TEE CROSSING OF THE RACES 495 



land of his adoption. However, he has refused to do this except in in- 

 dividual instances. As a class, he has, as a matter of principle, refused 

 to intermarry with those of other religions. 



This raises the question, How can a people amalgamate and fit into 

 the general populace when they refuse to take the one step absolutely 

 essential to complete amalgamation? Protestants of all denominations 

 can intermarry and still maintain their standing in their respective 

 churches. By the exercise of a few essentially trivial formalities, pro- 

 testant and catholic can intermarry and both remain good proiestant 

 and good catholic, but let the Jew marry the Gentile and the Jew is 

 at once branded by his co-religionists as a bad Jew. 



Those of his race who have conformed to the apostolic injunction, 

 when in Eome to do as the Eomans do, have always been a credit 

 to the land of their adoption. But the tendency to adaptation has, so 

 far, been developed only on a small scale. There does not seem to be 

 a general movement of sufficient momentum to encourage the belief 

 that the Jew, forgetting his race and remembering only the essential 

 principles of his religion, will finally arrive at the goal of complete 

 racial amalgamation. True, there is a marked tendency among the 

 adherents of reformed Judaism in the United States to bury the anti- 

 quated customs of the past and to become real Americans, but this re- 

 formed Judaism hardly has time to make itself felt before it is dealt 

 a killing blow by the mere force of numbers in the opposite ranks. 

 In other words, the old ideas from the ghettos of Europe are imported 

 so rapidly that the new has but a poor chance to gain sufficient ad- 

 herents to keep pace with, and finally outstrip, the old superstitions. 

 And this thought brings us to the final conclusion of the whole matter, 

 and that is, whatever the race of people from which the immigrant 

 comes, the final result is not to be feared so long as he does not come 

 in overwhelming numbers. If he trickles in slowly we shall take care 

 of him. Let him be what he will when he comes, the amalgamation 

 will finally be complete. On the other hand, if we continue to let him 

 come in what is practically unlimited numbers, we can not take care of 

 him. He will take care of us. We shall lose our inherited Anglo- 

 Saxon ideals, and instead of a perfect amalgamation, we shall confront 

 the danger of a complete racial substitution. 



