ITALIAN, SLAVIC, AND HUNGARIAN UNSKILLED IMMIGRANT LABORERS IN THE UNITED STATES.

BY FRANK J. SHERIDAN.

The present article deals with the unskilled immigrant laborers of the Italian, Slavic, and Hungarian races, and undertakes to show how they have fitted themselves into the industrial life of the United States. A study has been made of the distribution of these laborers and their selection of certain States for especial industrial activity, the demand for their services, their wages, their methods and costs of living compared with American standards and costs of living, and their segregate system of living and employment and its effect upon them and upon their assimilation. The results of this study are presented in the following pages.

Although according to its title this study deals chiefly with unskilled immigrant laborers of the Italian, Slavic, and Hungarian races, yet, following the classification of the United States Bureau of Immigration and Naturalization, it includes some immigrants who are of the same grade and come from the same countries but belong to other races. Thus, under Slavs are included Hebrews from Eastern Europe, Roumanians, and others who, strictly speaking, are not of the Slavic race. In the preliminary tables, dealing with all immigrants from Eastern and Southern Europe, Hebrews are included in the Slavic group, though their numbers are given separately. In the discussion and tables following the preliminary tables, and dealing with the "Italian, Slavic, and Hungarian unskilled immigrant laborers in the United States," Hebrews are not included for the reason that they do not engage in the unskilled occupations on railroads and in mines,

403

etc., considered in this article. Few of the males of the race seek employment through labor agencies and are shipped out of the cities by them. They are, as a rule, employed in the greater cities in occupations not requiring much physical strength.

The total number of foreign-born persons in the United States, exclusive of Alaska and Hawaii, at the census of 1900 was 10,356,644, or 13.57 per cent of the total population. The number of these who were of Italian, Slavic, or Hungarian birth, together with the number of the same races who were admitted to the United States in each year since 1900, is given in the following table:

NUMBER OF FOREIGN-BORN PERSONS AND NUMBER AND PER CENT OF THOSE OF ITALIAN, SLAVIC, AND HUNGARIAN BIRTH IN THE UNITED STATES AT THE CENSUS OF 1900 AND NUMBER ADMITTED IN EACH YEAR, 1901 TO 1906.

[The numbers admitted for each year from 1901 to 1906 are compiled from the Reports of the Commissioner-General of Immigration.]

From the foregoing totals should be deducted the returning immigrants, variously estimated as being from 28 to 40 per cent of the arrivals. There have been no records kept of returning immigrants, but this defect has been remedied by the immigration law of 1907, which requires from the steamship companies manifests in detail of outgoing as well as incoming passengers.

The Italian, Slavic, and Hungarian immigrants admitted into the United States during the year ending June 30, 1906, numbered 739,978 and were 67.23 per cent of the 1,100,735 immigrants of all nationalities admitted during that year. Of the total of all immigrants 598,731 persons were unskilled laborers, and 72.18 per cent of the unskilled laborers, or 432,152, were of the Italian, Slavic, and Hungarian races. Not included in the group of unskilled laborers were 285,460 persons of "no occupation," constituting almost wholly family groups of women and children, 66.22 per cent of whom, or 189,049 persons, were of the Italian, Slavic, and Hungarian races. The remaining 19.67 per cent of the total immigration, or 216,544, belonged to the skilled, professional, and commercial classes, and of this group

4

118,777, or 54.85 per cent, were of the Italian, Slavic, and Hungaria

races.

The foregoing figures are presented in detail in the following tabl

NUMBER AND PER CENT OF IMMIGRANTS OF ITALIAN, SLAVIC, AND HUNGARIA BIRTH ADMITTED INTO THE UNITED STATES DURING THE YEAR ENDING JUN 30, 1906.

[Compiled from Report of the Commissioner-General of Immigration for the year ended June 30, 1900 pages 29 to 33.]

Per cent

of Italian

and Hun

A considerable number of the Italian, Slavic, and Hungarian immigrants had been engaged in agricultural pursuits in their native lands and had lived in scattered communities, removed from contact with great centers of population. This is shown in the following table for immigrants admitted from 1901 to 1906:

ITALIAN, SLAVIC, AND HUNGARIAN IMMIGRANTS ADMITTED FROM 1901 TO 1906 WHO WERE FARMERS OR FARM WORKERS BEFORE COMING TO THE UNITED STATES. [Compiled from the Peports of the Commissioner-General of Immigration.]

208, 281

20,891

538,707

559,598

Total

Of the 432,152 unskilled laborers of these races admitted to this country in 1906, 48.2 per cent, or 208,281, had been engaged in agricultural labor before coming here.

Of the 82,115 farmers and farm hands arriving in 1906 from Italy, 90.7 per cent were southern Italians, and but 7,634 were from northern Italy.

The great mass of the 9,611,003 persons in Italy in 1901 engaged in agricultural pursuits were southern Italians. This class of workers in southern Italy raised over 90 per cent of the cereal crops. In 1904, they produced 70 per cent of the wine product and 99 per cent of the olive oil.

In Austria in 1900, 13,709,204 persons of the total population of 26,150,708, or 52.4 per cent, were engaged in agriculture. In Hungary in 1900, 13,175,083 persons of the total population of 19,254,559, or 68.4 per cent, were engaged in agriculture, including in both countries forestry, sheep breeding, dairying, market gardening, etc.

Since the year 1900 the United States has secured from Italy, Hungary, and from the Slavic countries 559,598 men who had been farmers and farm hands in their native lands, but who have become a part of the unskilled laborers employed in the various industries of the United States since their arrival.

The wages paid to unskilled laborers in agriculture and in other industries in the countries from which these immigrants come are extremely low, and the life of the laborer is one of continuous poverty. The common laborers' reasons for leaving their native countries may be summarized as follows: (1) Primary necessity; (2) to escape compulsory military service and other burdens; (3) to become selfsupporting. All three objects are overcome or attained, they assert, by coming to the United States.

After their arrival in the United States these immigrants do not seek employment in agriculture, partly because of the difficulties in the way of securing it, but mainly because of the higher rates of wages in other industries. In transportation, manufacturing, mining, and in building the demand for common labor has been very great.

The Italian laborers prefer railroad construction, tunnel building, grading, ditching, building excavation, and work in factory industries, while the Slavs and Hungarians seek the industries where the compensation is somewhat higher and the labor somewhat harderwhere strong men are required, as in the blast furnaces, iron and steel works, iron-ore handling, and anthracite and bituminous coal mining.

Other reasons why the Italian immigrant agricultural laborers do Up not seek American farm life are thus given by Italian authorities:

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we

19.6 skill

In spite of the fact that the great mass of the Italian population (in Italy) is engaged in agricultural pursuits, an unusual proportion of the inhabitants are congregated in towns. The Italian is no lover of the country; he dreads of all things an isolated dwelling. Landowners, farmers, and most of the laborers dwell together in their boroughs or hamlets, and the peasants have often a journey of several miles before they reach the fields intrusted to their care.

The following table shows for each race the number reported as having followed the various unskilled occupations before coming to the United States. Those reported as having no occupation (mostly women and children) are included:

IMMIGRATION OF UNSKILLED WORKERS OF THE ITALIAN, HUNGARIAN, AND SLAVIC RACES IN DETAIL, YEAR ENDING JUNE 30, 1906.

[Compiled from Report of the Commissioner-General of Immigration for the year ended June 30, 1906, pages 28 to 33.]

DISTRIBUTION OF UNSKILLED LABORERS.

There are many methods used in the employment and distribution of immigrants and of unskilled laborers. Most of the great industrial establishments have well-o ganized systems for registration and employment at offices within their own gates, where hiring is done. directly and without the intervention of middlemen.

The labor employment agencies distribute but a small part of the total immigration. The New York City agencies distribute a maxi mum of about 70,000 men annually, and a large proportion of this is a redistribution including the movement of a number of American citizens. The total number of immigrants in 1906 reporting the State of New York as their destination was 374,708. Of the more han one million immigrants admitted in 1906, 86,539 reported the State of Illinois as their destination, and were absorbed there. The Chicago immigrant labor agencies had but a small number of these to edistribute. In other great cities conditions were the same.

Distribution through labor agencies is the most expensive method ›r the immigrant or other unskilled worker. The most effective as ell as the least expensive means is through the international and omestic mail service. Through this channel reliable information as