! of population statistics "that the decrease in the proportion of children began in the United States as early as 1810. "I The number of children under five years of age to one hundred women of the child-bearing age decreased in 18101830 by 9.9, and in 1880-1900 by 9.4. Thus the twentyyear period of the recent immigration did not substantially differ in this respect from the time when, according to Gen.eral Walker himself, immigration had not affected the birthrate among native Americans.

Moreover, the declining birth-rate is a world-wide social phenomenon of the present day. In the Australian Commonwealth, with her vast continent as yet unsettled and practically no immigration, as well as in New Zealand, "the decline of the birth-rate has probably been as rapid, says Professor Wilcox, "as among native American stock."

The greater decline of the native birth-rate in those sections and counties into which the foreigners most largely enter, goes together with the growth of the urban population. The percentage ratio of native white children of native parentage under five years of age, to native women of child-bearing age averaged in 1900 for cities with 25,000 inhabitants or over-29.6, and for smaller cities and rural territory-52.2. The latter ratio, of course, is subject to great variation, the limits being 76.7 in Louisiana and 29.1 in Massachusetts.3 As indicated by these two extremes

1 Walker, loc. cit,, pp. 495-496.

* Supplementary Analysis. XII. Census, p. 410. Carlton, loc. cit., P. 347.

"So alarming has this phenomenon of the falling birth-rate become in the Australian colonies, that in New South Wales a special governmental commission has voluminously reported upon the subject. It is estimated that there has been a decline of about one third in the fruitfulness of the people in fifteen years. New Zealand even complains of the lack of children to fill her schools."—"Race Progress and Immigration," by William Z. Ripley, Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, vol. xxxiv., pp. 132-133.

3 Supplementary Analysis, XII. Census, Table XXII., p. 434.

the variation of the statistical average is to a great extent purely arithmetical, being due to the heterogeneous character of the settlements combined in this class; on the one hand, there are the manufacturing towns of Massachusetts, on the other, the purely agricultural settlements of Louisiana. The connection between the agricultural character of the population of this class of settlements and the ratio of native-born children to native women of child-bearing age can be seen from Table 70 in which all States are divided into four areas, according to the ratio of nativeborn children under five, and the percentage of "farmers, planters, and overseers" to the total number of breadwinners for each group is given in a parallel column. The States are shown on the map on page 227.

TABLE 70.

PER CENT RATIO OF NATIVE WHITE CHILDREN UNDER 5 YEARS OF AGE, BORN OF NATIVE MOTHERS, TO NATIVE WHITE FEMALES, 15 TO 44 YEARS OF AGE, IN CITIES OF LESS THAN 25,000 INHABITANTS AND RURAL TERRITORY, AND PER CENT RATIO OF NATIVE WHITE MALE FARMERS, PLANTERS, AND OVERSEERS TO THE TOTAL NUMBER OF WHITE MALE BREADWINNERS, 1900, BY AREAS COMPRISING STATES AND TERRITORIES GROUPED ACCORDING TO RATIO OF CHILDREN, 1900.

The preceding table clearly shows that the native birthrate declines with the percentage of farmers among the

1 Supplementary Analysis, XII. Census, Table XXII, p. 434.

2

Occupations at the XII. Census, Table 41, pp. 220 et seq. (computed).

native population. The rearing of children on a farm requires less of the mother's time and attention than in the city. Moreover, the child on a farm begins to work at an earlier age than in the city. A numerous family on a farm has the advantages of a co-operative group, whereas every addition to the family of the wage-earner, or of the salaried employee with a fixed income, tends to lower the family's standard of living.

I

On the other hand, the decline of the birth-rate is uni, versal among those classes which are scarcely, if at all, affected by immigrant competition. A noted Canadian physician holds, from his own experience, that on the American continent race suicide "is most prevalent among the highly educated classes," because "after having had one or at the most two children, the woman objects to having any more." Unfortunately the published results of the United States censuses contain no data on the comparative size of families classified by occupation of father. Some statistical information on this subject can be gained from British sources. From a comparison of the number of births to one hundred fertile couples selected from the peerage and baronetcy lists for each decade from 1831 to 1890, it appears that the average number of births to each family has gradually declined from 7.1 in 1831-1840 to 3.1 in 1881-1890. The unequal distribution of the decline in the birth-rate among various classes of the population of England has led Prof. Karl Pearson to the following conclusions:

The mentally better stock in the nation is not reproducing itself at the same rate as of old. . . . For the last forty years the intellectual classes of the nation, enervated by wealth or by love of pleasure, or following an erroneous standard of life, have ceased to give in due proportion the men wanted to carry on the ever-growing work of the Empire.3

I

A. Lapthorn Smith: "Higher Education of Women and Race Suicide," Popular Science Monthly, March, 1905, pp. 468, 470. Arthur Newsholme: The Declining Birth-Rate, p. 32.

3 Ibid., pp. 42-43.

It is clear that this "volitional limitation of the family" has no relation to the variations in the rate of wages.

In the United States, as observed by Dr. Billings nearly twenty years ago, it is the desire of "the lower middle classes" to maintain "social position," along with "the great increase in the use of things which were formerly considered as luxuries, but which now have become almost necessities" that accounts in part for "the deliberate and voluntary avoidance or prevention of child-bearing."" Still the "lower middle classes" are scarcely affected by immigration. Their standard of living is higher than that of the wage-earner. Yet it is precisely this higher standard that is productive of a "desire to have fewer children. All speculation to the effect that an increase in the rate of wages "might have been attended" in the past, or is likely to be attended in the future, "by a larger natural increase among the native-born portion of the population," has accordingly no foundation of fact.

I Newsholme, loc. cit., p. 33.

Supplementary Analysis, XII. Census, p. 410.

Per cent ratio of native white children under 5 years of age, born of native mothers, to native white females 15 to 44 years of age in cities of less than 25,000 inhabitants and rural territory, 1900.

CHAPTER X

THE STANDARD OF LIVING.

A. Introductory

N so far as immigration is an economic movement, it is obvious that the immigrant's standard of living in his home country must have been below the American standard. This is as true of the old as of the new immigration. Those immigrants only are an exception to this rule who seek to escape from political or religious oppression. Its victims are not confined to the poorer classes, but include people of means and of standing in the community, whose standard of living is often superior to that of the native American mechanic. Since 1890, however, of all the races which have come to this country, the Jews, the Poles, the Lithuanians, the Russians, the Finns, and the Armenians, have furnished the only immigrants of this class. As to all others, it was just the higher standard of living of the American wage-earner that induced them, like most races that preceded them, to emigrate to the United States. If the lower standard of living to which the immigrant has *been accustomed at home tends to reduce the American standard of living, then these effects of immigration must have manifested themselves in the days of the Irish and German immigration as much as to-day. At most there may be only a difference of degree. That the standard of living of the recent immigrant employed as an unskilled laborer is lower than that of the native American mechanic or of the older immigrant engaged in skilled work, is no new