Thread: Jefferson understood the immigration problem 220 years ago

Notes on the State of Virginia, Query 8

The number of its inhabitants?

Thomas Jefferson; 1787
http://www.idexer.com/articles/jefferson.htm
…But are there no inconveniences to be thrown into the scale against the advantage expected from a multiplication of numbers by the importation of foreigners? It is for the happiness of those united in society to harmonize as much as possible in matters which they must of necessity transact together.

Civil government being the sole object of forming societies, its administration must be conducted by common consent. Every species of government has its specific principles. Ours perhaps are more peculiar than those of any other in the universe. It is a composition of the freest principles of the English constitution, with others derived from natural right and natural reason. To these nothing can be more opposed than the maxims of absolute monarchies.

Yet, from such, we are to expect the greatest number of emigrants. They will bring with them the principles of the governments they leave, imbibed in their early youth; or, if able to throw them off, it will be in exchange for an unbounded licentiousness, passing, as is usual, from one extreme to another. It would be a miracle were they to stop precisely at the point of temperate liberty. These principles, with their language, they will transmit to their children. In proportion to their numbers, they will share with us the legislation. They will infuse into it their spirit, warp and bias its direction, and render it a heterogeneous, incoherent, distracted mass. I may appeal to experience, during the present contest, for a verification of these conjectures.

But, if they be not certain in event, are they not possible, are they not probable? Is it not safer to wait with patience 27 years and three months longer, for the attainment of any degree of population desired, or expected? May not our government be more homogeneous, more peaceable, more durable?

Suppose 20 millions of republican Americans thrown all of a sudden into France, what would be the condition of that kingdom? If it would be more turbulent, less happy, less strong, we may believe that the addition of half a million of foreigners to our present numbers would produce a similar effect here. If they come of themselves, they are entitled to all the rights of citizenship: but I doubt the expediency of inviting them by extraordinary encouragements….

[From Notes on the State of Virginia, ed. William Peden (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press for the Institute of Early American History and Culture, Williamsburg, Virginia, 1954), 84-5.]

I find it fasinating to hear of how our ancestors thought and just how right they were on so many things. I recently got some information on tracing my families origins. Fathers side. I guess I come from those first groups of illegals. Landed January 1, 1709. From Germany on the Good ship the Globe. A total of 53 people on board. Hardly an invasion. Weavers, carpenters, masons, cabinet makers. Don't even have the same last name. Well it sounds the same....just English spelling instead of German. I mean for generations we have a string named George Washington ...., John Adams ....... Fought in the revolutionary war, civil war, on down the line.

I just figure they came from such varied backgrounds that they didn't want to make the same mistakes here. They had a vision of the future and we lived it. Now it seems they want to take us backwards. I just don't see our future with the same hope our ancestors had.