National Life and Character 307 



population mainly Slav, the remainder of which is 

 being Slavicized. From the United States and Aus- 

 tralia the Chinaman is kept out because the democ- 

 racy, with much clearness of vision, has seen that his 

 presence is ruinous to the white race. 



Nineteenth-century democracy needs no more 

 complete vindication for its existence than the fact 

 that it has kept for the white race the best portions 

 of the New Worlds' surface, temperate America and 

 Australia. Had these regions been under aristo- 

 cratic governments, Chinese immigration would 

 have been encouraged precisely as the slave-trade 

 is encouraged of necessity by any slave-holding oli- 

 garchy, and the result would in a few generations 

 have been even more fatal to the white race; but 

 the democracy, with the clear instinct of race selfish- 

 ness, saw the race foe, and kept out the dangerous 

 alien. The presence of the negro in our Southern 

 States is a legacy from the time when we were ruled 

 by a trans-oceanic aristocracy. The whole civiliza- 

 tion of the future owes a debt of gratitude greater 

 than can be expressed in words to that democratic 

 policy which has kept the temperate zones of the 

 new and the newest worlds a heritage for the white 

 people. 



As for the industrial competition, the Chinaman 

 and the Hindoo may drive certain kinds of white 

 traders from the tropics ; but more than this they can 

 not do. They can never change the status of the 

 white laborer in his own home, for the latter can al- 

 ways protect himself, and as soon as he is seriously 



