Sorry friend, but the Irish fought on both sides of the war. Savannah, Ga. had a huge Irish influx, possibly third in the country after NY and Boston.
Posted on 04/04/2006 5:34:55 PM PDT by neverdem
Today's rancorous debate over immigration has a parallel in the nativist reaction to the mass Irish immigration in the mid-19th century.
Spurred by the potato famine that began in 1845, 3.5 million mostly destitute Irish migrated to America by 1880 - about 7 percent of the population of 50 million. By contrast, today's 11 million unauthorized immigrants, of all nationalities, constitute just 4 percent of our population.
Contemporary immigration foes, like former Gov. Dick Lamm and Rep. Tom Tancredo, claim America can't absorb so many foreign-born without fatal damage to our economy and culture.
Yet, history shows we did just that. Today, there are 43 million Americans of Irish ancestry, a key element of the vibrant alloy that is America.
Today's nativists argue we can't compare today's illegal immigrants to the Irish, because the Irish came here legally. That's technically true, but the 19th century wave was just as uncontrolled, because America had virtually no bars to immigration in those days.
Kenneth Ackerman's book, "Boss Tweed: The Rise and Fall of the Corrupt Pol Who Conceived the Soul of Modern New York," details how the desperate Irish were welcomed at the docks by the political machine that provided the only social safety net in that era.
Tweed minions would help the newcomers find housing and work and, if there was an election in the offing, they would swiftly be naturalized as citizens in mass ceremonies by Tweed's judges, so they could vote for their benefactors.
Cartoonist Thomas Nast, who hated Irish and Catholics with equal fervor, pandered to the nativist bigotry by depicting Irishmen as drunken, subhuman brutes. The accompanying Nast cartoon depicts the role immigrants played in supporting Tweed by showing an Irish thug and a Catholic priest carving up the Democratic Party goose that laid the golden eggs.
But though the Irish were despised, they were still admitted through America's golden door. That's because Americans needed them to do our dirty work.
The first generations of Irish worked largely at unskilled and semiskilled occupations, but their children found themselves working at increasingly skilled trades. By 1900, when Irish Americans made up about 8 percent of the male labor force, they were almost a third of the plumbers, steamfitters and boilermakers. Their places at the bottom of the ladder were taken by newly arrived laborers from southern and eastern Europe.
Today, those dirty, low-paying, jobs are being taken by Latinos. But if history is any guide, the daughter of that Latina who scrubs your floor today may be the doctor who delivers my granddaughter's baby a generation hence.
To some, that is a frightening prospect. But I think Clio, the muse of history, would join with Lady Liberty herself to say:
Bienvenidos, Americanos nuevos.
Bob Ewegen is The Denver Post's deputy editorial page editor.
"We faced many of those Irish mercenaries in the War of Northern Aggresion,
the ranks of the invaders were filled with many foreigners, from many lands,
while we were true born Americans."
The South had Irish regiments too. My own people were Scots-Irish and fought in the 1st and 10th Tennessee.
Are you saying that someone who swims the Rio to get here illegally isn't a wetback when he gets out of the water on the other side?
Scum indeed.
The Irish were known as the White N****** and now the Hispanics are known as S****
"The Irish, God love em, more then paid their fair share to their new homeland, USA or CSA:"
I was trying to have a little fun, but your post is more correct,
The Irish really gave a lot of blood to America, including the Indian Fighting Army after the Civil War.
And of course I'm part Irish too, although it's not my favorite bloodline.
Sorry friend, but the Irish fought on both sides of the war. Savannah, Ga. had a huge Irish influx, possibly third in the country after NY and Boston.
His e-mail address is: bewegen@denverpost.com
And just in case you ever need it, there's this website.
;^)
"I agree that the Mexicans are not interested in becoming Americans, but can we leave the racism to them?"
And just what "race" are Mexicans? Do you mean ethnic group?
And just what "race" are Mexicans? Do you mean ethnic group?
Please use your spell check. I believe you meant:
S***
;)
Hardly the case. Nativism and anti-Catholicism ran rife in reaction to Irish immigration.
'wetback' is a racist epithet, and doesn't help the argument. Racism is also against FR policy- and why would you want to forfeit the moral high ground in a discussion on illegal immigration where you are right?
And probably no happy hour either!
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