One of the unique, if not the one unique, American problem has been that of assimilating great masses of nearly all the important races of the earth. As far as European and Asiatic races are concerned the question of absorption into the American nation has been largely an urban one. More and more the assimilation of the negro also is becoming an urban problem, for the migration of negroes to the towns and cities is a significant part of the general movement of the population cityward. The Census of 1910 showed that more than one-fourth of the negro population now dwells in towns of 2,500 population and over. Thirty-nine cities have ten thousand or more negroes; five northern and seven southern cities have more than forty thousand negroes each. Negroes are not only moving to the cities, but the Census further shows that in each of twenty-seven large cities, negroes form one-fourth or more of the total population and in four cities they constitute one-half the population.
On one side the question of assimilation of all races in the cities is a labor problem: one of employment, a living wage, proper housing, and industrial opportunity. On the other, it is a social problem: one of education, recreation, common counsel, investigation, publicity, and protection. It is with the social aspects of assimilation that we shall deal in this chapter.
As a preparation for constructive work with them, women first studied the needs, customs, and labor of foreigners as well as they knew how. Louise Montgomery’s investigation of “Old Country Mothers and American Daughters” in the stockyards district of Chicago is an excellent example of such study. It is thus reviewed by Christina Merriman:
It is a remarkably comprehensive, balanced and interesting survey that Miss Montgomery has made, of the industrial and educational problems of a district torn by the struggle between the inherited standards of the European peasants and those of their American daughters, “struggling to keep up with American standards” and making every effort to avoid being classed as a “foreigner.” The same problem concerns every American city which has a foreign industrial community.
The study is based on the records of 900 families known to the University of Chicago Settlement for a number of years, and from which was selected a group of 500 girls from whom it was possible to secure the most reliable information.