Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

The Scandinavian Element in the United States

1915; Taylor & Francis; Volume: 47; Issue: 11 Linguagem: Inglês

10.2307/201616

1931-0838

Mark Jefferson, Kendric C. Babcock,

Nuclear and radioactivity studies

numbered more than 1,700,000.Whether viewed as emi- grations on the eastern shores of the Atlantic, or as immi- grations on the western shores, these modern Volkerwanderungen constitute one of the wonders of the social world, in comparison with which most of the other migrations in history are numerically insignificant.The Israelites marching out of Egypt were but a mass of released bond- men ; the invasions of the Goths, Vandals, and Huns were conquering expeditions, full of boisterous, thoughtless, unforecasting energy.Even the immigration from Europe to America in the whole of the seventeenth century scarcely equalled in number the columns which moved westward in any one year from 1880 to 1890.In this flux of humanity, mobile almost to fluidity, various in promise of utility, shifting in proportions of the good and bad, of pauper, refugee, and fanatic, or "bird of passage", sweatshop man, and home-builder, there has been such an interplay of subtle and vast forces that no just and final appreciation can as yet be reached.But some sort of tentative conclusions may be arrived at by intensive study of each immigrant group, following it through years and generations, searching for its ramifications in the body politic and social.The student of this phase of American history must attempt the scientific method, and exercise the patience, of the student of physical nature.No geologist, for example, would think for a moment of generalizing as to the history and the future of a continent of complicated structure after a few examinations here and there of cross-sections of its strata.He must know from thoro-going observation the trend, thickness, and composition of each stratum; he must trace, if possible, the sources of the material which he finds metamorphosed ; he must be familiar with the physical and the chemical forces at work in and on this material, heat, pressure, movement, affinities, gases, water, wind, and sun.In like manner, the student of immigration as a whole, or of a section as large as that of the Scandinavians or Italians, must make careful discriminations as to pre- THE SCANDINAVIAN ELEMENT [240 can life and of its contributions to the evolution of the Northern Mississippi Valley during the last sixty years.In such a study, the Norwegians, Swedes, and Danes, like all other citizens of foreign birth, must be judged by the character and preparation which best fit men to con- tribute to the permanent progress of a self-governing peo- ple.What are the signs of readiness for full American- ization?The fundamentals are manliness Roman virility , intelligence, and the capacity for co-operation, ennobled by "dignified self-respect, self-control, and that self- assertion and jealousy of encroachment which marks those who know their rights and dare maintain them" ; 2 devotion to law, order, and justice; and a ready acquiescence in the will of the majority duly expressed.3 Such qualities in America have been the especial pos- session of that sub-race of the Caucasian stock which the later ethnologists call -the Baltic, in contradistinction to the co-ordinate sub-races, the Alpine, and the Mediterran- ean or Ligurian.This Baltic race has for centuries occupied the British Isles, the northern plains of Germany, and the North European peninsulas, being found in its purest state in Norway, Sweden, and Scotland.The people of this sub-race, asserts the writer of an admirable article on racial characteristics, are mentally "enterprising and persevering, and cheerfully dedicate most of their time and thought to work. . . .They are liberally gifted with those moral in- stincts which are highly favorable to the creation and growth of communities, altho not always so favorable to the individual who possesses them ; they are altruistic, fear- less, honest, sincere.They love order and cleanliness, and attach considerable importance to the dress and personal appearance of individuals." 4While the other Caucasian sub-races do not lack these qualities, their most dominating characteristics are different; for example, one may 2