on the eastern counties of Nova Scotia began about 1760 with the
arrival of Scots and Ulster Scots. In 1772 a contingent of Highlanders
direct from Scotland took up land alongside an American group from
Philadelphia. From then on until about 1820, a steady stream of
Highlanders came into the region; Gaelic is still spoken in parts
of the colony. Nova Scotia with the other Maritime Provinces still
represents the most purely British of all the Canadian provinces, and
as shown, an important part of its population came to it through the
United States.
* * * * *
New Brunswick was established on August 16, 1784, out of a part of
ancient Acadia. It also received an important number of Loyalists
at the time of the Revolution--indeed it might be said to owe its
existence to the arrival of some 10,000 expatriates from the United
States. But the bulk of the population is Scottish with a strong
Highland contingent. There are few foreign-born other than a small
element from the United States.
* * * * *
Prince Edward Island is similar as to its population and is the most
purely "native" of all, only one in each one hundred in this province
being foreign-born. The Roman Catholics there include a considerable
number of Scotch Highlanders and number nearly a half of the population.
* * * * *
Quebec is still the stronghold of the French-Canadians, more than
half of whom are unable to speak the English language. The French
stock still numbers one-fourth of the entire population of the entire
Dominion of Canada. On the northern frontier of Quebec there was some
mixture with the Indians, but the half-breeds are probably not numerous
enough to form a substantial part of the old population. In addition to
their great movement to New England the French-Canadians have spread
into Ontario, New Brunswick, and Prince Edward Island to some extent.
The French-Canadian stock is the most highly inbred of any of the
large groups of the New World. It is based on original immigrants who
numbered a good many less than 10,000. In the course of three centuries
this nucleus has multiplied to 3,000,000, with virtually no additions
of fresh arrivals from abroad. They have lived a New World life longer
than have most of the Whites of the Western Hemisphere, and must be
put in a class by themselves. They are not French, in spite of their
language--an archaic speech at which the true Frenchman laughs. In
every way they differ from the present-day French, more indeed than
New Englanders of Colonial descent now differ from the present-day
Englishman. From the cradle to the grave they are surrounded by the
influence of the Roman Catholic Church to an extent almost as unknown
to the present-day French as it is to the present-day Americans. Of
late years not only those who have come to New England, but some of
those living in Quebec Province have shown a disposition to break away
from the church because of its heavy and inexorable taxation.
The French-Canadians, in Quebec and the neighboring provinces, were, to
an extent, disloyal to the British Empire in the Great War. Under the
influence of their priests they resisted the draft in several instances
and there was bloodshed in Quebec on this account. As has been said
elsewhere, these Frenchmen would not fight for the British Empire,
which had guaranteed them extraordinary privileges as to their language
and religion, nor would they fight for France, which they claimed as
motherland, but which they now regarded as atheistic. Neither would
they fight for Belgium, which is pretty nearly as clerical as they are.
In short, their conduct during the World War was contemptible and in
sharp contrast to the militant and effective patriotism of the more
westerly provinces of Canada.
* * * * *
Ontario, called Upper Canada in distinction to French-speaking Lower
Canada, received its first important population from the United
States when Loyalist refugees, including many Highland Scots, mainly
from northern and western New York, settled there and became known
as the United Empire Loyalists. Among these immigrants, were the
disbanded frontier regiments which had been organized by Sir John
Johnson, including abundant Macdonalds from Glengarry and Inverness,
together with Camerons, Chisholms, Fergusons, MacIntyres, Russells, and
Hamiltons, who opened up the region constituting the present counties
of Glengarry, Stormont, and Dundas.
In 1785, almost the entire parish of Knoydart, Glengarry, emigrated
direct from Scotland and settled in a body in Upper Canada. In 1793 a
contingent from Glenelg settled at Kirkhill. In 1799 came many Camerons
from Lochiel, and in 1803 another delegation of Macdonalds arrived,
with more people from Glenelg and Kintail. Thus Ontario, which in 1791
was set off from (French) Lower Canada and given its own government
under the name of Upper Canada, became almost as much entitled to
consider itself a "Nova Scotia," as did the Maritime Province of that
name.
At the end of the American Revolution, Upper Canada was supposed not
to contain as many as 10,000 inhabitants. By 1811 it had 83,000 and
by 1817 it was estimated to have 134,000. While many Irish came at a
somewhat later period, most of these eventually went on to the United
States.
The interference with British immigration caused by the Napoleonic
wars led to Upper Canada's offering special attraction to settlers
from the United States. The lack of sympathy of these with the British
Government during the War of 1812 was an embarrassment to Canada, just
as the loyalty of the United Empire group, which prevented Canada from
being conquered by the United States, was in turn a serious annoyance
to the American Government.
The later settlement of Ontario was largely from Scotland and the
northern English counties, and was pre-dominantly Presbyterian. There
were enough Ulster Scots to make it an active center of the American
Protective Association of forty years ago and it is definitely, at the
present time, a Nordic territory.
During the present century it has received thousands of Austrians,
Poles, and Italians, who introduced racial elements not easily
assimilated.
* * * * *
Manitoba began to be settled shortly after the War of 1812, when Lord
Selkirk established his Red River Colony. The Scotch Highlanders,
Swiss, and others whom he planted there did not prosper, and many of
them eventually drifted down into the United States, taking an active
part in the formation of Minnesota. Around this nucleus, however,
there gradually grew an incongruous and isolated settlement made up
of three elements that had almost nothing in common; the Scotch, the
French-Canadians, and the half-breeds. In 1849 the Red River Settlement
was credited with 5391 people. With the establishment of steam
navigation on the Red River, and the official creation of Winnipeg,
both of which occurred in 1862, development began on a larger scale.
A provisional government was given to the territory in 1869, and from
time to time land was generously allotted to the early white settlers,
to the half-breeds, and to the Hudson's Bay Company. Thereafter the
province grew slowly, from the natural increase of its founders and
from a Nordic migration from Ontario and from the neighboring parts of
the United States, until the mixed European immigration of the last
half-century changed somewhat the character of the population. These
latter now account for one-third of the whole.
The proportion of these non-Nordic Europeans, from southern or central
Europe, is three times as great as the European immigration from either
northern or western Europe. If this immigration continues in like
proportions, Manitoba, like the other prairie provinces, is in danger
of being lost to the Nordics.
* * * * *
Saskatchewan has a larger American-born population than Manitoba, one
resident in every eight having first seen the light of day under the
American flag. But it has a still larger recent European immigration
amounting to nearly 40 per cent of the total population of the
province. A bare half of the people of Saskatchewan are of British
origin.
* * * * *
Alberta has both a somewhat smaller European element and the largest
American-born contingent of any of the provinces, amounting to one in
six. Many English of a fine type have settled there.
* * * * *
In all the Prairie Provinces the French-Canadian represents scarcely
more than one in twenty of the population.
* * * * *
British Columbia has prided itself with justice on its British origin,
and is exceeded in this respect only by the Maritime Provinces. Of its
European immigrants (one in eleven of the whole), approximately equal
numbers are Nordics from northern or western Europe, and Alpines or
Mediterraneans from southeastern and central Europe. During the World
War its young men showed great attachment to the mother country, and
the loss from death was correspondingly great. Because of its great
distance from the ports of entry, it was long avoided by immigrants.
Not until about 1907 did it begin to get its fair share. Since then, it
has held its own, about half of its new arrivals however coming from
the United States.
The province also has its Asiatic problem, which has been the source
of hard feeling on several occasions. One of the great hindrances to
its more rapid development was shortage of labor, and it was natural
that the Orient, which could reach British Columbia more easily and
cheaply than could either Europe or even the Atlantic provinces of
Canada itself, should be called upon to meet the need. Chinese soon
began to enter, until stopped by a head tax of $500. Japanese came in
considerable numbers, not merely in the fisheries but for day labor in
railway construction. Some 6000 Hindus likewise found their way there.
Orientals now amount to one in every seven of the total population.
There is a real Asiatic question here and the Whites are beginning to
look to the United States for protection.
* * * * *
Canada's immense arctic area, the Yukon and the Northwest Territories,
may be neglected in this discussion because of the lack of population.
Those who see in the mosquito-infested tundra of "The Land of Little
Sticks," with its months of winter darkness, a future populous area of
agricultural and livestock industry are destined to wait long for the
realization of their dream.
* * * * *
So far as the British element in Canada is concerned, it has been
pointed out above in several places that the country is to a certain
extent an offspring of the United States. This contribution has
continued up to the present time. During the 1880's there was another
great period of migration from the Union to the Dominion. At that time
nearly twice as many entered Canada from this country as from Great
Britain, and six times as many as from the continent of Europe.
Not all of these Americans were of the old native stock. It has been
calculated that at least half of this contingent was of British
extraction, the other half being made up of various European
nationalities who, after becoming acclimated to the New World in the
United States, passed on to Canadian soil. Thus the contribution from
the United States during that period did not represent a purely Nordic
accession.
The 1890's represented a period of British immigration. But, with
the turn of the century, Canada began to share in the great influx
of miscellaneous peoples who were already deluging the shores of the
United States. During the first twelve years of the twentieth century,
Canada received 2,000,000 people, of whom 800,000 were British. About
700,000 others came from the United States, but more than a third of
these are calculated to have been Continental arrivals who merely
passed through the United States for convenience. In 1901 there were in
Canada some 650,000 of "foreign stock"--that is, of neither British nor
French origin. In 1921 there were more than twice as many. Since the
beginning of the century Canada has acquired more than 100,000 Jews.
After the World War the Empire Settlement Act began to make itself
felt, reducing markedly the proportion of immigrants from the United
States into Canada while from 1900 onward Ireland began to figure
heavily in the immigration statistics.
In 1930 there were, on the other hand, over 1,200,000 Canadian-born,
both of British and French stock, in the United States and during the
preceding eight years 300,000 had returned to Canada.
Not only have the western provinces, then, been thrown violently into
a disequilibrium by the population changes of the last generation, but
the stability of the whole Dominion has been menaced. Canada, like the
United States, has taken on a great liability in the admission of the
hundreds of thousands of non-Nordics, who will be hard to assimilate,
even if it be assumed that they would become valuable when assimilated,
which is by no means always the case. One of Canada's advantages, on
the other hand, is the negligible proportion of Negroes, and it might
well erect barriers even now against them, as it has already done
against the Asiatics.
With its immense territory and more than 10,000,000 inhabitants, Canada
is still to be credited to the Nordics, though, if the population
trends that began with this century should continue, the balance would
change rapidly. While the United States has contributed by far the
largest number of foreign-born, Russia has contributed the second
largest number of immigrants, Saskatchewan receiving more of these than
any other province. Ontario, Quebec, and Manitoba have received about
equal numbers, in each case one-third less than went to Saskatchewan.
Those of Austrian birth, who are third in the list, are concentrated in
the two provinces of Manitoba and Saskatchewan in about equal numbers,
each of these provinces having almost twice as many Austrian-born as
Alberta or Ontario. The Chinese stand fourth in numbers among the
foreign-born of the Dominion, but most of them are concentrated in
British Columbia. Ontario has almost as many Italians as all the rest
of Canada put together, and it has also the largest number of Poles.
Because of the great body of French-Canadians, the Roman Catholic
Church is proportionately twice as strong as in the United States.
The 1921 census showed the population to be made up as follows:
PER CENT
British origin 55.40
French 27.91
Other European 14.16
Indian 1.26
Asiatic .75
This computation distributes the immigrants from the United States
according to their racial stock; thus the main part would be classified
with those of British origin, a smaller part as "other European," and
so on.
From the foregoing it is evident that Canada is now less than 60 per
cent Nordic--probably less Nordic than the United States.
Canada has been the great obstacle to extending the American
immigration quotas to the countries of the Western Hemisphere. The
majority of its inhabitants are our own kinsmen, many of whom have
already contributed elements of great value to our population. Others
would be most welcome if they chose to come.
Our nation has been unwilling to put the slightest restriction on
Canadian immigration, by applying a quota; and it was thought it would
be invidious and discriminatory to apply a quota to the countries south
of us, and not to the one to the north. That difficulty will have to be
met firmly in the near future. One proposed solution has been to admit
from Canada only those whose mother tongue is English.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 15: Acadie in the Micmac language means "place." Henry
Wadsworth Longfellow's pathetic poem, "Evangeline," embodies the
anti-English sentiments of the early nineteenth century in New England
and is founded largely on an error of spelling, which made "Arcadia"
out of the Indian word. The expulsion of the French in 1758 was by
Bostonians under Colonel John Winslow, and was justified by the refusal
of the French to accept loyally the rule of the English.]
XVII
OUR NEIGHBORS ON THE SOUTH
Unlike Canada on our north, the countries south of the Rio Grande have
been relatively little influenced by Nordic culture, to say nothing
of anything resembling a Nordic conquest. The outlying territories of
Mexico which were annexed to the United States were nearly empty lands
and present Mexican influences in the Southwest are matters of more
recent date.
Latin America is one of the major divisions of the World, and from the
present point of view should no more be discussed as a unit than could
Europe or Asia. Its original population represents one of the great
racial divisions of mankind. Its twenty different nations now speak
several different languages, and embrace representatives of all the
important races of both hemispheres.
The general area gets such unity as it possesses from the Latin and
Roman Catholic aspect of its culture as contrasted with the Protestant,
Anglo-Saxon culture of America north of the Mexican border. This Latin
civilization was originally Spanish (in Brazil Portuguese), but since
the era of the revolutions which threw off the Spanish yoke, the
Spanish influence has become more and more negligible, and locally has
been somewhat supplanted by the French, and, to a small extent, by the
Italian influence.
Latin America was never colonized at all in the sense that North
America was colonized. English settlers with their families came to the
New World to found homes, but the early history of Latin America was
that of a series of plundering and proselyting expeditions, and such of
the adventurers as tarried were usually men without families who had
no desire to stay a day longer than was necessary to acquire a fortune
and return to Europe. Add to these the military forces who came under
compulsion, and the missionaries, administrators, and concessionaires
of all kinds and one has the bulk of the early European immigration.
Under these circumstances the number of women who came with their
husbands was naturally small, and most of the Europeans took Indian
wives, frequently several of them, thus laying the basis for the
half-breed population of the present day. In Paraguay, for instance,
some of the colonial rulers are said to have had fifty or a hundred
native concubines. If every descendant of these matings carries the
Spanish name but has married mainly with Indian stock in the ten or
fifteen generations since, it is easy to understand that present-day
families may bear the names of hidalgos, of whose genetic traits they
have virtually none.
The number of European immigrants was never large. During the sixteenth
century, a period of active exploitation, the entire movement from
Spain to America is thought to have represented only about 1000 or 1500
persons a year. With a high death rate, and the disposition on their
part to return as soon as possible, there was no opportunity for the
Spaniard to establish the basis of a civilization built upon his own
race.
By 1553 foundling half-breeds numbered thousands in Spanish America
and the viceroy Mendoza was obliged to establish an orphan school for
them. Even at the end of the eighteenth century, when Humboldt visited
Mexico City, he remarked that of the European-born Spaniards there, not
one-tenth were women. The proportion of women must certainly have been
still smaller in the provincial towns and on the frontiers.
So far as the present population goes back to the early days of Spanish
dominion, it may be said to be Spanish by name and Indian by blood. The
families, which in many Spanish American countries have social prestige
because of descent from the conquerors and rulers of the Colonial
Period, must therefore attach all importance to the family name, and
little or none to the many other lines of descent which have entered
into the composition of their present generation.
Honorable exception should be made in almost every one of the Spanish
American republics of a small group of Whites that has consistently
maintained its racial integrity and upheld intelligent ideals of racial
progress, under most difficult conditions. In many of the countries,
too, there are groups of far-seeing intellectuals who are working
for the adoption of wise immigration policies, presenting sound and
constructive measures of eugenic reform, and striving to awaken their
fellow countrymen to the fact that a nation's capital is, in the last
analysis, biological, and that permanent and satisfactory progress is
possible only to a people with a healthy family life.
In many of the Latin American countries the Whites, or those who pass
as such (for they have, in most cases, a large proportion of Indian
blood) form an oligarchy or ruling caste occupying the higher positions
in the political and ecclesiastical worlds. They also constitute the
land-owning and professional classes, while commerce and industry are
largely in the hands of foreigners or their descendants. In many cases
these foreign immigrants marry into the best native families, and thus
their children become a part of the ruling caste.
* * * * *
Mexico. The restriction of European immigration into the United
States under the National Origins Quota cutting off what had been the
principal source of unskilled labor had an unexpected and undesirable
effect in encouraging immigration from nearby countries of the Western
Hemisphere, which were not under the quota, and particularly from
Mexico. Industries accustomed to depend upon cheap, ignorant, and
docile workers from Mediterranean or Alpine countries turned to the
illiterate Indians on the South as a ready substitute. The stream of
arrivals across the border, more illegal than legal, soon brought into
the United States more than a million Mexicans. Only the unexpected
depression beginning in 1929 stemmed this tide and apparently prevented
Mexico from reconquering peacefully, by an immigrant invasion, the
territory it had lost by the decision of war in 1848.
Since the sixteen million residents of Mexico are the nearest large
body of people in a position to supply immigrants to the United States
and ready to do so, a study of their composition is of the highest
importance at the present time. Mexico at the time of the Spanish
Conquest had seen the rise and fall of several relatively high native
civilizations, and that of the Aztecs, which was destroyed by the
Spaniards, had many noteworthy features. The combination of brutality
and piety which dominated the conquerors led to the extermination as
far as possible of every salient feature of the native culture. The
country was, thereafter, exploited ruthlessly by the Spaniards, but the
Spanish civilization, such as it was, did not succeed in establishing
itself in this foreign soil. The history of the last four centuries
has been a history of the gradual absorption of the foreigners by the
Indian element. This is true alike of race and culture.
[Illustration: MEXICO CENTRAL AMERICA AND THE WEST INDIES]
The large native population found here by the Spaniards was quickly
reduced in numbers. A Spanish priest enumerates ten plagues which had
decimated the people during his time, that is, during the first
quarter of a century after the conquest. First the smallpox, brought
by a Negro in one of Narvaez' ships. It is said to have destroyed more
than half of the people in many of the provinces. The others were: the
slaughter in the capture of Mexico City, the famine resulting from
the widespread warfare; the abuses of overseers of the towns given in
vassalage; the heavy tributes; the tremendous abuses in connection
with the mines; the reconstruction of Mexico City by forced labor;
the traffic in branded slaves; the abuses of transportation, with
Indians as human beasts of burden; and the factional warfare among
the Spaniards themselves, in which the Indians bore the brunt of the
fighting. To these should be added particularly the other infectious
diseases that the Spaniards introduced, such as tuberculosis and
syphilis, as to which the aboriginal inhabitants had not the slightest
immunity or resistance, through previous racial experience.