DISTRUST OF THE IMMIGRANT. 233 



The reformer's reason for distrust is a grave one. It is a fact that 

 thousands of immigrants receive qualification as voters when under 

 the law they are clearly not entitled to it. There is no doubt that 

 such a mass of ignorant voters constitutes a great power for evil. 

 But the blame can hardly be charged to the immigrant; rather is it 

 due to the unscrupulous ward politicians who thus increase their fol- 

 lowing and to the judge who grants citizenship papers without proper 

 investigation of the applicant. 



So far as the fear of loathsome and contagious disease is con- 

 cerned the danger is comparatively slight. The immigrants are sub- 

 jected to a rigid physical examination at Ellis Island by the officers 

 of the United States Public Health and Marine-Hospital Service. 

 The double system of inspection practiced there makes it practically 

 impossible for any immigrant suffering from a loathsome or dangerous 

 contagious disease to pass without detection. The ratio in each race 

 of the number so affected, to the total number of that race landed, 

 during the fiscal year ending June 30, 1901, is here given: 



Slav (Pole, Slovak, Croatian) 



Magyar 



Italian 



Lithuanian 



Hebrew 



Finn 



Syrian 



As far as the fear of increase of crime and pauperism is concerned, 

 it is true that prison statistics usually show a majority of those con- 

 victed of crime to be foreign born. But the industrious statistician 

 loses sight of the fact that the 'other half of the population of a 

 great city, the poor and the needy, the underpaid and the underfed, 

 are almost all foreign born, and it is from this class of course that we 

 expect to fill our jails. It was not, however, his birth, but his poverty, 

 that caused the immigrant to commit crime. We do not expect to 

 find criminals so frequently on Fifth Avenue as on the Bowery. 



Hunger may prompt a poor starving wretch to steal, and his act 

 is a criminal offense duly recorded, but when greed of money or 

 position or fondness for good living makes the comparatively rich 

 man commit a 'breach of trust,' his error does not appear in prison 

 statistics. Pauperism is the result of the absence of one or both of 

 the prime requisites of a desirable immigrant. The pauper is either 

 unwilling to work or lacks the physique to stand hard labor. The 

 amount of money brought does not affect greatly an immigrant's 

 chances of becoming a pauper. One immigrant may have little money, 

 but with a rugged physique and willingness to work he will not become 

 a public charge; another immigrant, too lazy for laboring work, or 



