Assimilation, past and present

Public Interest, Spring, 2005 by Robert A. Levine

IS AMERICA'S Anglo-Protestant-African-Catholic-Indian-German-Irish-Jewish-Italian-Slavic-Asian society in danger of "Hispanicization?" The obvious answer is "no." Every major new addition to American society has been viewed in its time as a potential agent of change. And this view has been correct: American society has continuously evolved. But "change" is not a synonym for "danger," and in no case has the essential fabric of America been endangered. Nor is it by the latest influx of mainly Mexican Hispanics.

Acculturation has always been a two-way street in the United States. The major waves of immigrants into this country, starting with the Irish in 1845, did not become Anglo-Protestants like those who colonized the eastern seaboard, declared independence, and wrote the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. (Of course, given the large numbers--and, yes, influence--of blacks, the colonies and states had never been fully Anglo-Protestant anyhow.) But the newcomers did become Americans, and in the process, Anglo-Protestant society changed too.

Although the answer to the question about endangerment is "no," it is not, however, "Of course not." Those who fear the current Hispanic influx contend that this time things will be different. True, the same has been stated about every previous wave of immigrants, wrongly as it happens. But perhaps the case of Hispanics really is different: After the boy's false cries of "wolf," the wolf did come and eat a number of villagers, including the boy. But in our case, the wolf is not crossing the Rio Grande and the Sonoran Desert. The Hispanic immigration is in fact different, but it is no more different than the other ones were from each other, and the republic is not in danger, at least not from this quarter.

I will focus on the effects of the current large-scale Mexican immigration on American society and life, because that is where the fears are. As put by Harvard political scientist Samuel P. Huntington in his recent book Who Are We? The Challenges to America's National Identity:

   Mexican immigration is leading toward the demographic reconquista of
   areas Americans took from Mexico by force in the 1830s and 1840s ....
   It is also blurring the border between Mexico and America,
   introducing a very different culture, while also producing the
   emergence, in some areas, of a blended society and culture,
   half-American and half-Mexican.

These concerns are directed at the Mexican immigration (or sometimes at the broader Hispanic immigration), not at other related issues or problems: the parallel Asian immigration that is both smaller, more highly educated, and thus more easily assimilated; the environmental and other effects of overall population increases; or the legal and political issues surrounding undocumented immigrants. The issue raised by the critics is the composition of the American population, not its size or the effects on homeland security of a porous border. These are issues in their own right, and would have to be addressed separately.

Huntington provides an important analytical dichotomy, dividing the elements of "American identity" between "creed"--ideology, having to do mainly with our political institutions--and the underlying "culture" that structures the society in which we live. I'll start with a brief discussion of previous mass immigrations--Irish, Eastern European Jews, and Italians--as a background for the examination of the impact of the Mexican immigration first on America's creed--which remains safe--and then on our culture--which the newcomers will change, as newcomers always have.

The Irish, Jews, and Italians

Until 1845, the 13 colonies and then the United States were essentially the Anglo-Protestant societies of rosy recall. There were some others--English Catholics and Germans, in particular--but the generalization held. Starting with the Irish potato famine of 1845 and the consequent mass migration to the United States, however, things began to change rapidly. The remainder of the nineteenth century and the beginning of the twentieth saw three waves of immigration comparable in size to the current Hispanic influx. After the Irish, a new wave beginning in the 1880s and lasting until the threshold of the First World War brought in Italians (and a smaller number of Eastern European Catholics), and Eastern European Jews. The two million Irish who entered in the 1840s became about 10 percent of the American population; by 1925 Italian Americans and Jews together constituted a somewhat larger proportion of the population. It should be noted that the peak proportion of foreign-born Americans was 14.8 percent in 1890; in 2000, it was 11.2. We have a way to go before we match even our own immigrant past.

All three migrations were different from one another; all three were absorbed in similar ways--"Americanizing" the newcomers into a society that changed simultaneously by adapting to the immigrants. For each of the three groups, the process was a long one--from 50 or so years for substantial acceptance to about a century for full assimilation.