The “Americanizers”

THERE is a certain sect in America that, for lack of a more forceful epithet, may be termed "Americanizers." It was particularly active in the months that followed April, 1917. With the passion for minding other people's business that is the distinguishing mark of the sect, some of its disciples descended upon the humble tenement home of a Bohemian family in Chicago during the first summer of the war.

"We are here," the spokesman announced, impressively, "in the interests of Americanization."

"I'm sorry," faltered the woman of the house, "but you'll have to come back next week."

"What!" The cry was a choice compound of protest and reproach. "You mean that you have no time for our message! That you want to put off your entrance into American life?"

"No, no!" The poor Bohemian woman fell straightway into a panic, for not even a policeman has the austere authoritativeness of those who elect themselves to be light-bringers. "We're perfectly willing to be Americanized. Why, we never turn any of them away. But there's nobody home but me. All the boys volunteered, my man's working on munitions, and all the rest are out selling Liberty Bonds. I don't want you to get mad, but can't you come back next week?"

This incident, true as gospel even if anecdotal, serves the purpose of volumes in setting forth accurately the war attitudes of both native-born and immigrant aliens. On the part of the native American there was often a firm conviction that our declaration of war carried an instant knowledge of English with it, and that all who persisted in speaking any other tongue after April 6, 1917, were either actual or potential "disloyalists," objects of merited suspicion and distrust; on the part of the overwhelming majority of aliens there was an almost passionate desire to serve America that was impeded at every turn by the meannesses of chauvinism and the brutalities of prejudice, as well as the short-sightedness of ignorance.

Yet as long as history is read it will stand as a monument to the democratic experiment that in an hour of confusion and hysteria the American theory of unity stood the iron test of practice. For the most part, those of foreign birth or descent kept the faith in spite of every bitterness— the great mass of the native population held to justice in spite of every incitement to hatred and persecution. And out of the test emerged an America triumphant, strengthened, and unstained!

Speaking in terms of percentage, the amount of actual disloyalty was not large enough even to speck the shining patriotism of the millions of Americans that we refer to as "adopted." Nothing in the world was ever so smashed by developments as all those pre-war apprehensions that filled us with gloom. Who does not remember the fears of "wholesale disloyalty" that shook us daily? There were to be "revolutions" in Milwaukee, St. Louis, Cincinnati; armed uprisings here, there, and everywhere; small armies herding thousands of rebellious enemy aliens into huge internment camps; incendiarism, sabotage, explosions, murder, domestic riot. No imagination was too meager to paint a picture of America's adopted children turning faces of hatred to the motherland. The President went before Congress, a state of war was accepted formally, and even as one army gathered in the cantonments, another went out over the land to watch, to search, to listen. The Department of Justice had already in the field a large, intelligent, and well-trained organization; there was also the Secret Service of the Treasury Department, and into being swiftly sprang Military Intelligence, Naval Intelligence, Shipping Board Intelligence, etc.; and, by way of climax, the American Protective League, an organization of two hundred and fifty thousand "citizen volunteers" formed with the sanction of the Attorney-General and operated under the direction of the Bureau of Investigation.

Never was a country so thoroughly contra-espionaged ! Not a pin dropped in the home of any one with a foreign name but that it rang like thunder on the inner ear of some listening sleuth! And with what result?

A scientific system of registration, prescribed by law, revealed that there were about five hundred thousand German "enemy aliens" living in the United States, and between three and four million "Austro-Hungarian enemy aliens." These figures, as a matter of course, did not include the millions of naturalized citizens, or the sons and daughters of such millions. Out of this large number just six thousand were adjudged sufficiently disaffected to be detained under presidential warrants! Even a percentage of these, as a matter of common sense and justice, were eventually released from the army internment camps under a strict parole system.

As for criminal prosecutions, 1,532 persons were arrested under the provisions of the Espionage Act prohibiting disloyal utterance, propaganda, etc.; 65 persons for threats against the President; 10 persons for sabotage; and under the penal code, with relation to conspiracy, 908 indictments were returned, the last group including the I. W W. cases. Even this does not spell guilt in every instance, for there have been acquittals as well as convictions, and many trials are yet to be held.

With full allowance for flagrant cases of intrigue and treachery, for the disloyalists that may have escaped the meshes of even so fine a net, for the disloyalty that cannot be measured in terms of jail and indictment — taken all in all, no belligerent country, not even those invaded, made as good a record of unity and loyalty.

After all the hubbub about "rebellion," "armed uprisings," "monster internment camps," etc., the showing was, to put it plainly, rather disappointing. In all of us there is a certain savage something that thrills ,to the man-hunt. People generally, and the press particularly, were keyed up to a high pitch, an excited distrust of our foreign population, and a percentage of editors and politicians were eager for a campaign of "hate" at home.

There is a simplicity about hate that makes it peculiarly attractive to a certain type of mind. It makes no demand on the mental processes, it does not require reading or thinking, estimate or analysis, and by reason of its instant removal of every doubt it gives an effect of decision, a sense of well-being. When the facts developed by the investigatory branches of government failed to provide sound foundation for a "hate campaign," these editors, politicians, and what not, commenced to build a little foundation of their own. Officials were arraigned for inefficiency and spinelessness, "firing-squads" were demanded with frequency and passion, and fake after fake was sprung, many of them laughable but for their appeals to prejudice and hysteria.

Take just one typical instance out of many: A man whose name need not be mentioned was arrested in December, 1917, and on the heels of his arrest these exaggerations were printed in rapid succession: that he was a former German officer of high rank; that he was a master spy known to have been in communication with Bernstorff, Boy-Ed, and other high German officers prior to our declaration of war; that he arrived in this country on the submarine U-53; that after the commencement of the European War he went back to Germany and later returned to the United States; that at times he disguised himself in the uniform of an American army officer; that he was arrested while in the act of lighting a fuse or match for an American army magazine; that a number of men were known to have been employed in his spy machinations; that money was advanced to him by the German spy system, etc. As a matter of fact, all the investigators and investigations failed to prove anything more than that he was a German reservist, in this country since 1910, and a poor sort, unable to hold any job long.

Every fire, every explosion in a munition-plant, every accident on land or sea, was straightway credited to the "spy system"; if the cut in a child's hand didn't heal quickly, then the "Germans" had put germs in all the court-plaster; if any experiment in submarine or aircraft factory failed, it was undoubtedly because the "spies" had tampered with delicate mechanism or dropped acid on the wires; if a woman's headache didn't yield to remedies, then the "Germans" had "doped" the particular pill or powder. I am not saying that none of these things happened; but what happened was out of all proportion to the dimensions of the mad rumors that swept the country ; yet through it all the great, splendid majority of America's "aliens" stood fast, discharging their full duty to the United States in a manner that shamed the patriotism of many an heir to the traditions of Plymouth Rock.

In the year and a half of my chairmanship of the Committee on Public Information, a stream of people poured through the office daily, of all colors, creeds, and races; and out of that nightmare of solicitation, selfish purposes, and personal aggrandizements I can recall with gratitude that never once did any foreign-born American come to me for any other purpose than an offer of service to the United States or some plan of sacrifice. When it comes to motives, of course, I am unable to estimate the possible weight of caution or fear; but the mere fact is too significant to be negligible.

Among the six thousand people interned were many Germans as full of disloyalty as an adder is full of venom. There were Germans, Austrians, and Hungarians in the United States not interned, who hid disloyalty in their hearts; nor may it be denied that there is still a great work to do among the German population to burn 'away entirely the last trace of Deutschtum. But against this minority must be balanced an overwhelming majority of Germans who offered their lives to cleanse the honor stained by the treachery and ingratitude of others.

It is estimated by military authorities that from 10 to 15 per cent, of the American Expeditionary Forces were men of German birth or origin. How they conducted themselves on the firing-line is a matter of history, for in the imperishable records of the War Department Americans of foreign birth and descent have written the story of their valor on every page. In the list of those cited for distinguished service by General Pershing, nothing is more significant than the fact that name after name betokens other than native origin. Here are a few illustrative samples:

Lieutenant Kuehlman, Field Engineers: "Sent on night of August fifth-sixth to make a reconnaissance of all possible means of crossing the river Vesle, near Fismes, France. It had been reported that the Germans had all retreated from the south bank of the river, but he found that such was not the case; they were there in force; nevertheless, such was his bravery and determination that he crossed into and through the German lines, made a full reconnaissance, and returned with his report."

First Lieutenant Frank Baer, S. R. C. pilot, 103d Aero Pursuit Squadron: "For the following repeated acts of extraordinary heroism in action, April 5, 12, and 13, May 8 and 21, 1918, Lieutenant Baer is awarded a bronze oak leaf to be worn on the Distinguished Service Cross awarded him April 12, 1918. Lieutenant Baer brought down enemy 'planes on April 5, April 12, and on April 21, 1918. On May 4, 1918, he destroyed two German machines and on May 21st he destroyed his eighth enemy 'plane."

Private Bernard Schuliheis: "When the infantry was advancing in a position exposed to cross-fire, volunteered and carried a message to advancing troops, informing them that the machine-gun barrage laid down on the enemy emplacements was friendly fire from a unit not in their support and acting without orders to cover the advance. He delivered the message, returned across an open field swept by enemy machine-guns, and thereby made it possible for the infantry unit to advance four hundred meters and gain its objective."

Sergeant John Blohm: "From a shell-hole in which he had taken shelter while returning from a successful daylight patrol across the Vesle River, Sergeant Blohm saw a corporal of his patrol dragging himself through the grass and bleeding profusely from a wound in his neck. He unhesitatingly left his shelter, carried the corporal behind a tree near the river-bank, dressed his wounds, and, using boughs from a fallen tree as an improvised raft, towed the injured man across the river and carried him two hundred yards over an open field to the American outpost line, all under continuous rifle and machine-gun fire."

The Distinguished Service Cross went posthumously to the following: Sergeant L. W. Pilcher, Corporal R. McC. Fischer, Corporal Charles Auer, Corporal V. M. Schwab, Sergeant Bernard Werner.

As it was with our German-born, so it was in even larger degree with all the other foreign elements in our population.

Throughout its existence, the Committee on Public Information maintained intimate contact with over twenty foreign-language groups, and while this contact had its tremendous depression, there were also splendid inspirations. It was inspiring to see the passion of the immigrant peoples for freedom, their pathetic devotion to the professed ideals of America, their determination to be "real" Americans, and to watch their devotion persist in spite of persecution, neglect, and misunderstanding; it was depressing to discover how little America had done for them, how small a part the alien played in America's love and thought.

Nothing is more true than that people "do not live by bread alone." The great majority live on catch phrases. For years the United States had discharged its duty to the immigrant by glib reference to the melting-pot, and yet it has been years since the melting-pot has done any melting to speak of. These hopeful thousands, coming to the land of promise with their hearts in their hands, have been treated with every indifference, and only in the most haphazard way have they been brought into touch with the bright promise of American life.

Cheated by employers, lawyers, loan sharks, and employment agencies; excluded from American social and religious life as "wops," "Dagoes," and "hunkies"; given opportunity to learn English only at casual night-schools after brain-deadening days of toil; herded in ghettoes and foreign quarters by their poverties and ignorances ; and then, after all this, when war brought these millions to our attention, we actually wondered why they had not been "Americanized," and cried out against foreign languages, a "foreign press," and a "foreign pulpit" as evidences of disloyalty.

In spite of the past, with all of its cruelties and despairs, the foreign-born were loyal, and, what is even more inspiring, they grew in loyalty despite new persecutions initiated by mistaken patriotism. For instance, the governor of Iowa proclaimed the following rules:

"First — English should and must be the only medium of instruction in public, private, denominational, or other similar schools.

"Second — Conversation in public places, on trains, or over the telephone should be in the English language.

" Third — All public addresses should be in the English language.

"Fourth — Let those who cannot speak or understand the English language conduct their religious worship in their homes."

In other states, similar prohibitions were put into effect, and sudden and fundamental changes were worked not only in the schools, churches, and the press, but in the whole social structure. No effort at distinction was made — the language of Allied and neutral countries being put under the ban as well as enemy languages.

There can be no denial of the evil that was attempted to be cured. In our schools, our churches, our press, and in our social life, English should be the one accepted language, and this must of necessity be our goal. But it was criminal to let the ideal of to-morrow alter the facts of to-day. We faced the conditions that there were hundreds of thousands of foreigners in the United States who could not speak any language but their own — and through no fault of their own. The drive against the use of foreign languages, either written or spoken, merely shut off these thousands from contact with American life, with the danger of pushing them farther into ignorance and aloofness, and robbing us of the opportunity to win their understanding and co-operation.

The Czechoslovaks were the first to come to us with reports of the cruelties and injustices worked by these regulations in the various states. A great people indomitable, devoted! Over sixty thousand fought in the American army, thousands enlisting voluntarily at the outset of war; there were about thirty thousand in the Czechoslovak army in Italy, and about ninety thousand fought in Siberia. It will be news to many to learn that the first real blow against German and American intrigue in the United States was struck by the Bohemian National Alliance. With the assistance of some Czechoslovak officials at the Austrian consulates, and through a most remarkable machinery of espionage, the Bohemians defeated plot after plot against America and brought out the evidence that resulted in the recall of Dumba. The Czechoslovak societies were the only ones that adopted the rule that every member must own a Liberty bond.

Even these people, however, whose courage and loyalty have become proverbs, were not spared persecution by provincial ignorance. In one Texas town, virtually all the young men of the Czechoslovak colony volunteered, and their departure was made the occasion of a great demonstration. Many old people were there, and the speeches were in the native tongue. Without any attempt to inquire into the nature of the meeting, "native patriots" threw rocks in the window, attacked the audience, and drove them forth from the building as though they_had been Huns caught in some atrocity.

In Iowa and Nebraska, meetings held to secure recruits for the Czechoslovak army were broken up because English was not used, and from scores of communities we received pathetic letters telling how Bohemian parents, who had given all their sons to the American army, were hounded as traitors because they could not speak English.

The Council of Defense for Seward County, Nebraska, requested all the churches in the district to conduct their services in English, except one for old people who could not understand English. The minister of the Danish Lutheran church of Staplehurst, one Hansen, asked the Council's permission to continue preaching in Danish because he was not young when he came to America, also because his bad ears had prevented him from learning English sufficiently well to preach in it. The Council denied his request and also refused him a year's grace while he found other work to support himself and his family.

The Danish Young People's Society of America changed a "loyalty convention" from Iowa because forbidden the use of Danish. Queerly enough, many of the members of the society speak and understand Danish but poorly, and, under ordinary circumstances, always use English among themselves. But as 85 per cent, of the members were serving in the United States army and navy, the members deeply resented the charge that the use of Danish in any way interfered with their patriotism.

Sheer stubbornness, of course, but exceedingly natural. The Danes, Norse, and Swedes are proud people, and very "set," and it stung them unbearably to be adjudged unpatriotic in any degree and to have their native tongues put under the ban along with German. But while they resented and protested, even working hard to remember a language half forgotten, they never failed to make themselves understood in every Liberty Loan drive, Red Cross rally, or at every recruiting station.

All the while the foreign-born, patiently, indomitably, were writing a record of devotion shot through with service and sacrifice. In Milwaukee a group of Polish women evolved an idea that spread all over the United States into every racial group. In order that their husbands might fight, these Polish women clubbed together by sixes and eights, rented a house, selected from among themselves a housekeeper who took care of the house and the children while the other five or seven went to work. In this way, their living expenses were cut down so that they could not only support themselves and relieve their husbands from any anxiety about them, but were even able to buy Liberty bonds from their savings.

The Italians in the United States are about 4 per cent, of the whole population, but the list of casualties shows a full 10 per cent, of Italian names. More than three hundred thousand Italians figured on the army list, and in defense of the inner lines as well as on the firing-lines they proved their devotion to their adopted country. There was no shipyard, ammunition - factory, airplanefactory, steel-mill, mine, lumber-camp, or docks in which the Italians did not play a large part, and often the most prominent part, in actual and efficient work. In some places, such as mines and docks, the Italians reached fully 30 per cent, of the total number of employees, working at all times with full and affectionate loyalty toward the government of the United States. For instance, when a strike was threatened in one of the big industrial centers, it was an Italian who jumped on a box and cried, "If you leave work now, it will be as though you were sneaking back out of a trench, abandoning your comrades at the time of a fight when they need you most." And the strike was averted.

The Lithuanians, of whom there are about one million in the United States, gave thirty thousand soldiers to the colors, 50 per cent, of them volunteers. At the close of the Fourth Liberty Loan, the leaders assured us that there was not a Lithuanian home in the United States in which the family savings had not been invested in bonds or War Savings Stamps.

There are about 15,000 Russians in the United States army and the total contribution of Russians to the Fourth Liberty Loan was $40,000,000.

The National Croatian Society, with a membership of 42,000, did these three things: adopted one of the most ringing declarations of loyalty ever penned; decreed expulsion for any member expressing a disloyal sentiment or attempting to evade military service; bought $300,000 of Liberty bonds, and donated over $50,000 to Red Cross work.

In the army were 60,000 men of Greek birth or descent, and it is estimated that the Greek purchase of Liberty bonds was well over $30,000,000 for the four drives, all coming in small amounts that represented sacrifice.

It is a record that could be stretched out into pages, for there is not a foreign-language group in the United States that did not answer America's call with devotion and understanding, pathetically proud of their Liberty bonds and their service flags, and feeling every individual instance of indifference or disloyalty as a stain and a shame. But never at any time were we able to fix this record in the consciousness of the American people or to induce the press of the United States to give it prominence or even recognition. It was infinite labor to get noted Americans to address the foreign-language groups, and great loyalty meetings of the foreign-born, where thousands pledged lives and money and love, either went unnoticed by the papers or were given an indifferent little note of two or three lines.

As if prejudice, indifference, and misguided patriotism were not handicaps enough in the fight for unity, politics also played an ugly part in the drama of confusion. Particularly was this true in the Northwest, where Scandinavians and Germans are in the majority among the farmers. There is no doubt that many of these people were pro-German at the outset, and, even after America's entrance, pro-Germanism persisted by reason of wellestablished lies and certain fundamental ignorances.

The Committee on Public Information, formed to fight disaffection, attacked the Northwest at once. Our pamphlets and motion pictures, received somewhat coldly at first, soon began to gain ground, and the next move was to send speakers, for there is nothing like the give and take of a public meeting to burn away misunderstanding. The one organization that we wanted most particularly to reach was the Nonpartisan League, for it had a membership that covered the Dakotas, Minnesota, Montana, and Idaho, and, more than any other, was impregnated with the lie about a "rich man's war."

The leaders of the Nonpartisan League came personally to Washington to ask the government to commence a campaign of patriotic education, and Minnesota was selected for the initiation of the drive. Our speakers, however, upon arrival in Minnesota, were informed by the State Public Safety Commission that they would not be allowed to address any meetings arranged by the Nonpartisan League or under its auspices. There was no quarrel with the men we sent, for the Commission asked permission to use them in its own speaking campaign.

As we tried to explain to them, however, the main purpose in sending speakers over the United States was not to address those already enthusiastic in the national service, but to reach and convert people out of touch and sympathy with American thought and aims. Even if the Nonpartisan League were disloyal, then the more reason why our speakers should smash at its membership with the truth. But the State Public Safety Commission stood like iron, barred our speakers absolutely, and inaugurated a campaign of terrorism that had its ugly reflex among the farmers and labor unions in every state.

In summer the proscribed farmers were compelled to hold Liberty Loan rallies or Red Cross meetings out in the fields under the blazing sun, and in winter they huddled in cowsheds and car-barns. Parades were stopped by Home Guards or broken up by townsmen. Old men and women were dragged from automobiles, and on one wretched occasion a baby of six months was torn from its mother's arms by the powerful stream from a fire-hose. Tar-and-feather "parties" were common, and even deportations took place, men being driven from their homes and from the very state because they had sons belonging to the League.

There is no doubt as to the political nature of the persecution. The Nonpartisan League had carried the state of North Dakota, and was showing such strength in Minnesota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Montana, and Idaho as to arouse the alarm of Democratic and Republican politicians. These leaders made no bones about confessing that the disloyalty issue was the means by which they hoped to crush and destroy the Nonpartisan League as a political organization.

Such is the seeming invincibility of the democratic ideal, however, that even campaigns of terrorism could not drive its membership, largely German and Scandinavian, into disloyalty. North Dakota, where the League elected every state officer, had a war record of which any state might be proud.

The State Councils of Defense did splendid work, as a rule, and the country owes much to them, but there were exceptions that aroused far more anger than loyalty, conducting themselves in a manner that would have been lawless in any other than a "patriotic" body. During Liberty Loan drives, for instance, it became a habit, in certain sections, to compel a regular income return from the foreign-born and the poorer classes. Men, claiming authority, would visit these homes, insist upon a statement of earnings, expenditures, savings, etc., and then calmly announce the amount of the contribution that the dazed victims were expected to make. Anything in the nature of resistance was set down as "slacking" and "disloyalty," and some of the penalties visited were expulsion from the community, personal ill treatment, or a pleasant little attention like painting the house yellow. Of all the bitternesses and disaffections reported to us, the majority proceeded from this sort of terrorism, and it had results that will be felt for years to come.

Another handicap in the fight for national unity soon presented itself in the form of those volunteer patriotic societies that sprang up over the land like mushrooms, all sincere and loyal enough, but demoralizing often by virtue of this very eagerness. These organizations collected their funds by public appeal, and as the most obvious justification of existence was furnished by publicity, their activities inevitably took such form as would earn the largest amount of newspaper space. As a consequence, their patriotism was a thing of screams, violence, and extremes; they outjingoed the worst of the jingoes, and their constant practice of extreme statement left a trail of anger, irritation, and resentment.

One instance may be cited as illustrative. Prof. Robert McNutt McElroy of the National Security League, returning from a three weeks' tour of the West, gave out a statement in which he said that he had known what it was "to face large bodies of young men clad in the uniform of the American army beneath which were concealed the souls of Prussians." Later, in The New York Tribune, he gave the University of Wisconsin as the place where he had encountered disloyalty. The basis of the

13 181 charge was the inattention of the audience throughout his speech, shuffling feet, snapping of rifle triggers, etc., and he told how, finally, to test the audience, he leaned forward and deliberately insulted them as "a bunch of damned traitors"; how, to his amazement, there was no resentment whatever of this or of his later reference to "a Prussian audience." "I hesitate to accuse an entire university of disloyalty," he said, "but to my mind that episode stands out as one of the most disgraceful things I have encountered."

Dr. Charles R. Van Hise, president of the university, John Bradley Winslow, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Wisconsin, and E. A. Birge of the College of Science and Letters were appointed as a committee of protest, and their report asserted that the address had been long; that the audience included the cadet regiment — students — who had marched two and a half miles in the rain and were wet and cold; that, being present under orders and unable to withdraw, they merely indicated their desire for an end to the long speech; that Professor McElroy's reflections on their loyalty were made in a tone so low that persons within • twenty feet of him did not hear the words at all.

Thus, then, by reason of a speaker who failed to hold an audience of boys throughout an address of two hours, the loyalty of a state was impugned, the patriotism of a great university was besmirched, and a new element of anger and justifiable resentment introduced into the already delicate Wisconsin situation.

And so the story runs on drearily, vommes being necessary for any complete and circumstantial account of the obstacles thrown in the way of the millions of foreign birth or descent as they marched forward from every state in answer to the battle-call of their adopted country. The big fact is that they continued to march and that they arrived. We are even now so close to the trees that we cannot see the forest. All that we have known is the underbrush of irritation, the tearing vines of prejudice, and the poisonivy of politics. But when the day is come that we are on a 'hill, blessed with vision and perspective, it will be seen that the rallying of America was not sectional nor yet racial, but that it was the tremendous response of a unified whole, with men and women from other lands standing shoulder to shoulder with the native-born, serving and sacrificing with the same devotion, and in equal measure pouring their blood on the altar of freedom.