This act,while it served to exclude illiterates,made no drastic cut in the volume of immigration.Indeed a material reduction was resolutely opposed in many quarters.People of certain nationalities already in the United States objected to every barrier that shut out their own kinsmen.Some Americans of the old stock still held to the idea that the United States should continue to be an asylum for "the oppressed of the earth."Many employers looked upon an increased labor supply as the means of escaping what they called "the domination of trade unions."In the babel of countless voices,the discussion of these vital matters went on in town and country.
Americanization.-Intimately connected with the subject of immigration was a call for the "Americanization"of the alien already within our gates.The revelation of the illiteracy in the army raised the cry and the demand was inten-sified when it was found that many of the leaders among the extreme radicals were foreign in birth and citizenship.Innumerable programs for assimilating the alien to American life were drawn up,and in 1919a national conference on the subject was held in Washington under the auspices of the Department of the Interior.All were agreed that the foreigner should be taught to speak and write the language and understand the government of our country.Congress was urged to lend aid in this vast undertaking.America,as ex-President Roosevelt had said,was to find out "whether it was a nation or a boarding-house."
QUESTIONS
1.What are the striking features of the new economic age?
2.Give Mr.Rockefeller's view of industrial democracy.
3.Outline the efforts made by employers to establish closer relations with their employees.
4.Sketch the rise and growth of the American Federation of Labor.
5.How far back in our history does the labor movement extend?
6.Describe the purposes and outcome of the National Labor Union and the Knights of Labor.
7.State the chief policies of the American Federation of Labor.
8.How does organized labor become involved with outside forces?
9.Outline the rise of the socialist movement.How did it come into contact with the American Federation?
10.What was the relation of the Federation to the extreme radicals?To national politics?
To the public?
11.Explain the injunction.
12.Why are labor and immigration closely related?
13.Outline the history of restrictions on immigration.
14.What problems arise in connection with the assimilation of the alien to American life?
PRESIDENT WILSON AND THE WORLD WAR
"The welfare,the happiness,the energy,and the spirit of the men and women who do the daily work in our mines and factories,on our railroads,in our offices and ports of trade,on our farms,and on the sea are the underlying necessity of all prosperity."Thus spoke Woodrow Wilson during his campaign for election.In this spirit,as President,he gave the signal for work by summoning Congress in a special session on April 7,1913.He invited the co?peration of all "forward-looking men"and indicated that he would assume the r?le of leadership.As an evidence of his resolve,he appeared before Congress in person to read his first message,reviving the old custom of Washington and Adams.Then he let it be known that he would not give his party any rest until it fulfilled its pledges to the country.When Democratic Senators balked at tariff reductions,they were sharply informed that the party had plighted its word and that no excuses or delays would be tolerated.
Domestic Legislation
Financial Measures.-Under this spirited leadership Congress went to work,passing first the Underwood tariff act of 1913,which made a downward revision in the rates of duty,fixing them on the average about twenty-six per cent lower than the figures of 1907.The protective principle was retained,but an effort was made to permit a moderate element of foreign competition.As a part of the revenue act Congress levied a tax on incomes as authorized by the sixteenth amendment to the Constitution.The tax which roused such party pas-sions twenty years before was now accepted as a matter of course.
Having disposed of the tariff,Congress took up the old and vexatious currency question and offered a new solution in the form of the federal reserve law of December,1913.This measure,one of the most interesting in the history of federal finance,embraced four leading features.In the first place,it continued the prohibition on the issuance of notes by state banks and provided for a national currency.In the second place,it put the new banking system under the control of a federal reserve board composed entirely of government officials.To prevent the growth of a "central money power,"it provided,in the third place,for the creation of twelve federal reserve banks,one in eachof twelve great districts into which the country is divided.All local national banks were required and certain other banks permitted to become members of the new system and share in its control.Finally,with a view to expanding the currency,a step which the Democrats had long urged upon the country,the issuance of paper money,under definite safeguards,was authorized.
Mindful of the agricultural interest,ever dear to the heart of Jefferson's followers,the Democrats supplemented the reserve law by the Farm Loan Act of 1916,creating federal agencies to lend money on farm mortgages at moderate rates of interest.Within a year $20,000,000had been lent to farmers,the heaviest borrowing being in nine Western and Southern states,with Texas in the lead.
