THE GERMAN AMERICAN.

Oamaru Mail, Volume XL, Issue 12538, 8 May 1915, Page 2

THE GERMAN AMERICAN.

ADECLINING INFWIENCE-'.- ] THIRD GENERATION P'LAJ>" AMERICAN. There ;''': ,^ni ; . 18,000,000 of citizens of the United Statfts- who are known as German-American.- (save the Now lork correspondent of an English .W.'ha-Hge). The Press of tins picturesque country I*; t'ers to them as "the hyphenated ones." They are of aH sorts and conditions. The jarg'ti majority -iti-e men and women of the second g'eneiatio'n o! Otntiian immigrants who came to the tinted Swtesato escape the rigours of the very militarism which their sons now uphold so vigorously. It is a curious mix-up. The second generation, cited above- lias produced a third generation which, in its num.- is emphaticallv anti-German. Thus you may meet m the" street Mr Schlappenhauer, oJ Hoboken, Ne\V Jersey, whose father was born at Breskiu, and hj» will tell you, with forefinger dangerously near your eye by way of emphasis, tha't "We'must be careful about our neutrality. Germany js .right.I hope she will beat those piraticw? Brf 1 ' islierS, They made the war, and we Oe'f man-Amerkai's will not permit the Prcrf--dent," etc.

Then, ten minutes later you meet young Schlappenhauer, of the third generation, and he: will say, "Aw.- the old mail is bughouse (dotty)" "rt that- German subject, i'm American 1 all*?, «W*l I- wan-t to- se« that- old Kaiser get it iii iVitv neck good and hard." , That is the tragedy of the hyphened ones. They cannot run more than two generations, after which their progeny becomes n.bsoi'bed into the great American nuit ; !?h-om.- They cling to their German names. bifJ /'.''-- ''flVc'.fwl to explain at every turn thai they are .** | o'-'"»:"ii ! , cither in sympathy or nationality. . "The .''Teat Hood of German i<7imotion to the United States ceased a qlliinei 91 a century ayo, when Germany began v> J ijtve uj( 'asl'it'tilluri-' tor manufactuie, and tiiris' w<* mai' expect in smother twenty- j five vey'f.-* tMft' final 1 flie'kerint: out pi the | German-Amene'cl.' - ?W ifii fM-ity. At the present tinu".- toiwevevv they '.«- . ert a powerful iuHuence, in | the Middle West, in great towns- '»k» l-in-cinnati, St. -Louis, Chicago. Umalul. wl Milwaukee, For instance, St. Loins mid ■ MiKv.'tllfceo we preponderantly German in sentiment.- .Milwaukee has a population of stfrftefchihg like half -si million mhabi- : tantsV ihftie. £w(>4hirds of these are hyphenated." Aitefjie/ large slice is Slav. The American.of English' descent tomes limping far in the rear. Ih'J 'J.-rmalin besau to pour into the Middle \Vtst in 1.1" fifties. They stopped coming in lh'r eighties. ' . t'jl/ tt< till- latter time Cincinnati. SILouis; tint} .Milwaukee were like German uiv.-m?.- KvfivV Mi'.' s|wli<.' German. If von went into a' s'iuji in .Milwaukee thirlv vcais ago the <fiaiK.es were that 'you were fhst addressed in Germany. So, too, in the. framcars and in public places. There were several daily papers piinte! exclusively in German, and l hey had large Hi'enbitiuiis. exerting a powerful influence <m politics. They upheld Gorman iKiUonalirfiii, preached Gernian idea's*.- fostered Gcnnitn literature. Luderiving it- .'ill was tile commercial idea, for 'it was h> the interest of these papers to keep the OniifiJi language inviolate against the time wlmi the new generations should become wholly Americanised. '-.'■■- ' ■ That time is coming-. Uie.v tfpeak English now in Milwaukee and IM. Louis. The third generation is actually ashamed of being "Dutch.'' It rejects the Gcfnian n<'w*papeis, which -.dwindle in circulation from year to year. 'iii' more the gri'ji of tilt" Kaiser is ■ relaxed, the moie energetic is th€ <:a.mpa.igu for '•Deutschthum'.' on the part of t)le German newspapers, and to this feeling of weakening power must be ascribed the violence of such persons as Congressman Bartholdu of St.- Louis.- and M'r Hermann Rid'.lcr. the projj.iietor of flic .N<sw York "Sl-aats Zeittiiiif:"

.Mr Ridclcr himself is a sta.-untl generatiun hyphenate. He inherited I.ho jiuj/'.-i founded bv a revolutionary refugee of 1848, one Oswald Ottendoil'er. who prolite'cl ■ immensely from the U-erman influx of that time, 'made a great success of his paper, and died u millionaire. The "Slants /Ml mig" >H no longer the power it- was, but, liorr JX-rnburg unci Count John Ik-riistrirff have. whipped it back into Urn limelight, and to-day it is the leader of the millions of citizens who live on memories of their fathers' tales, and loudly believe that they are,upholding the ideals' of '4B for which the Germans fought and fruin which thoy fled to a free country.

The ■ilut)L-fiitliintS i -uf those Germans who eame to America before the revolution of '4B—and there are. thousands of them—l;jk-L- no interest whatever in the new cabal. They are not hyphenated. Thus, "I have just, met a man with a Get•inan name whose k foicfaiheis came to America five generations ago, and he repeated what has now become a national phrase. He said : "I'm neutral, as every American should be. I "in so neutral Unit. I don't care a damn who licks the Kaiser.'' C.H.B.