Part 12

From the records of the court proceedings it is often quite evident to the reader that the foreign-born parent has little idea of the reasons why he or his child should have been brought to court. In one Bohemian family studied the eldest boy, aged sixteen, was in the State School for Delinquent Boys. The parents seemed utterly unaware of the serious nature of the boy's offenses and of the blot on his record. They seemed to regard the school for delinquents somewhat as more prosperous parents are wont to regard the boarding school. In fact, they expressed regret that the boy was soon to be released. Yet this boy had been in the Juvenile Court three times; the first time for truancy, and the other two for stealing.

The attention of the community is usually called to the difficulties of the foreign-born parents only when a complete breakdown occurs, resulting in juvenile delinquency. This result is, however, comparatively rare. Most families work their way through without getting into a situation that calls public attention to their family affairs. There is no question, however, that there is often a lack of harmony in the home. Sometimes the child of working age leaves home, to board perhaps in the same neighborhood or to contract a hasty marriage.

Occasionally there are situations in which the ordinary relations of parent and child have been completely reversed, and the children have assumed responsibility for the management of the home and the family. For instance, the Juvenile Court was asked by the neighbors to investigate conditions in a Polish family, in which a six-year-old boy was said to be neglected. The investigation showed no real neglect from the point of view of the court, but a situation that needed supervision.

The mother was a widow and had, besides the six-year-old boy, two daughters aged seventeen and nineteen. Both girls were born in Austria. The father had preceded his family to the United States, and for five years the mother had worked and supported herself and the children in the old country before he was able to send for them. He seems not to have had a very good moral influence over the children, but had been dead several years. The daughters were both supporting the mother, who was doing one or two days' work a week. The daughters turned over all their earnings to the mother, but said that she was a poor manager and never had anything to show for it. They themselves had managed to buy new furniture and clothes for themselves. They said they were ashamed to go out with their mother, who remained unprogressive, would not dress as they liked, and would not manage the home as they wished. The girls told the officer that they did not take her out with them, but gave her money to go to the "movies." Yet she would do nothing but sit at home and cry.

At one time the boy was accused of stealing coal from a neighbor. The oldest girl wanted her mother to investigate, but the mother would not go near any of her American neighbors. The daughter herself found out that the child had really taken the coal from a neighbor, and whipped him. Gradually the daughters, especially the older one, have assumed entire control of the family. The mother can no longer discipline even the six-year-old boy. Since the daughter has undertaken to correct him, he pays no attention at all to his mother. The probation officer has tried to restore a more normal family relationship, and has tried to help the girls to understand their mother's position. She still speaks with pride of the five years in the old country when she supported them alone, and when she was really of some use to them.

The older daughter threatened for some time to leave home if her mother could not be more agreeable. When the court officer remonstrated, she said that of course she would leave her furniture, and could not be convinced that that would not entirely compensate. Later she did leave home, and took some of her furniture. The family are Catholics, but the mother no longer goes to church, and, though the girls go, the priest seems to have had no influence over them.

Although the great majority of the foreign-born parents succeed in bringing up their children without the children becoming delinquent, the minority who are not successful is large enough to cause grave concern. This has been shown in all figures in juvenile delinquency. A study of delinquent children before the Cook County Juvenile Court shows that 72.8 per cent of the 14,183 children brought to the court between July 1, 1899, and June 30, 1909, had foreign-born parents.[48] A special study of 584 of these, who were delinquent boys, showed 66.9 per cent with foreign-born parents.[49] A comparison of the nativity of the parents of children in the Juvenile Court with the proportion of each group in the married population of Chicago indicates that the number of parents of delinquent children in the foreign-born group is disproportionately large. That is, the foreign born form 57 per cent of the married population of Chicago, while "at least 67 per cent of the parents of delinquent boys of the court were foreign born, and there is reason to believe that the true percentage is above 67."[50]

This preponderance of children from immigrant homes must not be taken to mean that children of foreign-born parents are naturally worse than the children of American parents. It confirms the fact that immigrant parents have special difficulties in bringing up their children and are in need of special assistance. It suggests very forcibly the danger to the community in continuing to ignore their special needs.

FOOTNOTES:

[44] Breckinridge and Abbott, _The Delinquent Child and the Home_, p. 66.

[45] See Thomas and Znaniecki, _The Polish Peasant_, vol. i.

[46] Abbott and Breckinridge, _Truancy and Nonattendance in the Chicago Schools_, chap. viii, p. 129.

[47] See Jane Addams, _Twenty Years at Hull House_, chap. xi.

[48] Breckinridge and Abbott, _The Delinquent Child and the Home_, p. 57.

[49] _Ibid._, p. 61.

[50] Breckinridge and Abbott, _The Delinquent Child and the Home_, p. 62. See _U. S. Twelfth Census Population_, vol. ii, p. 314, Table XXXII.

VII

IMMIGRANT ORGANIZATIONS AND FAMILY PROBLEMS

In the former chapters an attempt has been made to set out some of the difficulties encountered by foreign-born families who attempt to establish themselves in the United States. The discussion has dealt with the problem as though the community were one factor and the immigrant family another factor, and as though the solution to be arrived at could be discovered by bringing them into new relations to each other. This treatment is justified, in view of the fact that even a slight analysis makes it clear that certain modifications in governmental and social machinery are highly desirable. When the limitations imposed by the war on freedom of migration have been removed, the possibility of dealing more wisely and more humanely with incoming family groups must be considered.

In a very real sense, during any period when the volume of immigration is considerable, the community _is_ one factor and the immigrant _is_ another factor, and a partial solution is to be found in a new treatment of the relationships between these two. But in another sense the discussion is inadequate and perhaps misleading. The relationship between the community and the immigrant is not mechanical, but organic. So soon as he is admitted, he is in fact a part of the community, and what will be done, what can be done, depends in part at least upon the extent to which that relationship is developed. The currents of the community life must flow through and both enrich and be enriched by the life of the newcomer. If these currents are obstructed, he neither shares nor contributes as he might.

These channels of intercourse, however, have often been so obstructed that contacts have been denied. That segregation and separation have characterized the life of many of the groups for considerable periods of time has become a commonplace, and it has been generally known that the life of these different foreign-born groups was separate from the general life of the community, and the life of one group separate from the life of other groups. But the fact that within these separate groups was developed often a fairly rich and highly organized life has not been so widely recognized.

SAFETY IN RACIAL AFFILIATIONS

During the war, for example, the community became aware of the fact that within these national groups there had developed more or less powerful and efficient organizations formerly active in behalf of political interests in the old country, capable, at least, of fostering a spirit of clannishness, of perpetuating the language, customs, and ideals of an alien population in the midst of American life, and of keeping alive in this country national and racial antipathies brought from Europe. Leaders in the European struggle came to these groups and obtained pecuniary support and political adherence. Recruiting for military service among the foreign born was successfully carried on.

Leaders of active societies among the different Slavic groups have stated quite freely that a spirit of unity and of nationality has been consciously fostered in America by these societies, so that, when the time came for the oppressed nation to strike for freedom in the European struggle, the representatives of the race in this country might stand solidly behind such efforts. It is impossible, after the exhibition of the generous support given among foreign-born groups during the war to the efforts of the United States, to raise the question of their loyalty; but their separateness has been far greater, their exclusion from many community efforts and activities far more complete, than the leaders among them had realized.

The leaders among the foreign born do not wholly blame the leaders of the "American" group; they seem to feel that immigrants who came at an earlier date are in part to blame. These earlier arrivals knew what immigration meant, and might have been expected to help open the way for those who came afterward, but were, in fact, chiefly concerned to get ahead and to leave old associations behind. This was the opinion expressed by a Bohemian business man prominent in both local and national organizations. He also said that the reason that had in the past led to the formation and support of these organizations had ceased to exist; but now that the European struggle against oppression had ended for his people, and leaders understood how separate the life of the foreign-born groups had been, these very societies could be used to establish a variety of contacts and to develop among the foreign born a wider interest in the United States and its problems. Particularly the ability to act together learned during the war should be used to develop effective co-operation.

As the organization of these societies is discussed in another volume in this series, they will not be described here, except as they affect the position of women and so exercise an influence upon the adjustment of family life.[51]

Possibly the most significant fact revealed in the course of the study has been the extent to which foreign-born groups have been inaugurating and developing educational and social movements, and establishing institutions and agencies, quite independent of the Federal, state, or local agencies at work along the same general lines. On the other hand, the national educational and welfare movements carried on by the "American people" have ignored the organization and leadership in the foreign-born community. This has been the case to an amazing extent, even when the public efforts have been ostensibly based upon studies of conditions existing in cities with a population that is largely of foreign birth.

When no channels of communication between the immigrant and the larger community seem to have been established, we have been concerned to inquire how such channels can be most effectively created. The barriers that through ignorance, indifference, and misunderstanding on either side have been allowed to grow up must be broken down. We have tried to follow up such avenues of communication as have opened naturally before us, after becoming acquainted with some of the leaders in the different groups.

The organizations with which we have become somewhat acquainted are representative of the types found in all the main Slavic groups and among the Lithuanians, Hungarians, Rumanians, and Greeks. Suggestions applicable to them indicate a basis of co-operation with a very large proportion of our foreign-born population.

A list of the principal racial organizations in the United States is included in the Appendix. Information about local branches of these organizations can usually be secured by correspondence.

LOCAL BENEFIT SOCIETIES

The first incentive to organization among all the groups seems to have been the precarious economic situation during the years of effort to get a foothold here. The first association of the newly arrived immigrant is one of mutual aid. "Benefit" will be found as the basis of the important foreign-born organizations, no matter what new purposes may have been taken on with the establishment and progress of the group as a whole.

In the interviews we have had with the leaders among the groups the point has been repeatedly emphasized that Americans can never appreciate the situation of immigrants during their first ten years in this country. The strangeness, the poverty, the pressure to send money home, the inadequate, irregular income, the restriction to the low-skilled job--"there is in America, at first, nothing for an immigrant but the shovel"--the lack of knowledge of money values and ignorance of American domestic and social practices--these conditions drive the immigrants into co-operative effort. The appeal sent out by a Russian national society organized in 1912 begins with some such words as these:

While we are in this country we are doing the lowest kind of work, and many accidents happen to us; if we do not belong to an organization we are without help.... The purpose of our brotherhood is to help our brethren in a strange country.

Not even in associated effort can they always find security, however. One of the reasons now being given very often by immigrants seeking passage back to Europe is their feeling of uncertainty about their future here. They say that America is all right so long as a man is young and strong enough to do the hard work in the industries, but they cannot see what is in store for them as they grow older, for they cannot save enough to provide for themselves; in Europe, a little land and a cottage are assurance of the necessities for old age.

There are, of course, many cases in which there is failure within the group as there is neglect without. Exploitation of immigrants by their fellow countrymen, and the evils of fraudulent banks, steamship companies, "tally-men," are well known. At the same time there is a great mass of neighborly service and of kindness of the poor to the poor, and of the stranger to the more recent comer.

Benefit societies based either on neighborhood associations here or on village association in Europe, soon grow up. These are usually self-assessment societies, in which each member pays a small sum each month, often only 25 cents. Out of the funds thus raised, a sick benefit of from $3 to $5 a week is paid. On the death of a member an assessment of from 50 cents to $1 is laid on the surviving members, and the resulting sum is paid to the bereaved family, helping to meet the funeral expenses.

Such societies are not incorporated, their officers are usually without business training, and they are often unstable. They include, however, a considerable proportion of the more recent immigrants, who, through fear of falling into distress and dread of charity, are influenced to keep up the membership. In addition to the money benefit, these neighborhood societies often mean friendly interest and help in nursing, in the care of the children, and in household work. As the fees are low and as provision for the sick benefit seems very important, a person often belongs to several such societies.

Owing to the instability of these organizations the effort is often made to combine them and to establish them on a sound financial basis as national fraternal insurance societies. These societies substitute fraternal insurance for the sick and death benefit. As the immigrant family gains a foothold in the new community the members are likely to join a national fraternal insurance society or, in the second generation, an organization of the type of the Catholic Order of Foresters, Knights and Ladies of Security, Tribe of Ben Hur, or Woodmen of the World.

The national fraternal insurance society is, among the Slavs, highly organized. Often in one national group as many as three flourishing societies will be found, with membership determined by religious or political preferences. As they exist now, these societies are all much alike, differing in the elaborateness of their organization in accordance with the period covered by the immigration of the group or with the strength of its cohesion in America. Leaders who wish to communicate directly with the great body of their co-nationals in America, do so through the channels provided by these organizations.

As the group develops a feeling of confidence, the insurance function becomes less urgent. In fact, officers of the national societies predict that the societies will gradually abandon the field of insurance and develop along other lines. Many societies already admit a considerable number of uninsured persons, who join in order to share in other enterprises. It would be neither possible nor profitable to describe all the groups, but the organization of a Croatian society and the relation of women to certain societies in the Polish and Lithuanian groups will be briefly discussed.

NATIONAL CROATIAN ORGANIZATIONS

The strongest societies among the Croatians are the National Croatian Society of 50,000 members, and the Croatian League of Illinois of 39,000 members, sometimes called the "New Society," which in spite of its name is really a national organization.

The purpose of the National Croatian Society is set forth in its constitution:

... to help people of the Croatian race residing in America, in cases of distress, sickness, and death, to educate and instruct them in the English language and in other studies to fit them for the duties of life and citizenship with our English-speaking people, to teach them and impress upon them the importance and duty of being naturalized under the laws of the United States, and of educating their children in the public schools of the country; these purposes to be carried out through the organization and establishment of a supreme assembly and subordinate assemblies of the Croatian people with schools and teachers.

Those eligible to become members are:

Croatians or other Slavs who speak and understand the Croatian language, of all creeds excepting Jews. All between the ages of sixteen and fifty may be admitted, provided they are neither ill nor epileptic nor disabled, are not living in concubinage, and have not been expelled from the national society.

The structure of the society is quite elaborate, and the conditions of admission and of membership, the organization and conduct of the lodges, the relations among the lodges and between a lodge and the national society, are all carefully specified in the constitution and by-laws.

Lodges are often organized on a sex basis, and in a community in which there is a lodge for men and a lodge for women, no one of one sex can be admitted to the lodge organized for the other. There is no special notice taken of women's interests in the structure of the national society, but there are local women's lodges, and women constitute about one tenth of the total membership.

The functions of these local lodges, aside from their official relation to the national organization, as specified by the by-laws, are:

... to assist those members who do not know how to read and write (either an officer or member shall, at least once a week, teach such members reading and writing); to establish libraries for members and gradually supply the same with the best and most necessary books; to hold entertainments with a view to building up the lodge treasury and to provide for brotherly talk and enjoyment.

The officers and members of some of the local lodges in Chicago have endeavored to develop and extend the social and recreational features of the lodges to meet what they believe to be one of the greatest needs of their people, but the efforts have so far met with little success.

Failure has been attributed to conditions found in the community and to the altered circumstances of family life in America. It has been difficult to find suitable meeting places, as Croatian people have no halls of their own and do not feel at home in the neighborhood recreation center. Any kind of recreational activity planned is, of necessity, so different from that to which these men and women are accustomed, that it does not interest them at once. Large families of small children make it impossible for men and women to take their recreation together, or for women to leave their homes at all except for a very short time.

Leaders whom we have consulted feel, however, that it is only through the development of such organizations within the group that Croatian women can be drawn into any social or recreational activities in considerable numbers; for, because they feel peculiarly strange and ill at ease when with persons who are not of Croatian origin, they lead secluded lives.

The important projects of the National Croatian Society have been the raising of funds for the establishment in each large colony of a national headquarters under the name Croatian Home, and for the erection and maintenance of an invalid home. A "National Fund," into which each member pays a cent a month, is created for the "culture and enlightenment of Croatians." The orphan children of members of the society are given the preference in the distribution of any benefit paid from the national fund.

CARE OF CROATIAN ORPHANS

The Croatian community in the United States has been peculiarly confronted with the problem of care of orphan children. The estimated number of orphan children is large in proportion to the number of Croatian families because a very large proportion of the Croatian men work at low-grade labor in the steel industry, in which fatal accidents are common.

At the last convention of several of the national societies, the representatives agreed to form a new national council especially to undertake the care of orphan children and to raise funds for this cause. The plan was formed to buy a tract of land in the vicinity of Chicago, on which an orphan home and training school were to be erected. The sum of $10,000 was devoted to the site and $100,000 to buildings. As free thinking has spread rapidly among Croatians in America, it was intended to establish a nonsectarian institution and to take children of free-thinking parents away from the Roman Catholic schools as well as to provide for children who should be later orphaned.