This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1904 edition. Excerpt: ... CHAPTER XI IMMIGRATION, UNIVERSAL SUFFRAGE, AND THE NEGRO QUESTION THE success of a democracy depends altogether on the quality of the people who compose it; if they be of a common mind as to the main purposes of the state, sufficiently educated, mutually helpful and considerate, seeking good government, in a word, truly patriotic, the commonwealth will be strong; if there be an admixture of people who do not have these qualities in direct proportion to the amount of the uncitizenly element, the political life will be weakened, and at a certain stage in the degradation the state will cease to have the characteristics of a government for and by its true people. It is this general truth that makes the question of immigration of great interest to all Americans, for into their country there is now pouring a great tide of folk gathered from .nearly all the states of the civilised world, and some that are not, in one sense of the word, civilised at all. At first sight there is much to please us in this spectacle of folk who have suffered from the political oppression which other lands inflict upon them, seeking a refuge in the ample room of our national domain; to them and their children this country is a land of promise and often of ample fulfilment. It is indeed a noble thing for a state to be, as our own is, a place of safety to millions of shipwrecked persons. There is, however, another and very practical side to the question which every citizen must consider. These foreign people are principally from countries whose speech, customs, and ideas of government are very different from our own. This difference is not a matter of the moment; it has existed for the centuries during the time in which our ideas of democracy have been slowly forming...