This change is to be expected. The
influence of environment, especially of free education and unfettered
opportunity, is calling forth the talents of the children of the
immigrants. The number of descendants from the American stock yearly
becomes relatively less; intermarriage with the children of the
foreign born is increasingly frequent. Profound changes have taken
place since the American pioneers pushed their way across the
Alleghanies; changes infinitely more profound have taken place even
since the dawn of the twentieth century and have put to the test of
Destiny the institutions which are called "American."
Nevertheless in a large sense every great tradition of the original
American stock lives today: the tradition of free movement, of
initiative and enterprise; the tradition of individual responsibility;
the primary traditions of democracy and liberty. These give a virile
present meaning to the name American. A noted French journalist
received this impression of a group of soldiers who in 1918 were
bivouacked in his country: "I saw yesterday an American unit in which
men of very varied origin abounded--French, Polish, Czech, German,
English, Canadian--such their names and other facts revealed them.
Nevertheless, all were of the same or similar type, a fact due
apparently to the combined influences of sun, air, primary education,
and environment.
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