Part 27

During the year, for the purpose of including the wife in this citizenship-betterment campaign by the public schools, the bureau wrote a special letter personally addressed to the wives of 49,094 petitioners and declarants, telling them of the advantages which would result from their attendance upon the public schools. The name of each wife was also sent, upon an individual card, to the public school in the community where the candidate lived. This inclusion of the wife in the scope of this activity was to enable her to get some conception of the meaning of an American home and aid her in establishing it for her family.... Intense interest is manifested upon the part of these wives and mothers, as in many instances they bring their babies to the schoolroom and while they sleep the mothers devote their time to learning to read, speak, and write our tongue in addition to receiving instruction in the more domestic subjects. In order to insure extending this influence to the wife of every declarant the bureau, with the approval of the department of labor, changed the form of the declaration of intention so as to require the inclusion of the name of the wife therein, no provision having been made for her name in the form as originally prepared. Approximately a quarter of a million women of foreign allegiance will be thus brought within the province of the Bureau of Naturalization through the filing of declarations of intention and petitions for naturalization by their husbands.

Well, this is all very fine as rhetoric and the expression of pious wishes. But what comes of it in reality? An elaborate table in the report for 1919[157] shows that in the fiscal year ended June 30th the names of 108,395 wives of candidates were furnished to the school authorities in cities and towns showing a total population of nearly 35,000,000 people with a “foreign-born white male of voting age” population of more than 4,400,000. And on the next page are tabulated reports of 166 school superintendents as to classes for foreign-born persons in English and citizenship, showing:

TABLE XXXVI

MAXIMUM ENROLLMENT IN CITIZENSHIP AND ENGLISH CLASSES IN THE UNITED STATES IN 1919

=========================================== Men | 11,854 Women | 2,733 Unclassified | 1,287 ----------------------------+---------- Total | 15,874 ===========================================

Every bit of it valuable, no doubt. Presumably, also, the complete figures would present a much larger total, but, as an exhibit of goods, it is hardly up to the promises of the show window!

FOREIGN-BORN WOMEN WITHOUT POLITICAL EXPERIENCE

The fact is that the married women of foreign birth, who are made citizens by the naturalization of their husbands, have had, as a whole, not the slightest practical interest in any stage of the business. In the old country from which they came they had, as a rule, no participation in government; the traditions of the society in which the majority of them grew up relegated women to domestic employments, made them subordinate to their husbands in every phase of public life; they have been slow to learn the language here, and the proposal that they go to school in order to fit themselves for a function about which they know nothing and care less meets with little enthusiasm on their part--as the statistics of the Naturalization Bureau plainly show.

The intelligent woman’s advent to politics always has been dreaded by the professional politician. He felt it in his bones that she might not have the political superstitions and docility that have been exhibited by the average male voter; she might ask questions and display initiative; she might remember with an eye to reprisals the things that politicians, legislators, and executives have done to the interests of women in ages past. He grew eloquent about the “place of woman in the home,” the demoralizing atmosphere of the polling place, and so on. And, as for the foreign-born woman, he knew, first, that the foreign-born husband as a rule was opposed to having his wife and daughters meddling in such matters, and second, that all she would do, anyway, would be to duplicate the vote of her husband or father.

THEY ARE GOOD MATERIAL

As has been said, very few of the foreign-born women, made citizens and voters by the naturalization of men, thus far have displayed much interest in politics. Where there has been participation by them, what has been their attitude? There is not much testimony on the subject, but what there is is largely to identical effect.

The rule is [says an investigator at Los Angeles] that the wives follow the party allegiance of their husbands, and vote with them. The more intelligent, however, often think and act independently, voting for what they believe is the good of their children. The parents of the public-school children teach them to follow the guidance and advice of the teachers. I myself, as one of the accredited speakers of the Parent Teachers’ Federation of Los Angeles, have marked hundreds of ballots for foreign women, and I am called up on the telephone before each election and questioned about candidates and measures. As a rule my advice is taken without question. The foreign woman acts in such matters according to her individual nature and her intelligent understanding. Some of them vote secretly because their husbands have forbidden them to go to the polls.

Miss Jane Addams, whose long and intimate acquaintance with foreign-born women, through her protracted residence in Hull House, Chicago, entitles her to speak with peculiar authority, describes a typical experience at a polling place in the Hull House neighborhood, which is populated almost entirely by immigrant families:

It was a great satisfaction to me to see what good judgment the women showed. There was one Irishwoman, very bright, who could not read, and therefore I was allowed to go into the booth with her to help her mark her ballot. The first proposition was about bonds for a new hospital. The Irishwoman said, “Is the same bunch to spend the money that run the hospital we have now? Then I am against it.” The next proposition was about a subway; the next about a hospital for contagious cases, and so on. There were ten propositions to be acted upon. I was scrupulous not to influence her; yet on nine of them she voted, from her own common sense, just as the Municipal League and the City Club had recommended as the result of painstaking research. Italian women came in to vote who knew more about our city than their husbands, who were away digging railroads during six or nine months of the year.

Mrs. Emma Smith Devoe, President of the National Council of Women Voters,[158] describes the foreign-born woman citizen as taking in governmental affairs, as soon as she realizes that she is a voter, a most serious and conscientious interest, “making almost a religious duty of it.” The women, she says “are particularly impressed with the sacredness of the ballot, and they always vote for the betterment of humanity as they see it.”

Almost every foreign woman’s vote [says Mrs. Lucy B. Johnstone, wife of the Chief Justice of Kansas][159] “represents a home where there are children who are going to the public schools now and fast becoming Americanized. The foreign-born women are, in the main, ambitious for their children, and for that reason are learning, in their way, about our institutions, and are zealous to take advantage of our free educational opportunities”.

Senator Helen Ring Robinson of Colorado remarking that “the Italian women frequently do not vote, while the Pole always votes and takes a keen interest in local politics,” says:[160]

In the matters affecting the family purse, such as voting of a bond issue, the acquisition of the water supply by the city, etc., I find the immigrant woman usually more keenly concerned than her husband.

The immigrant woman in the coal camps--like the immigrant man--often votes blindly at the dictate of the boss; but the daughter of the immigrant woman often shows an independence, an understanding, and a vision, in matters of public concern, well worth the emulation of Daughters of the American Revolution I wot of--and Colonial Dames. It is the daughter of the immigrant woman, grown to the full stature of citizenship, who is proving one of the most useful elements in our Colorado electorate.

Miss Edith Knight Holmes, editor of the Woman’s Department of the Portland _Oregonian_, wrote that:

Personally, I have noticed women who were born in various European countries going early in the morning to vote, as soon as the breakfast was over. They study their ballots carefully and seem most conscientious in marking them. I know an old Scotch lady who sat up half the night to study her ballot. A little English lady whom I know always tries to be at the polls. She goes with one of her sons to vote.

In families where there are several little children, sometimes the mother next door will stay with the babies while the mother of the family votes, and then when she returns she takes care of her friend’s baby while she, too, casts her vote.

Of course, this is special pleading, and it is easy to exaggerate. Over against it might well be told that ancient story of the housemaid who was said to favor woman suffrage on the ground that it would augment the family income:

My father and my two brothers each gets five dollars for his vote, and now mother and me will each get five--that makes twenty-five dollars, all for a little while in one day.

The fact is, abundantly verified, that the foreign-born woman, when she votes at all, brings to the function a deep sense of solemnity; it is new to her to participate in government; she has not acquired from the streets a cynical contempt for the ballot, as her husband and sons are likely to have done. The effect of government upon her home and her children is a more desperate matter to her, and it will take long to demoralize her attitude on the subject.

But the fact is, also, that foreign-born women have not in any large measure awakened to the opportunity. Their devotion to their homes has taken on no public or political aspect. They are confined to those homes, not only by tradition, ignorance of American life and the English language, and the inertia of their existence, but even more by overwork and by the unremitting detail of family duty and care. They have hardly heard of their new and increasing privileges, and generally regard them, when they do hear of them, as only a new burden, unfamiliar and to be ignored if not resented. It is only in the home, and by a realization of its direct and inevitable effect upon the home, her home, that any interest in or enthusiasm about political action can reach her.

HOW THE WOMEN CAN BE REACHED

There would seem to be four ways in which the foreign-born woman citizen can be reached with effort to interest her in the political aspect of her citizenship:

1. The normal, direct attack of the political organizations, and voluntary efforts, organized and unorganized, of public-spirited citizens or others interested in “getting out the vote.” Generally speaking, the politicians have scarcely as yet discovered the voting power of the foreign-born woman citizen--especially such as do not speak the English language. The vote and political influence of the foreign-born woman have been negligible everywhere--except possibly in a few places where they have been rallied in a local-option election. One investigator reports two or three towns in Illinois where a “wet” result was attributed to the vote of foreign-born women. Other reports would indicate that the foreign-born woman, like her English-speaking sisters, have tended to favor the abolition of the saloon with its resulting (or, anyway, expected) reduction of home-coming drunkenness and deductions from the pay envelope.

In districts where politically active social settlements and similar organizations are influential, and in states which have had woman suffrage the longest, there is a considerable appearance of foreign-born women at the polls. But they are relatively few in numbers, and consist of younger women from the more radical parties, from those racial groups which display the keenest and most aggressive social intelligence, such as the Bohemians, and from such as in their own countries have had some experience with some measure of woman suffrage, such as the Swedes and Finns. There is quite as much tendency among foreign-born women as among native-born--perhaps considerably more--to follow the husband’s lead in politics and to duplicate his vote. In general, the political organizations have as yet made little effort to capitalize the “derivative vote.” The mass of it stays at home.

2. The campaign of the public schools, with or without the inspiration of the Naturalization Bureau, to induce the foreign-born woman to avail herself of formal educational work in the schools. As we have seen, she does not, to any appreciable extent, respond to this campaign. Social settlements, even attributing great influence to them--though as a matter of fact few of them exert any political influence whatever--are relatively few and far between; churches, as such, and other institutions of the same general kind, cannot be counted as substantially effective in this direction. The foreign-born woman goes to church in large numbers, but she does not get there any great impulse to interest herself in community affairs. She goes back to her babies and her washtub.

It is in her home, in the intervals between domestic duties and within arm’s length of the cradle and the kitchen table where she feeds her children, that she must be reached with this inspiration and instruction, if in any large measure she is to be reached at all. This brings us to

3. The Home Teacher. The movement in favor of the creation of a teaching force, employed by the public and organically a part of the public-school system, to go into the neighborhoods and into the homes and carry instruction in English, common-school branches, and the elements of civics, follows logically from the treatment of the foreign-born woman citizen as an individual, and from the fact that she must be dealt with in or close to her home. Classes grouped within a small section of a neighborhood, intensively instructed by teachers who realize the difficulties and limitations of their pupils, take on the aspect of social occasions, help to arouse a neighborhood spirit, encourage mutual acquaintance, and most effectively instruct those whom it is desired to reach. A movement of this kind, spreading over the country and backed by the public as such, follows the natural line of least resistance and tackles the problem where it really lives.

4. The direct and indirect influence of the children upon the mother. This is the best of all. And, while we are exciting ourselves about the ignorance and indifference of the foreign-born woman, and bemoaning her possible influence upon her children, it is well for us to remember that these children are in the American public schools, talking the English language, absorbing whatever there may be of “Americanism” in the social atmosphere about them, in daily sight of the Stars and Stripes, singing “The Star-Spangled Banner,” gaining enthusiasm for and pride in our country, and, what is most important, taking home daily to their foreign-born parents the direct and indirect influences of what they are learning, seeing, and feeling. The extent of this leavening process is impossible to estimate, but undoubtedly it is enormous.

A SPECIFIC EXAMPLE--IT WORKS

Perhaps the most striking and unmistakable exhibit of this process is to be found in the city of Grand Rapids, Michigan, where the work of the Americanization Society presents concrete and visible results. The work in process there since the fall of 1918 is susceptible of definite and even statistical study. It has produced effects upon elections which can be stated in figures, and results in homes upon concretely discoverable human beings about which there can be no question. It is socially physiological, so to speak; working in a normal way in consonance with known political methods and customs, along the rational lines of least resistance--making use of the natural, spontaneous life of the people in their ordinary social and political relationships and in their homes.

A battle with machine politics over a matter of local administration, especially as affecting the treatment of the poor, convinced those interested in the unselfish conduct of the city’s business that the way to win, and the only way, was to appeal to the people direct and get them to vote. There was no fear as to how they would vote, but the effort was not addressed to that aspect of the question. The slogans speak for themselves!

Whether or not you vote is not your business; it is Uncle Sam’s business. HOW you vote is your business.

It’s always safe to trust all the people. If all the people vote, they will vote right.

Cast your own ballot. When you don’t vote, somebody else votes for you.

How many votes has a man? You say one. If you don’t vote somebody else has TWO votes.

Tags were the weapons directly used, and they had a profound effect. Committees of women, drawn from mothers’ clubs, women’s clubs, parents’ associations, etc., gave out the tags at the polls, asked the voters to wear them, and pinned them on when they could. The only way to get a tag was to vote; everybody who voted found it to his interest to wear one; and those who didn’t have tags wished they had. For the tag said:

“I am an American. I voted. Did you?”

The effectiveness of these tactics in arousing not only sentimental enthusiasm, but that kind of practical personal action _at and in the ballot box_ which decides elections, is convincingly attested by the great increase in the registration and in the total vote.[161]

The essential purpose of the job was to get to the polls every individual entitled to vote; but incidentally, or perhaps better to say, fundamentally, to train the rising generation as to their privilege and duty of participation in public affairs, and to accelerate the naturalization and Americanization of the alien. In order to accomplish the first of these last two purposes, the campaign was carried into the public schools; in order to accomplish the second, great stress was laid upon naturalization. There were three other slogans:

Send the alien to the county clerk.

An early tag helps the flag.

Get your tag early. Ask the man who has none WHY?

This meant embarrassment for the untagged, and when the school children began to plague the untagged adult males it became unendurable. Woe to that father who came home at night without a tag! The family was disgraced in the eyes of the children. He was nagged, not about _how_ he voted, but about why he didn’t vote at all!

Meanwhile, woman suffrage was established in Michigan, and the women came in for their share of the bombardment. A great campaign was begun to make the women realize their political responsibilities. It bore fruit in the registration of 26,000 women for the election in April, 1919; in one day 1,500 women registered. For the primary election in March the tag system got out 28,700 votes, and it was estimated that a blizzard raging on that day prevented at least 3,000 more. At the April election all the candidates recommended by the Citizens’ League were elected, although the tag system involved no pressure as to particular candidates or causes. There were thirteen different matters to be voted upon, and the result showed notable discrimination in the voting--by 37,000 voters, while from 5,000 to 7,000 votes could not be cast because of inadequacy of the polling facilities.

WHAT THE CHILDREN DID

The children were a vital factor in the campaign. After the elections they were asked to collect tags and bring them to school. Out of 29,000 tags given out at one election, they brought back more than 17,000. After the next election they brought back 27,000 out of 37,000. Flags were given as prizes to the schools showing the highest totals.

In the schools--and all schools were enlisted, parochial and private as well as public schools--the children wrote letters, and later little essays, describing their experiences, telling why it was important to vote, and what the issues were. The response was instantaneous, enthusiastic; and it requires no special imagination to infer the effect in individual homes, not only in compelling American citizens to vote, but in virtually forcing alien fathers and mothers to avoid embarrassment at their own firesides by expediting their efforts to gain citizenship.

Space is not available for extensive quotation of the children’s essays; but their general tenor, and the reflex influence of their spirit upon the homes, may be imagined from such excerpts as these:

By an eleven-year-old boy, fifth grade: The men and women who are citizens of the United States are regular voters; if they are not, they should be.... If all the people voted, we should have a clean city. If your mother has to do all the dishes, you can say, “Why, mother, I can do the dishes while you go and vote.” Your father may have to rake the yard. Why not rake the yard yourself and let your father go and vote? Then the children and their parents will be good citizens.

By a girl in the sixth grade: The American government is governed by the people by means of voting. If people do not vote it is their fault that we have poor officials.... The anarchist and the other people who ignore our government are both destroying it, only the anarchist destroys it violently and the people who ignore it, slowly. Some aliens come here to enjoy all our privileges without becoming citizens. They save their money and go back to their old country. But some aliens appreciate our government, and are now of the best citizens we have.... Join hands with the American government. Mother, do not let Dad do it alone!

There is plenty of direct testimony as to the effect of this enterprise in the home, not only of the American citizens, but of the aliens. Thousands of mothers who otherwise might have remained prisoners to indifference and drudgery have been fairly driven out into the liberation of social contacts and into a broader life of interest in all the things that make for responsible citizenship _by the interest of their children_.

It is _in their homes_ that the foreign-born women must be reached with inspiration and enlightenment as to their part in the process of self-government and the privileges, duties, and responsibilities--and activities--which are essential to anything worthy to be called American citizenship.

XI

THE FOREIGN-BORN VOTER IN ACTION

There is not and never has been in the United States anything that could be segregated as the “labor vote,” although such a thing has been the dream of many labor leaders, the bugaboo--or rather the _ignis fatuus_--of politicians of many parties, and a permanently legendary figure in the popular speech. The absence of such a vote is the principle reason for the political futility of most of the efforts of the Socialist parties.