Germany to other countries than the United States steadily declined, while immigration from Southern and Eastern Europe to the United States advanced from 44.3 to 75.1 per cent of the total.

It is, evidently, not because living conditions in the United States have grown worse, but because living conditions in Germany have grown better, that emigration from Germany to all countries has fallen off.

C. The Scandinavians

Scandinavian immigration to the United States reached its maximum during the decade 1881-1890, when it exceeded by about two thirds the total for the preceding sixty years.' Yet while the total number of immigrants of both sexes and all ages in 1901-1910 fell short of the maximum reached in 1881-1890, the number of breadwinners showed a very substantial increase, as appears from the following table: TABLE 55.

SCANDINAVIAN IMMIGRATION TO THE UNITED STATES, 1881-1910.2

The total number admitted up to 1880 was 397,011, the total for 1881-1890 was 656,494. Computed from Reports of the Immigration Commission, vol. 1, Table 9, pp. 66–96.

Monthly Summary of Commerce and Finance, June, 1903, pp. 4408-4411; Report of the Immigration Commission, vol. 1, Tables 12-13. Annual Reports of the Commissioner-General of Immigration: 1899–1900, Table VIII.; 1901-1904, Table IX.; 1905–1908, Table VIII.; 1909–1910, Table X.

3 All immigrants exclusive of dependents, described in immigration statistics as "without occupation (mostly women and children)."

DIAGRAM XV.

As shown by the figures, the number of Scandinavians coming to compete in the American labor market actually increased: the total for 1901-1910 exceeded by 20 per cent that for 1881-1890. The population of the Scandinavian countries increased at the same time approximately 22 per cent. Emigration kept pace with population.

I

The only observable change is that, whereas the earlier Scandinavian immigration was mostly of a family type, among the recent Scandinavian immigrants single persons vastly predominate; in 1881-1890 there were 46 dependents to every 54 immigrant breadwinners, in 1901-1910 only 19 to 81. In this respect the Scandinavian immigrants of the present day are very much like the immigrants from Southern and Eastern Europe. The cause of this change in the matter of the family relations of the Scandinavian immigrants is evidently not racial, but economic. The old Scandinavian immigration came largely to settle on farms, where a family was a help, while the new Scandinavian immigration, like the new immigration from Southern and Eastern Europe, comes chiefly to seek industrial employment. A single person, without family responsibilities, can more easily hazard the uncertainties of emigration to a strange land; a married wage-earner will as a rule leave his family behind, until he feels certain of his ability to provide for them in the new country.

2

That Scandinavian immigration to the United States was in no way affected by immigration from Southern and Eastern Europe is evidenced by the change in the direction

'Computed from Statistical Abstract of the Principal and other Foreign Countries (British), No. XVI., p. 8; No. XXXV., pp. 8, 10.

At the census of 1900, 49.8 per cent of all Norwegians, 42.3 per cent of all Danes, and 30.2 per cent of all Swedes in the United States were reported as engaged in agricultural pursuits. It is probable that some of those who were described by the enumerators in agricultural districts as laborers were agricultural laborers. Both groups combined numbered 59.3 per cent of all Norwegians, 52.3 per cent of all Danes, and 43 per cent of all Swedes.-Reports of the Immigration Commission, vol. 28, Table IA, pp. 216 et seq.

of the former; whereas prior to 1890 the greater part of Scandinavian immigration was directed to the agricultural States of the Central West and the Northwest, since 1890 the majority of the Scandinavian immigrants follow the current of immigration from Southern and Eastern Europe. The figures are presented in Table 56. The increase of the number of foreign-born from Scandinavian countries and from Southern and Eastern Europe in 1880-1910 represents the net results of immigration from those countries, as reduced by emigration and death. In Diagram XV a graphic representation of the same figures is furnished, each number being expressed in the area of the corresponding semicircle or quadrant. The black quadrants represent Scandinavians, the shaded semicircles and quadrants natives of Southern and Eastern Europe. The left side represents the eleven Western States indicated on the map, the right side, all other States and Territories.

TABLE 56.

INCREASE OF FOREIGN-BORN FROM THE SCANDINAVIAN COUNTRIES AND FROM EASTERN AND SOUTHern europe, 1880–1910, BY GEOGRAPHIC DIVISIONS (THOUSANDS). '

If it were true that the Scandinavians stayed away from the United States because they were reluctant to compete with immigrants from Southern and Eastern Europe, we should expect to find that the recent Scandinavian immigrants, like their predecessors, were headed for the West 'See Appendix, Table XIV.

where the field was comparatively clear, and avoided those States which attracted the bulk of immigration from Southern and Eastern Europe. Table 56 and Diagram XV furnish clear proof to the contrary. From 1880 to 1890 the net accessions to the Scandinavian population were about evenly divided between the western agricultural States, where immigration from Southern and Eastern Europe was insignificant, and the rest of the United States, where the Scandinavians were outnumbered by the races of Southern and Eastern Europe. (See the circle on the left; compare the two black quadrants with each other and with the shaded quadrant and semicircle on each side.) At the end of the next ten years, the Western States, where the accretions from Southern and Eastern Europe had declined, held only one third of the net gains of the Scandinavian population, while two thirds were distributed over other States, where they had to face ten times as many new competitors from Southern and Eastern Europe. (See the circle in the middle; repeat the same comparisons, as above.) Again during the past decade most of the new Scandinavian population sought employment in these States, where they were overwhelmed by the enormous tide of immigration from Southern and Eastern Europe, and only a minority settled in the West, where there were comparatively few newcomers from Southern and Eastern Europe. (See the circle on the right; repeat the same comparisons as above.)

It is evident that the Scandinavian immigrant did not seek to avoid the competition of the Italian and the Slav. Nor did the average Scandinavian immigrant at any time display such superior skill as would place him above the competition of the immigrant from Southern and Eastern Europe. Most of the Scandinavian immigrants, like the Slavs and the Italians, come from rural districts. The

According to Swedish official statistics, the ratio of emigrants from rural districts to the total emigration was 76 per cent in 1891-1900 and 77 per cent in 1901-1908. (Computed from Gustav Sundbärg's