Review: [untitled] Author(s): Jerome Krase Reviewed work(s): The Golden Door: Italian and Jewish Immigrant Mobility in New York City 1880-1915. by Thomas Kessner Source: International Migration Review, Vol. 12, No. 1 (Spring, 1978), pp. 140-141 Published by: The Center for Migration Studies of New York, Inc. Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2545642 Accessed: 26/02/2010 11:50 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use, available at http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp. JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in part, that unless you have obtained prior permission, you may not download an entire issue of a journal or multiple copies of articles, and you may use content in the JSTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use. Please contact the publisher regarding any further use of this work. Publisher contact information may be obtained at http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=cmigrations. Each copy of any part of a JSTOR transmission must contain the same copyright notice that appears on the screen or printed page of such transmission. JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact
[email protected].
The Center for Migration Studies of New York, Inc. is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to International Migration Review.
http://www.jstor.org
140
INTERNATIONAL MIGRATION REVIEW
they had doused with kerosene. Striking Slavic miners in 1910 knelt before the cruci? fix to swear they would not break faith with their fellows. In over one-half of the hun? dreds of non-union walkouts, strikes and boycotts in the 1880s and 90s immigrant workers won their demands for higher wages or better working conditions. Gutman asserts in this stimulating essay that the capitalist technoindustr ial order did irot emerge iir America easily. Rather, it faced a long and bitter struggle against the values aird habits of a diverse but stubborn prc-industrial people, hr other essays he shows that the post civil war industrialist did not simply "takeover" the manufactur? ing cities of America. Rather, if he offended the prc-modern sensibilities of his fellow townspeople he frequently paid a heavy price. Even "radicals" of the period enjoyed widespread popular support. For example, when convicted of libel in Patterson, New Jersey in the 1880s, Joseph McDonnell, editor of the radical Labor Standard, spent 18 months in jail. Yet the people of Patter? son made certain that he had good home? made food, they visited him in large num? bers, the warden allowed him to edit his aird townspeople helped newspaper McDonnell celebrate his birthday arrd St. Patrick's day with very fine dinners irrdeed. hr a touching show of support, nearly the entire town, including many prominent citizens, turned out to welcome him upon his release from prison. In the eyes of the people of industrializing Patterson, McDon? nell was not a radical anarchist undermin? ing the glory of emerging capitalism. Rather, he gave voice to the feelings of a citizenry deeply attached to the more per? sonal, more human and persistent values of a pre-industrial order. Social historians of Gutman's calibre have breathed new life into the study of "labor history". They have extended its boundaries outside the musty meetings of union leaders into the homes, the hearts and the customs of those millions who built America. In his introduction, Gutman pleads that we should get acquainted with the workers who loved their "goose eggs"
and "blue Mondays", the mill girls who quit work because they valued life and the tailor who penned poetry against the tyr? anny of the clock. To know these people and their emotions, Gutman wisely points out. "is part of the process of self-discovery". Indeed, it is so.
The (.jolden Door: Italian and Jewish Immi? grant Mobility in New York City 1880-1915. By 'Thomas Ressner. New York: Oxford University Press, 1977. Pp. 221. $12.95 (cloth), $3.50 (paper). Jerome Rrase Brooklyn College In recent years there has been a dramatic upsurge in the number of books on Ameri? can ethnic groups. The Golden Door deals with comparative ethnic group social mo? bility in a way that will stimulate both professional and popular readers. The au? thor artfully compares the absolute and relative mobility of Southern Italians and Kastern European Jews who settled in New York City between 1880 and 1915. He concludes that both groups made "significant" economic advances in New York, with Jews being more successful than Italians. The causes cited for the general mobility and the differential between the groups are not new. Ressner notes that they came to the city at a time of economic expansion and took advantage of the differ? ential opportunities open to them. As op? posed to Southern Italians, Eastern Eu? ropean Jews came with prior urban experience, occupational backgrounds that allowed them eventually to move into higher level occupations, a communal identity conducive to mutual aid, the ab? sence of a homeland to return to if they failed here, and a culture favoring education which was of prime importance for the mobility of subsequent generations. Jews and Italians did not start on the same step of the opportunity ladder and did not progress at the same rate. The Golden Door as sociohistorical anal-
BOOK REVIEWS ysis contains both major strengths and sig? nificant weaknesses. The book brings the reader successfully through a progression of questions concerning the process of assimi? lation. Ressner has done a great service to the student of immigrant social mobility by focusing on New York City, which others have avoided as being too unique. The book contains an excellent discussion of the rele? vant literature which is carefully integrated with the New York experience of Italians and Jews. Ressner has also captured the subjective, as well as the objective realities of aliens adjusting to a new, and often hostile society. The most important contributions of the work are neither literary nor humanistic. Through the use of somewhat innovative methodological techniques Ressner at? tempts to blaze new trails for historians, and it is here that he ventures upon rather shaky ground. He points out the weaknesses of studies of immigrant mobility which relied on census data and tended to misrepresent the difficult-to-find immigrant population. He uses censuses in his analysis but places greater weight on data from New York City directories, which list the name, occupation and address of heads of households. This makes it possible for him to "trace" them over time and ascertain their occupational and residential movement. However, the data is biased toward the most successful individuals, and is particularly unrepresen? tative of Southern Italians. Ressner also innovated by employing "quantitative" methods to confirm his hy? potheses of general and differential mobil? ity. He compares the ranking of Italians and Jews on a five item occupational prestige scale. Constructed from census and directory data his tables show that Italians are lower on the scale than Jews in 1880, 1905 and 1915. Tracing by household, and consider? ing generation, he shows that despite this difference both groups made substantial gains over the period; Jews showing more upward mobility than Italians. He also traces the course of ethnic residential mobil? ity demonstrating that immigrants were extremely mobile as individuals even
141
though the "natural areas" of immigrant settlement remained stable. The contributions made by quantitative methods in The Golden Door are impor? tant, but some deficiencies must be noted. They stem from the author's view that: "The real value of the quantitative ap? proach is not its precision, but rather that it adds another tool to the historian's craft." This lack of concern for precision has led to a rather cavalier treatment of apparent weaknesses in data and method. This raises some doubts as to the definitiveness of his conclusions which one is inclined to accept on the basis of the other data and arguments he presents. Another major problem is the reduction of 400 occupations to five ranked groups, thereby ignoring intra-rank, and over emphasizing inter-rank movements. For example, the change from blue collar worker to sales clerk is counted as upward mobility, while movement upward within blue collar employment is not. In general, Ressner's methodology leads to selective under and over estimations of both Jewish and Italian mobility during the period, and leads one to place greater confi? dence in the descriptive rather than the analytic contributions of The Golden Door. The book makes clear how the two groups differed in their social mobility in New York City, but it remains unclear how much they differed.
Bilingual Schools for a Bicultural Commu? nity. By William F. Mackey Von Nieda Beebe. Rowley: Newbury House Publish? ers, Inc., 1977. Pp. 223. $10.95. Raul Moncarz-Percal Florida International University This book makes an important contribution to the growing literature on bilingualism. Part One contains an account of Spanish and Cuban influence in the State of Florida. The second part provides the best that the book has to offer in terms of the beginning of bilingual education in Miami with the Coral Way Elementary leading the way and
