I saw a documentary on immigration two nights ago and I was fascinated by what I learned, although it painted a disturbing picture.
First, there was the matter of just how many of these particular immigrants there were — they accounted for 3.7 percent of the U.S. population. Initially, most of these people were concentrated in the most populous cities on the east and west coasts, but soon they moved into almost every state.
They didn’t speak our language, had strange customs, ate strange food and generally keep to themselves. They were fiercely proud of their “foreign heritage.” They lived together in large, poor neighborhoods and were suspicious of “outsiders.” They had a reputation for being criminals. They seemed to show no interest in assimilating — they made little effort to learn English, for example, and they seemed content with the low-paying, often dangerous jobs, that lured them to the country, so precarious were their lives in their home country. Many stayed here for a while, worked and saved money, then returned to their home country. Even those who did stay often sent much of their incomes “back home.”
They were uneducated, poor and a net drain on our society, many believed.
So, really, the question is: What should be done about all these Italians?
The documentary “The Italian Americans” told the story of the great immigration of Italians, most of whom came from the impoverished southern region of Italy, to the U.S. between 1890 and 1910.
History is a great teacher for those who care to learn and while history does not — in fact, cannot — repeat itself, the political, social and cultural influences that shape history often is repeated.
In truth, every large immigrant group has been, in varying degrees, criticized, demonized and marginalized, at least for a generation, maybe two. Yet today, we find nothing sinister about Irish-Americans or German Americans. Asian-Americans, whose history in the U.S. shows them to have been the most horribly abused of all immigrant groups, are no longer viewed with malice. We find nothing subversive in them even though they, probably more than any other group, have held on to their culture. We are not appalled by “China Town.” We are charmed by it.
The attitudes of the day — harsh, unforgiving, uncharitable and deeply-rooted in prejudice — eventually gave way to the undeniable evidence that these groups strengthened our country far more than they threatened it.
I suspect the same will someday be said of today’s illegal immigrants, most who have arrived here as economic refugees from impoverished Latin American countries. For decades, little attention was paid to their legal status. They were welcomed, their contributions valued. Only in recent years, when it became a part of a political strategy, did their status seem to matter. Today, there are estimated to be 11.7 million illegal immigrants in the U.S., which accounts for 3.7 percent of all U.S. residents. Interestingly, in 1920 Italian immigrants made up that same percentage of the U.S. population, yet no one would argue that we have become another Italy.
Italian immigrants became Americans only when they were treated like Americans. Someday the same will be true of today’s “illegals,” once common sense and fairness are applied to our immigration policies.
Consider the story of Amadeo Giannini.
In the aftermath of the great San Francisco earthquake in 1906, Giannini opened a bank to help Italian immigrants of the North Beach area of the city. In that era, banks would not lend to the Italian immigrants, a fact which seemed destined to keep them from fully engaging in the American economy. Without loans, they could not start or expand their businesses and were therefore relegated to low-paying jobs. They could not assimilate. Giannini, who had been one of the first and most successful of the Italian immigrants, opened the “Bank Of Italy” to address the problem. The story goes that Giannini would walk through the Italian neighborhoods of North Beach and make “hand-shake” loans.
It was said his decisions to make those loans was based on what he learned from those handshakes. Calloused hands belonged to hard workers and hard workers were good investments, Giannini believed. So successful was Giannini that “Bank of Italy” branches opened in major cities throughout the country.
I believe the story of the Italian Americans closely parallels the story of today’s largely-Hispanic “illegals.”
We will never have too many hard-workers in our country. Today, those people we scornfully dismiss as “illegals,” the people who, like the immigrant groups before them, perform the hard labor for low wages and live on the fringes of American Society, will ultimately prove themselves worthy, if history is any indicator.
Then we will realize that America wasn’t threatened by their presence here, but our fears and prejudices certainly were.
Oh, and one more thing about Amadeo Giannini and his bank.
The bank still exists today, although we no longer know it as “Bank of Italy.”
Today, it is called “Bank of America.”
That pretty much says it all, I think.
Slim Smith is a columnist and feature writer for The Dispatch. His email address is [email protected].
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