No data are available for 1900, hut in the census of 1890 we read that the ratio of prisoners to one million of the population is S98 for the native white and 1708 for the foreign white. As the foreign white are little more than one eighth of the entire etamminity. it is clear that these proportion• would not attribute to them an absolute majority of the (•ime• committed. Nor is the relative proportion of crime among the foreign born as great as these figures would in dicate. They relate to the entire population, while the adult population only contributes to the population of prisons. A comparison of the two elements by age classes, as shown by the following table, is more accurate: the foreign white and tilt'• native white. In tho later age classes the comparison is slightly un favorable to the foreign white.
These figures relating to the population of prisons are not altogether satisfactory. They lay undue emphasis on the more serious crimes and minimize the lesser offenses, and thus fail to give an accurate picture of the amount of crime committed in a given year. The fact that the foreign born ;ire more numerous among the pris oners with short sentenees shows us that if the enormous volume of petty crime which is com mitted annually were adequately- recorded the proportion of the foreigners would considerably incElTh.. There is, moreover, evidence which cannot be recited here in detail that the native whites of foreign patents are less law-abiding than the foreign whites and emitrast very unfa vorably with the native whites of native parentage.
There are few subjects upon which the offi cial records are more thoroughly unsatisfactory than in regard to crime, and all statements must be made in broad, general terms. It should, however, be rememlbered that a greater proportion of law-breaking among the foreign element might be adequately accounted for if we were able to divide the population into the social classes as respects wealth, education, and mode of lirinp act orally exist in il. It is not improbable
that in such a division it would appear that the foreign element showed no greater proportion of crime than the social strata to whip]) they belong.
PArentism. It is natural that the foreign born should contribute in larger measure than do the native to the population of the alms houses. They come here Without property and are found generally among the poorer °lasses. :Moreover. when age or incapacity overtakes them they have not the same relatives or friends to care for Omit as is frequently the case among the native population. It need not surprise us that the census of IS90, no figures for 1000 being available, showed that in every million of the population there were native white paupers and 3131 foreign white paupers, or nearly four times as ninny. While this is dne in part to the condition above described, the figures are again misleading, since' the active ages in the popula tion contribute little to the population of alms houses. This is brought out in the following table. showing the paupers age classes, in which it is to be noted tlmt nowhere is the dis proportion nearly so great as in the figures for the aggregate population: The larger proportion of foreign horn in the age, ten to nineteen is due to the fact that the foreign born increase in number as they ap proach twenty years of age. while among the native horn the numbers decrease from ten years onward. In the •haraeteristie ages of twenty to forty there is no substantial difference between