IRISH IMMIGRANTS IN THE UNITED STATES.
FTO THE EDITOR OP THE " SPECTATOR."J
Sin,—I have seldom laid your paper down since the Home- 'rule controversy began, without being tempted to correct some -error of fact with regard to the Irish in America. The particular error to which I am now about to call your attention is not a very serious one; but I have seen it reported in so many English journals, it is so often used in speeches and :articles about the Irish land question, and its correction is so easy, that I shall inflict it upon you.
You say, in your article of January 26th on "The Restriction -of Immigration," speaking of the influx of "Southern Euro- peans :"—" We fancy, too, that they retain their languages longer, and that, like the Irish, they herd together; while they avoid even more than the Irish the field labour in which, -as yet, the natives of the American Continent are careless of competition."
For the notion that the Irish-Americans, taken as.a whole, avoid agricultural pursuits and cling to the cities very much more than the Germans or other races on this continent, I do not know who is most responsible,—probably Mr. Goldwin Smith, who, owing to his constant state of mental inflammation towards the Irish in the United States, is a great fountain of misinformation about them. I seldom read one of his deliver- ances on American politics in the English papers without being reminded of Mark Twain's question,—" Whether it wouldn't be better to know nothing at all, than to know so many things that ain't so." But one has only to look at the census of 1880, to see that on this point there has been gross exaggeration.
I shall select the Germans for comparison with the Irish, because they are the only large body of immigrants belonging to one nationality. There were in the United States in 1880, 1,966,742 persons of German birth ant. 1,854,571 of Irish birth. Of these, there were living in the fifty principal " cities " or large towns of the Union, 795,143 Germans, or 40 per cent., and 850,291 Irish, or 46 per cent. The difference, as you will per- ceive, is not great enough to justify the charge of a special disposition to " herd " against the Irish.
The " occupations " connected with agriculture and country life, given by the census, are agricultural labourers, apiists, dairymen, dairywomen, farm and plantation overseers, florists, gardeners, nurserymen and vine-growers, stock-drovers, stock- herders, stock-raisers, turpentine farmers and labourers, and others in agriculture. Of 978,854 engaged in all " occupations " born in Ireland, there were in agriculture 140,307, or 14 per cent.; of 1,033,190 engaged in all " occupations " born in Germany, there were in agriculture 293,722, or 28 per cent.
These figures cannot be fully understood without taking into account the extent to which the Irish supply the domestic servants of the country in the Eastern States. Of the total Irish engaged in various occupations, 122,194 were in 1880 domestic servants, most of them undoubtedly females, against 19,477 Germans. The demand on the Irish for this sort of labour is due to the fact that they are the only large class of immigrants who speak the English language, and are thus immediately available for household service in American families ; and I will venture to say, after making due allowance for all their defects, their ignorance, and their want of training, the Irish servant-girls are, on the whole, a very creditable body of persons. What they do and have done in the way of money contributions out of their wages for the assistance of friends at home, is something, I think, without a parallel in the economic history of any other race. They must, therefore, be taken out of the category of those Irish who "herd together." They mostly lead rather isolated lives in American families in the cities, small towns, villages, and farmhouses of the Northern States ; and may fairly, for the purpose of comparison with the Germans in the matter of gregariousness, be added to the number of Irish engaged in agricultural occupations. This would nearly double the per-centage of those Irish who do not "herd together."
Moreover, it has to be taken into account, that of the two classes of immigrants which I am comparing, the Irish come with the least capital and least industrial training of any sort ; and ready-money, and a good deal of it, is necessary to enable a man landing in New York to strike out into the interior and become a farmer. The Scandinavians are almost all well-to-do, and go at once to the West, to join their great colonies in Iowa, Wisconsin, and Minnesota. The same thing may be said of many of the Germans. The Irish have, as a whole, to take the first employment that comes to hand, and they take it eagerly wherever found. There were, for instance, in 1880, 12,742 Irish blacksmiths, against 15,129 Germans ; 17,038 Irish bootmakers, against 27,181 Germans ; 14,000 Irish carpenters and joiners, against 30,000 Germans ; 16,730 Irish iron and steel workers, against 9,307 Germans ; 12,611 Irish masons, against 11,857 Germans,—not a bad showing, considering the enormously superior advantages of the Germans in learning trades in their own country.
I am satisfied the census of 1890 will show that the propor- tion of Irish engaged in agriculture has greatly increased within the last ten years. They have been rapidly taking up the farms in the Eastern States, especially in New England, which the natives have abandoned for the better openings in the great North-West. Of course, in saying all this, I do not forget that New York and Boston and Philadelphia all contain a considerable mass of Irish poverty, and the vice and squalor and turbulence that come of poverty; but considering what the political, social, and industrial training of the Irish has been at home, considering that they have never known the influence of a sympathetic and respected upper class, or of a loved and honoured government, my wonder always is that this residuum of wretchedness here is not larger and more savage and irreclaimable than it is.—I am, Sir, &c., •
New York, February 7th. E. L. GODKIN.
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