Chapter CXXIII: Section CCLXI: State Aid to Emigrants

The inquiry, What can the state reasonably do for emigration, must, of course, receive a very different answer according as there is question of merely negative (§ 259) or colonizing emigration (§ 262). To give the latter a proper impulse requires so great an outlay of capital and labor that it can be made only by the state; and in Germany, on a large scale, only by a union of several states. We must not here deceive ourselves. Emigrants will go uniformly where they have the nearest prospect of a comfortable future. Whether in emigrating they shall continue their connection with their old home, or whether their children shall be completely denationalized is a matter with which very few emigrants concern themselves; and considering the amount of education they generally possess, this need excite no surprise. Hence, if Germany would unite its departing children in a colony permanently German, and therefore new,[261-1] it would be necessary for it to offer them, at its own expense, at least the same advantages which they would find in older and fully established colonies. He who would reap should not endeavor to evade the sacrifice incident to the sowing.[261-2] Even great sacrifices in this direction would certainly be richly rewarded if properly made. Probably the outlay would never be directly returned to the national treasury; but there is all the more reason, on this account, that there should be an indirect return by the increase of duties and other indirect taxes.

On the other hand, the costly assistance of the state in the case of merely negative emigration would, as a rule, be folly. Who would compel the children of the great national family, who necessarily or voluntarily remain faithful to the paternal roof, to pay tribute to those who turn their backs on the old home for ever? The wealthy especially who remain in the country have to put up with the disadvantage of paying higher wages for labor.

Simple humanity requires that the state should not be blind to the movement of emigration, nor abandon it to all the risks of improvident liberty. Hence it should endeavor to remove the ignorance prevailing on questions of emigration. It should require personal and other guaranties that emigration agents are not simply dealers in men, and that the contracts made with ship-owners by emigrants are really performed. It should exercise a strict superintendence over the mode of transportation of emigrants, and see to it that its consuls accredited to America, etc. assist them by word and deed.[261-3] The legislation of Bremen is a model in this respect, and has contributed largely to make that port a principal outlet for German emigration.[261-4] The provisions of the laws of October 1, 1832, of July 14, 1854, of July 9, 1866, etc., embrace among others the following: Only a citizen of Bremen, of good repute, and who has given security to the amount of five thousand thalers, shall be entitled to receive and contract with emigrants for passage; to each passenger shall be allotted a space of at least twelve square feet of surface and six feet high; provision shall be made for the longest possible time of passage; for instance, for thirteen weeks for a voyage northerly from the equator. At the same time, the ship-owner is required to give security that in case of accident to the vessel, disabling it in such a way as to unfit it to continue the journey, he shall return the fare of all passengers saved, and pay them an additional sum of from twenty to forty thalers, according to the length of the passage, to cover the cost of salvage, to support themselves for the time being, and enable them to continue their journey. The entire matter is controlled by a rigid system of ship-investigation, and is under the superintendence of a board of officers, made up of senators and members of the chamber of commerce.[261-5] Among English provisions[261-6] particularly worthy of imitation is that which requires the government agents in Canada, etc. to furnish information gratis to emigrants. But to keep their clients from the practice of idling about, so ruinous to themselves, the agents refuse aid to all emigrants who, without sufficient reason, remain over eight days in the harbor.

[Footnote 261-1: Much might be gained if German emigrants to
the United States would concentrate themselves in one state,
and thus soon make it a German state. For many reasons
Wisconsin is best adapted to such a purpose.]

[Footnote 261-2: Provision made to put the colonists in
possession of lands well explored and surveyed, to have the
preliminary labor performed by persons already
acclimated--labor which is the most injurious to health, the
clearing of the land, the construction of
buildings--purchasing the agricultural implements at
wholesale, etc.]

[Footnote 261-3: _v. Gessler_ (Tübinger Zeitschr., 1862, 398
ff.), recommends the establishment of an "asylum" in the
neighborhood of the locality where the emigrants are likely
to settle. In this asylum they might, during the time
immediately following their arrival, find shelter, food,
medicines, etc., and all the implements necessary to a
settler, at cost. The institution might be established
either by the home government, by a humanitarian emigration
society, or by a land company in the colony itself.]

[Footnote 261-4: There passed

================================================================
| _In 1854._ | _In 1867._
------------------------+-------------------|-------------------
Through Bremen, | 76,875 emigrants. | 73,971 emigrants.
Through Hamburg, | 50,819 " | 42,845 "
(Of these directly only | 32,310) " | (38,170) "
Through Havre, | 95,849 " | 22,753 "
Through Antwerp, | 25,843 " | 12,086 "
Through other ports, | 2,50 " |
================================================================

The trade of Bremen has, as the result of this
transportation of emigrants, grown just as that of the
Italian sea coast cities by the transportation of the
crusaders in the Middle Ages. Here, as in so many other
cases, genuine philanthropy, in the long run, moves nearly
parallel with real economic advantage. And in fact, the
Statuta civitatis Messiliæ of 1228 (IV, 24 seq., 28, 30)
contain provisions in relation to the crusaders which
forcibly remind one of the modern Bremen laws. Similarly in
Venice: Compare _Depping_, Histoire du Commerce entre le
Levant et l'Europe, 284; II, 313 seq.]

[Footnote 261-5: Similar provisions in Hamburg, June 3,
1850, revised February 26, 1855; in France, January 15,
1855; in the United States of America, March 2, 1855.
Compare _Hübner_, Statistisches Jahrbuch, 1856, 289 ff.
However, there were serious complaints, a short time since,
concerning German emigrant transportation, especially of the
treatment of women: Novara-Reise, III, 49 ff. Ausland, 1863,
No. 8. One of the principal wants is that emigration agents
should be held responsible for detaining their clients a
long time and at a heavy expense, in places of embarkation.]

[Footnote 261-6: Compare _McCulloch_, Commercial Dictionary,
v. Colonies, 9 George, IV., ch. 21. The law of June 30,
1852, carries solicitude for the lot of emigrants very far.
It embraces 91 articles and 11 additions. Everything is most
minutely provided for, even the form of the passage ticket.
The old law of 1803, drawn up in accordance with the advice
of the Scotch Highland Society, was apparently devised in
the interest of the emigrants; but it contained a multitude
of minute requirements suggested by a desire on the part of
the advisers to restrict emigration. Hence it was, in
practice, by consent of both parties, always evaded. Compare
_Lord Selkirk_, Observations on the present State of the
Highlands of Scotland, with a View of the Causes and
probable Consequences of Emigration (1805). Edinburgh R.,
December, 1826, 61; January, 1828.]