Making Americans Out of Immigrants

Paper Summary:

This paper discusses how the founders of the US Constitution believed that education was the way to instill democratic principles in young citizens who would grow up to "sustain the US experiment in liberty". The paper further discusses how immigrants had a special need because they were bringing with them their exposure to a feudal system in Europe. Thus, this paper reports how civic education of US citizens was seen as primary to making democracy work and the responsibility fell upon the public school system.

From the Paper:

"There were those people who didn't believe that any amount of education could make Blacks, Asians, Catholics, Eastern Orthodox Christians, or Jews "real Americans." Real Americans were White Protestants. Although the Ku Klux Klan was an extremist hate group, its attitudes were fairly widespread, attitudes that led to laws in the mid-1920s that ended mass immigration to the United States for over 40 years. The immigrants had already made a big demographic impact on America, however. In 1900 60% of Americans were of British descent, but by 1920 that number was down to 40%. Although groups like the KKK and other advocates of ethnic nationalism challenged civic nationalism, clearly civic nationalism "dominated American life and education for the first third of the twentieth century" (Mirel, 2002a, p. 146). Most immigrant children attended public school. There they learned English, which helped them to succeed later in life. They also learned American ideals and values like freedom, democracy, and equality."

Sample of Sources Used:

• Bourne, R. (1916). Trans-national America, Atlantic Monthly, 118, July, 86-97.
• Cubberley, E. P. (1909). Changing Conceptions of Education. Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin Company.
• Haynes, C. C. et al (2003). The first amendment in schools. Nashville: First Amendment Center.
• Kallen, H. (1915). Democracy versus the melting pot, Nation, 100, 18-25 Feb, 190-194, 217-220.
• McBrien, J. L. (2005). Educational needs and barriers for refugee students in the United States: A review of the literature. Review of Educational Research, 75 (3), Fall, 329-364.

More papers on Making Americans Out of Immigrants:

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• Essay # 54850 : "Arab-Americans"

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