WHERE AMERICA FELL SHORT WITH ME
When I came to the United States as a lad of six, the most needful
lesson for me, as a boy, was the necessity for thrift. I had been
taught in my home across the sea that thrift was one of the
fundamentals in a successful life. My family had come from a land (the
Netherlands) noted for its thrift; but we had been in the United States
only a few days before the realization came home strongly to my father
and mother that they had brought their children to a land of waste.
Where the Dutchman saved, the American wasted. There was waste, and
the most prodigal waste, on every hand. In every street-car and on
every ferry-boat the floors and seats were littered with newspapers
that had been read and thrown away or left behind. If I went to a
grocery store to buy a peck of potatoes, and a potato rolled off the
heaping measure, the groceryman, instead of picking it up, kicked it
into the gutter for the wheels of his wagon to run over. The butcher's
waste filled my mother's soul with dismay. If I bought a scuttle of
coal at the corner grocery, the coal that missed the scuttle, instead
of being shovelled up and put back into the bin, was swept into the
street. My young eyes quickly saw this; in the evening I gathered up
the coal thus swept away, and during the course of a week I collected a
scuttleful. The first time my mother saw the garbage pail of a family
almost as poor as our own, with the wife and husband constantly
complaining that they could not get along, she could scarcely believe
her eyes. A half pan of hominy of the preceding day's breakfast lay in
the pail next to a third of a loaf of bread. In later years, when I
saw, daily, a scow loaded with the garbage of Brooklyn householders
being towed through New York harbor out to sea, it was an easy
calculation that what was thrown away in a week's time from Brooklyn
homes would feed the poor of the Netherlands.
At school, I quickly learned that to "save money" was to be "stingy";
as a young man, I soon found that the American disliked the word
"economy," and on every hand as plenty grew spending grew. There was
literally nothing in American life to teach me thrift or economy;
everything to teach me to spend and to waste.
I saw men who had earned good salaries in their prime, reach the years
of incapacity as dependents. I saw families on every hand either
living quite up to their means or beyond them; rarely within them. The
more a man earned, the more he--or his wife--spent. I saw fathers and
mothers and their children dressed beyond their incomes. The
proportion of families who ran into debt was far greater than those who
saved. When a panic came, the families "pulled in"; when the panic was
over, they "let out." But the end of one year found them precisely
where they were at the close of the previous year, unless they were
deeper in debt.
It was in this atmosphere of prodigal expenditure and culpable waste
that I was to practise thrift: a fundamental in life! And it is into
this atmosphere that the foreign-born comes now, with every inducement
to spend and no encouragement to save. For as it was in the days of my
boyhood, so it is to-day--only worse. One need only go over the
experiences of the past two years, to compare the receipts of merchants
who cater to the working-classes and the statements of savings-banks
throughout the country, to read the story of how the foreign-born are
learning the habit of criminal wastefulness as taught them by the
American.
Is it any wonder, then, that in this, one of the essentials in life and
in all success, America fell short with me, as it is continuing to fall
short with every foreign-born who comes to its shores?
As a Dutch boy, one of the cardinal truths taught me was that whatever
was worth doing was worth doing well: that next to honesty come
thoroughness as a factor in success. It was not enough that anything
should be done: it was not done at all if it was not done well. I came
to America to be taught exactly the opposite. The two infernal
Americanisms "That's good enough" and "That will do" were early taught
me, together with the maxim of quantity rather than quality.
It was not the boy at school who could write the words in his copy-book
best who received the praise of the teacher; it was the boy who could
write the largest number of words in a given time. The acid test in
arithmetic was not the mastery of the method, but the number of minutes
required to work out an example. If a boy abbreviated the month
January to "Jan." and the word Company to "Co." he received a hundred
per cent mark, as did the boy who spelled out the words and who could
not make the teacher see that "Co." did not spell "Company."
As I grew into young manhood, and went into business, I found on every
hand that quantity counted for more than quality. The emphasis was
almost always placed on how much work one could do in a day, rather
than upon how well the work was done. Thoroughness was at a discount
on every hand; production at a premium. It made no difference in what
direction I went, the result was the same: the cry was always for
quantity, quantity! And into this atmosphere of almost utter disregard
for quality I brought my ideas of Dutch thoroughness and my conviction
that doing well whatever I did was to count as a cardinal principle in
life.
During my years of editorship, save in one or two conspicuous
instances, I was never able to assign to an American writer, work which
called for painstaking research. In every instance, the work came back
to me either incorrect in statement, or otherwise obviously lacking in
careful preparation.
One of the most successful departments I ever conducted in _The Ladies'
Home Journal_ called for infinite reading and patient digging, with the
actual results sometimes almost negligible. I made a study of my
associates by turning the department over to one after another, and
always with the same result: absolute lack of a capacity for patient
research. As one of my editors, typically American, said to me: "It
isn't worth all the trouble that you put into it." Yet no single
department ever repaid the searcher more for his pains. Save for
assistance derived from a single person, I had to do the work myself
for all the years that the department continued. It was apparently
impossible for the American to work with sufficient patience and care
to achieve a result.
We all have our pet notions as to the particular evil which is "the
curse of America," but I always think that Theodore Roosevelt came
closest to the real curse when he classed it as a lack of thoroughness.
Here again, in one of the most important matters in life, did America
fall short with me; and, what is more important, she is falling short
with every foreigner that comes to her shores.
In the matter of education, America fell far short in what should be
the strongest of all her institutions: the public school. A more
inadequate, incompetent method of teaching, as I look back over my
seven years of attendance at three different public schools, it is
difficult to conceive. If there is one thing that I, as a foreign-born
child, should have been carefully taught, it is the English language.
The individual effort to teach this, if effort there was, and I
remember none, was negligible. It was left for my father to teach me,
or for me to dig it out for myself. There was absolutely no indication
on the part of teacher or principal of responsibility for seeing that a
foreign-born boy should acquire the English language correctly. I was
taught as if I were American-born, and, of course, I was left dangling
in the air, with no conception of what I was trying to do.
My father worked with me evening after evening; I plunged my young mind
deep into the bewildering confusions of the language--and no one
realizes the confusions of the English language as does the
foreign-born--and got what I could through these joint efforts. But I
gained nothing from the much-vaunted public-school system which the
United States had borrowed from my own country, and then had rendered
incompetent--either by a sheer disregard for the thoroughness that
makes the Dutch public schools the admiration of the world, or by too
close a regard for politics.
Thus, in her most important institution to the foreign-born, America
fell short. And while I am ready to believe that the public school may
have increased in efficiency since that day, it is, indeed, a question
for the American to ponder, just how far the system is efficient for
the education of the child who comes to its school without a knowledge
of the first word in the English language. Without a detailed
knowledge of the subject, I know enough of conditions in the average
public school to-day to warrant at least the suspicion that Americans
would not be particularly proud of the system, and of what it gives for
which annually they pay millions of dollars in taxes.
I am aware in making this statement that I shall be met with convincing
instances of intelligent effort being made with the foreign-born
children in special classes. No one has a higher respect for those
efforts than I have--few, other than educators, know of them better
than I do, since I did not make my five-year study of the American
public school system for naught. But I am not referring to the
exceptional instance here and there. I merely ask of the American,
interested as he is or should be in the Americanization of the
strangers within his gates, how far the public school system, as a
whole, urban and rural, adapts itself, with any true efficiency, to the
foreign-born child. I venture to color his opinion in no wise; I
simply ask that he will inquire and ascertain for himself, as he should
do if he is interested in the future welfare of his country and his
institutions; for what happens in America in the years to come depends,
in large measure, on what is happening to-day in the public schools of
this country.
As a Dutch boy I was taught a wholesome respect for law and for
authority. The fact was impressed upon me that laws of themselves were
futile unless the people for whom they were made respected them, and
obeyed them in spirit more even than in the letter. I came to America
to feel, on every hand, that exactly the opposite was true. Laws were
passed, but were not enforced; the spirit to enforce them was lacking
in the people. There was little respect for the law; there was
scarcely any for those appointed to enforce it.
The nearest that a boy gets to the law is through the policeman. In
the Netherlands a boy is taught that a policeman is for the protection
of life and property; that he is the natural friend of every boy and
man who behaves himself. The Dutch boy and the policeman are,
naturally, friendly in their relations. I came to America to be told
that a policeman is a boy's natural enemy; that he is eager to arrest
him if he can find the slightest reason for doing so. A policeman, I
was informed, was a being to hold in fear, not in respect. He was to
be avoided, not to be made friends with. The result was that, as did
all boys, I came to regard the policeman on our beat as a distinct
enemy. His presence meant that we should "stiffen up"; his
disappearance was the signal for us to "let loose."
So long as one was not caught, it did not matter. I heard mothers tell
their little children that if they did not behave themselves, the
policeman would put them into a bag and carry them off, or cut their
ears off. Of course, the policeman became to them an object of terror;
the law he represented, a cruel thing that stood for punishment. Not a
note of respect did I ever hear for the law in my boyhood days. A law
was something to be broken, to be evaded, to call down upon others as a
source of punishment, but never to be regarded in the light of a
safeguard.
And as I grew into manhood, the newspapers rang on every side with
disrespect for those in authority. Under the special dispensation of
the liberty of the press, which was construed into the license of the
press, no man was too high to escape editorial vituperation if his
politics did not happen to suit the management, or if his action ran
counter to what the proprietors believed it should be. It was not
criticism of his acts, it was personal attack upon the official;
whether supervisor, mayor, governor, or president, it mattered not.
It is a very unfortunate impression that this American lack of respect
for those in authority makes upon the foreign-born mind. It is
difficult for the foreigner to square up the arrest and deportation of
a man who, through an incendiary address, seeks to overthrow
governmental authority, with the ignoring of an expression of exactly
the same sentiments by the editor of his next morning's newspaper. In
other words, the man who writes is immune, but the man who reads,
imbibes, and translates the editor's words into action is immediately
marked as a culprit, and America will not harbor him. But why harbor
the original cause? Is the man who speaks with type less dangerous
than he who speaks with his mouth or with a bomb?
At the most vital part of my life, when I was to become an American
citizen and exercise the right of suffrage, America fell entirely
short. It reached out not even the suggestion of a hand.
When the Presidential Conventions had been held in the year I reached
my legal majority, and I knew I could vote, I endeavored to find out
whether, being foreign-born, I was entitled to the suffrage. No one
could tell me; and not until I had visited six different municipal
departments, being referred from one to another, was it explained that,
through my father's naturalization, I became, automatically, as his
son, an American citizen. I decided to read up on the platforms of the
Republican and Democratic parties, but I could not secure copies
anywhere, although a week had passed since they had been adopted in
convention.
I was told the newspapers had printed them. It occurred to me there
must be many others besides myself who were anxious to secure the
platforms of the two parties in some more convenient form. With the
eye of necessity ever upon a chance to earn an honest penny, I went to
a newspaper office, cut out from its files the two platforms, had them
printed in a small pocket edition, sold one edition to the American
News Company and another to the News Company controlling the Elevated
Railroad bookstands in New York City, where they sold at ten cents
each. So great was the demand which I had only partially guessed, that
within three weeks I had sold such huge editions of the little books
that I had cleared over a thousand dollars.
But it seemed to me strange that it should depend on a foreign-born
American to supply an eager public with what should have been supplied
through the agency of the political parties or through some educational
source.
I now tried to find out what a vote actually meant. It must be
recalled that I was only twenty-one years old, with scant education,
and with no civic agency offering me the information I was seeking. I
went to the headquarters of each of the political parties and put my
query. I was regarded with puzzled looks.
"What does it mean to vote?" asked one chairman. "Why, on Election Day
you go up to the ballot-box and put your ballot in, and that's all
there is to it."
But I knew very well that that was not all there was to it, and was
determined to find out the significance of the franchise. I met with
dense ignorance on every hand. I went to the Brooklyn Library, and was
frankly told by the librarian that he did not know of a book that would
tell me what I wanted to know. This was in 1884.
As the campaign increased in intensity, I found myself a desired person
in the eyes of the local campaign managers, but not one of them could
tell me the significance and meaning of the privilege I was for the
first time to exercise.
Finally, I spent an evening with Seth Low, and, of course, got the
desired information.
But fancy the quest I had been compelled to make to acquire the simple
information that should have been placed in my hands or made readily
accessible to me. And how many foreign-born would take equal pains to
ascertain what I was determined to find out?
Surely America fell short here at the moment most sacred to me: that of
my first vote!
Is it any easier to-day for the foreign citizen to acquire this
information when he approaches his first vote? I wonder! Not that I
do not believe there are agencies for this purpose. You know there
are, and so do I. But how about the foreign-born? Does he know it?
Is it not perhaps like the owner of the bulldog who assured the friend
calling on him that it never attacked friends of the family? "Yes,"
said the friend, "that's all right. You know and I know that I am a
friend of the family; but does the dog know?"
Is it to-day made known to the foreign-born, about to exercise his
privilege of suffrage for the first time, where he can be told what
that privilege means: is the means to know made readily accessible to
him: is it, in fact, as it should be, brought to him?
It was not to me; is it to him?
One fundamental trouble with the present desire for Americanization is
that the American is anxious to Americanize two classes--if he is a
reformer, the foreign-born; if he is an employer, his employees. It
never occurs to him that he himself may be in need of Americanization.
He seems to take it for granted that because he is American-born, he is
an American in spirit and has a right understanding of American ideals.
But that, by no means, always follows. There are thousands of the
American-born who need Americanization just as much as do the
foreign-born. There are hundreds of American employers who know far
less of American ideals than do some of their employees. In fact,
there are those actually engaged today in the work of Americanization,
men at the top of the movement, who sadly need a better conception of
true Americanism.
An excellent illustration of this came to my knowledge when I attended
a large Americanization Conference in Washington. One of the principal
speakers was an educator of high standing and considerable influence in
one of the most important sections of the United States. In a speech
setting forth his ideas of Americanization, he dwelt with much emphasis
and at considerable length upon instilling into the mind of the
foreign-born the highest respect for American institutions.
After the Conference he asked me whether he could see me that afternoon
at my hotel; he wanted to talk about contributing to the magazine.
When he came, before approaching the object of his talk, he launched
out on a tirade against the President of the United States; the
weakness of the Cabinet, the inefficiency of the Congress, and the
stupidity of the Senate. If words could have killed, there would have
not remained a single living member of the Administration at Washington.
After fifteen minutes of this, I reminded him of his speech and the
emphasis which he had placed upon the necessity of inculcating in the
foreign-born respect for American institutions.
Yet this man was a power in his community, a strong influence upon
others; he believed he could Americanize others, when he himself,
according to his own statements, lacked the fundamental principle of
Americanization. What is true of this man is, in lesser or greater
degree, true of hundreds of others. Their Americanization consists of
lip-service; the real spirit, the only factor which counts in the
successful teaching of any doctrine, is absolutely missing. We
certainly cannot teach anything approaching a true Americanism until we
ourselves feel and believe and practise in our own lives what we are
teaching to others. No law, no lip-service, no effort, however
well-intentioned, will amount to anything worth while in inculcating
the true American spirit in our foreign-born citizens until we are sure
that the American spirit is understood by ourselves and is warp and
woof of our own being.
To the American, part and parcel of his country, these particulars in
which his country falls short with the foreign-born are, perhaps, not
so evident; they may even seem not so very important. But to the
foreign-born they seem distinct lacks; they loom large; they form
serious handicaps which, in many cases, are never surmounted; they are
a menace to that Americanization which is, to-day, more than ever our
fondest dream, and which we now realize more keenly than before is our
most vital need.
It is for this reason that I have put them down here as a concrete
instance of where and how America fell short in my own Americanization,
and, what is far more serious to me, where she is falling short in her
Americanization of thousands of other foreign-born.
"Yet you succeeded," it will be argued.
That may be; but you, on the other hand, must admit that I did not
succeed by reason of these shortcomings: it was in spite of them, by
overcoming them--a result that all might not achieve.