good favor. The great economic need which they filled outweighed the social burden which they imposed, but which, as yet, was only vaguely felt. The hard manual labor on the construction enterprises of the period was mainly performed by Irish laborers, who flocked over in great numbers, constituting the largest single element in the immigration stream, amounting to probably nearly half of the entire number. It was believed by many Americans, as well as by foreign travelers and observers, that the canals and railroads could never have been built without these sturdy Irishmen. They were a turbulent and reckless lot, though perhaps not wholly through their own fault. Their miserable wages were supplemented by copious supplies of whisky, with the result that the labor camps were frequently the scenes of riotous demonstrations which shocked the sensibilities of the American community.

By the end of this decade, however, the evils attendant upon unregulated immigration were beginning to make themselves felt among the native population. Chief among these was the danger from an increase of pauperism. The frightful shipping conditions, which had marked previous periods, continued with practically no amelioration. The records of the time are full of heartrending tales of crowded, filthy, unventilated ships, and penniless, starved, diseased immigrants, often landed in a state of absolute destitution. The sickening details of these accounts make the most lurid description of present-day steerage conditions seem absolutely colorless. Under such circumstances it was inevitable that a very large number of these miserable victims should come immediately, or in a very short time, upon the public for support. The censuses of the poorhouses showed an altogether disproportionate number of foreign-born paupers among the inmates. In Philadelphia, for instance, it appears that at the beginning of the thirties the foreign-born paupers made up nearly one third of the total number, and by 1834 this proportion had increased to practically one half.[60] Such a state of affairs naturally aroused the consternation of the natives, and the feeling was made more intense by the belief that many of these paupers were taken directly from the almshouses of foreign countries, and shipped to this country at public expense. This matter has been the subject of so much debate that it will be worth while to examine the truth of these charges in this connection.

Mrs. Trollope, writing in 1832, said, “I frequently heard vehement complaints, and constantly met the same in the newspapers, of a practice stated to be very generally adopted in Britain of sending out cargoes of parish paupers to the United States. A Baltimore paper heads some such remarks with the words ‘INFAMOUS CONDUCT’ and then tells us of a cargo of aged paupers just arrived from England, adding ‘John Bull has squeezed the orange and now insolently casts the skin in our faces.’” Mrs. Trollope states that careful investigation on her part failed to substantiate this charge.[61] The article referred to is one which appeared in _Niles’ Register_ for July 3, 1830. It gives an account of the ship _Anacreon_ from Liverpool, which arrived at Norfolk with 168 passengers, three fourths of whom were transported English paupers, cast on our shores at about four pounds ten shillings per head. Many of them were very aged. The editor’s vehement protest against such action contrasts sharply with the complacency with which the same journal had viewed the advent of a crowd of transported Irish paupers seven years earlier.[62]

An examination of the evidence on the question tends to support the statement of the Baltimore editor, rather than the denial of Mrs. Trollope. Other numbers of _Niles’ Register_ contain frequent accounts of such practices. A letter written from England, dated February 7, 1823, and published in this journal states, “I was down in the London docks and there were _twenty-six paupers_ going out in the ship _Hudson_, to New York, sent by the parish of Eurbarst, in Sussex, in carriers’ wagons, who paid their passage and gave them money to start with when they arrived in the U. States.” The editor states that “this precious cargo has arrived safely.”[63] Other numbers of the _Register_ contain similar instances, some of them quoted from other papers.[64]

So far the evidence consists mostly of newspaper tales, and is perhaps open to reasonable doubt, though where there was so much smoke there must have been some fire. But more reliable testimony is available. Charges of the kind in question finally became so prevalent that the government ordered an investigation, and on May 15, 1838, Mr. John Forsyth, then Secretary of State, presented a report on the subject of pauperism and immigration. This contains a large amount of testimony, from which it will be sufficient to select a few typical cases.

On June 28, 1831, Mr. R. M. Harrison, United States consul at Kingston, Jamaica, reported that there was a local law compelling shipmasters who left that port to carry away paupers, for which they received $10 each as remuneration. If they refused to take them, they were fined $300. As various states had laws forbidding the landing of paupers, it was customary for shipmasters to sign the paupers as seamen. The pauper had the privilege of choosing his own vessel, and most of them went to the United States. Mr. Van Buren called the attention of Lord Palmerston, the British Foreign Secretary, to the affair, and requested a discontinuance of the practice. Lord Palmerston replied that the law was to expire December 31, and the governor of Jamaica had been instructed to withhold his assent to any similar law.[65]

Mr. Albert Davy, United States consul at Kingston-upon-Hull, Leeds, England, reported that while no reliable lists were kept at customhouses, distinguishing paupers from others, it was generally known that paupers emigrated, and several shipmasters admitted that passage was paid by parish overseers. If a pauper was an exceptionally hard case, he could demand considerable sums of money in addition to his passage, refusing to go unless they were paid.[66] Mr. F. List on March 8, 1837, reported from Leipsic that not only paupers, but criminals, were transported from the interior to seaports, to be embarked for the United States. A certain Mr. de Stein contracts with the governments to transport paupers for $75 per head, and several of the governments have accepted his proposition. There is a plan to empty the jails and workhouses in this way. It is a common practice in Germany to get rid of paupers and vicious characters by collecting money to send them to the United States.[67]

That it was customary to transport criminals as well as paupers is verified by the fact that during 1837 two lots of convicts arrived in Baltimore: one a party of fourteen convicts on a ship from Bremen, who had been embarked in irons, which had not been stricken off until near the fort; the other a shipload of 200 to 250 Hessian convicts, whose manacles and fetters remained upon their hands and feet until within the day of their arrival.[68]

A memorial of the corporation of the city of New York, January 25, 1847, states that within the last year the ships _Sardinia_ and _Atlas_ from Liverpool arrived in New York, one with 294 and the other with 314 steerage passengers, all paupers, sent by the parish of Grosszimmern, Hesse Darmstadt, to which they belonged and by which their expenses were paid. Two hundred and thirty-four of these immigrants, 117 from each ship, eventually found their way into the New York almshouse.[69]

On January 19, 1839, _Niles’ Register_ reported a crowd of paupers which had arrived in New York from England. Their passage had been paid by the overseers of the poor at Edinburgh, and the majority of them were still wearing the uniform of the poorhouse. This naturally aroused objections, and the consignees of the vessel finally agreed to take them back to Europe, and to repay the city all expense that it had incurred on their account. The United States consul at Basle, Switzerland, reported in 1846 that it was the practice in that country for congregations or town authorities to send paupers to America.[70]

Instances of this sort might be multiplied, but these will suffice to prove that the practice of transporting paupers was a common one during the period we are considering. Just when it was finally stopped it is impossible to say.[71] It certainly played a large part in creating the feeling of hostility to immigrants which manifested itself strongly during the decade of the thirties.

That the situation was partially, at least, comprehended also in England is evidenced by a burlesque poem entitled “Immiscible Immigration,” written in that country, which commences with the following words:

“The tide of emigration still flows fast; Millions of souls remove their bodies corporate— Columbia’s shores will be o’erstocked at last, And Yankees must support them by a pauper rate. Others, With their brothers, Fathers and mothers, Rush to Australia,” etc.[72]

While the dangers from pauperism and criminality were probably the leading causes for opposition to immigration, at this time, other broader and deeper objections were beginning to be felt and to be expressed in current writings. In the _North American Review_ for April, 1835 (p. 457), there is a very sane, calm and convincing article by Mr. A. H. Everett, in which the disadvantages of immigration are set forth. Many of the stock arguments of to-day are well set forth here, among them, of course, the dangers from pauperism and crime, but also the dangers of a heterogeneous population, of poor assimilation, congestion in cities, misuse of political power, and the growth of foreign colonies. The author questions whether the immigrants are really filling the demand for labor, and urges the necessity of furnishing the immigrants with information about different sections of the country, and advising them about their destination. He also feels the need of much greater discrimination in the admission of aliens.

In the same magazine, in the issue for January, 1841, there is an article entitled “The Irish in America,” in which the author names as one of the great grievances against the immigrants that they do more work for less money than the native workingmen, and live on a lower standard, thereby decreasing wages. This is one of the earliest expressions which we find of this objection, and shows that by this time the country had passed beyond the primitive stage where there was room enough for everybody, and no fear of economic competition. It is the foreshadowing of modern conditions and modern thought.

There was still another ground for opposition to the immigrants which very possibly at the end of the thirties eclipsed all the others in positive influence.[73] This was the hatred and fear of the Roman Catholic religion, to which the great majority of the Irish adhered. The Protestant bias which had strongly characterized the early settlers still persisted among the great body of the American people. This motive was the leading one which led to the formation of the first political party which was openly based on opposition to immigration. This was the Native American party which came into prominence as a political movement about 1835, in which year there was a Nativist candidate for Congress in New York City. In the following year the party nominated a candidate for mayor of New York. Nativist societies were formed in Germantown, Pa., and in Washington, D.C., in 1837, and two years later the party was organized in Louisiana, where a state convention was held in 1841. The adherents of this movement did not confine themselves to peaceful and orderly methods, but resorted to anti-Catholic riots in 1844. Two Catholic churches were destroyed in Philadelphia, and a convent in Boston.[74]

In 1845 the Nativist movement claimed 48,000 members in New York, 42,000 in Pennsylvania, 14,000 in Massachusetts, and 6000 in other states. In Congress it had six representatives from New York and two from Pennsylvania. Its first national convention was held in Philadelphia in 1845.[75] A national platform was adopted, the chief demands being the repeal of the naturalization laws, and the appointment of native Americans only to office. They succeeded in securing a certain amount of congressional investigation in 1838, and a bill was presented by a committee appointed for the purpose, which proposed to fine shipmasters who tried to bring into the United States aliens who were idiots, lunatics, maniacs, or afflicted with any incurable disease, in the sum of $1000, and to require them to forfeit a like sum for every alien brought in who had not the ability to maintain himself. “Congress did not even consider this bill, and during the next ten years little attempt was made to secure legislation against the foreigner,”[76] though many petitions to extend the period of residence for naturalization were received. The ever increasing opposition to unregulated immigration had not yet become sufficiently widespread to accomplish any positive measures.

During this period the immigrants were almost wholly from the United Kingdom and Germany, with the Irish in the lead, as we have seen. There were also considerable numbers of French, who outnumbered the Germans in some years in the early part of the period, and small contingents from various other nations, particularly the Scandinavian countries. It was natural that the ties of relationship, language, etc., should put the United Kingdom at the head at this time, and conditions in Ireland were such as to make emigration a very welcome means of relief. The Irish tended to linger in the cities, where they went into domestic and personal service, or to go out into the construction camps. The Germans and Scandinavians, on the other hand, tended to move westward into the interior, and colonies of these races were becoming numerous in several of the middle western states. The Germans of this period were mostly farmers from the thinly settled agricultural sections of the old country, and the great attraction which the United States had for them was the ease with which good farm lands might be secured in this country.[77]

Most of the agitation about immigration, as has been intimated, centered round the Irish, but there was also some feeling against the Germans. This was augmented by the decided clannishness of these people. There were many German societies and newspapers, and a strong and ill-disguised movement to form an independent German state in Texas, or elsewhere on the continent, which was not calculated to endear them to the native American.

Up to the year 1842 the total immigration did not reach one hundred thousand annually, and for the next three years it fell below that figure again.[78] During the last half of this decade, however, certain events occurred in Europe which vastly increased the immigration current, and brought the matter more forcibly to the notice of the American people than ever before. These were the potato famine in Ireland, and the political upheavals of 1848 in various nations of Europe, particularly in Germany. The result of the latter occurrences was to leave a large number of middle class liberalists in Germany in a very undesirable situation, in spite of the partial success of the revolution. The way out, for them, was emigration. This is one of the best examples in history of the political cause of emigration, though even here economic motives were also concerned. A tremendous emigration followed, reaching its climax in 1854, when 215,009 immigrants from Germany reached this country. These were mainly persons of good character and independent spirit, as might be expected from the causes of their departure. Considerable numbers of Bohemians also emigrated at this period, similar in character to the Germans, and actuated by similar motives and conditions.

Conditions in Ireland at about the same time resulted in an emigration rivaling that from Germany in numbers, but by no means so desirable from the point of view of the United States. It was almost exclusively an economic movement. The introduction of the potato into Ireland by Raleigh in 1610 had seemed at first a blessing to the country. It furnished an easy and abundant food supply, and its cultivation spread rapidly. Population increased correspondingly, growing from 2,845,932 in 1785 to 5,356,594 in 1803 and 8,295,061 in 1845. By the latter year most of the population were dependent for their subsistence upon the potato. This was a precarious situation, for the potato furnishes the largest amount of food in proportion to the land used of almost any crop which is grown in temperate regions. In other words, the Irish were living on a very low standard as far as food was concerned, with no margin to fall back on in case of calamity. A people subsisting upon grains and meat may, in time of distress, resort to cheaper and more easily secured food materials temporarily. But a land which is densely populated by people living on the cheapest possible food has no resources when any misfortune attacks their staple supply. Ireland was in this situation in the middle forties, and the misfortune came in the shape of the potato murrain, which attacked the plants in 1845 and caused an almost complete failure of the crop for that year.

Extreme hardship, privation, and distress followed. From 200,000 to 300,000 died of starvation or of fever caused by insufficient food. All who could sought relief in flight. Benevolent agencies in England and Ireland came to their assistance, and enormous numbers of Irish, in one way or another, found the means for emigration, and embarked for Canada or the United States. Added to the great numbers of Germans who were coming at the same time, they caused the first great wave in the immigration current, reaching a maximum of 427,833 in the year 1854, a number which was not exceeded until 1873. After 1854 the immigration current dwindled rapidly, until in 1862 it amounted to only 72,183.

During this entire period, up to the time of the great influx from Germany and Ireland, immigration had been practically unregulated so far as the United States government was concerned, the only federal law bearing on the subject being the ineffective act of 1819. Many of the individual states, however, had attempted to cope with the evils of the situation by restrictive or protective measures. New York took the lead in this matter. In this state there were two sets of laws bearing on the question. The first of these had to do with the support of the marine hospital. As early as 1820 New York had passed a law (April 14, 1820,

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