0 DOCUMENT REUME

ED 260 002 SO 016 727 7. 1 N 00 4 AUTHOR Giguere, Madeleine, Ed. TITLE A Rranco-American Overvie. Volume 3., t (Pa4t One). .. INSTITUTION National Assestmenthnd isseminaltion Center for Bilingual Education, Camb idge, Mlss.; National' Materials Development Center for French and Port4guese, Bedford, Atli.

r SPONS AGENCY. Department 9LEOucation, , DC. REPORT NO ISBN-0-89857/136-7 PUB DATE Mar 81 1 NOTE 278p.;'or the-other volumes. in this series, see SO 016 725-730. PUB TYPE ( Historical Materials (060) Viewpoints (120) . , . `Collected Works General (ozp) d, EDRS PRICE MF01/PC12 Plus'Postageh DESCRIPTORS *Acculturation; Biculturalism; ; Colonial History (); *Cross Cultural "Studies; *Cultur 1 Edumption; Cultural Influences; Cultural Pluralism; Culture; Ethnic Groups! Family Life; Industrialization; Land Settlement; MigraIion; Political Attitudes; Politics; Religion; Social History; Social Services; Social Studies; Subcultiires; United States History IDENTIFIERS A Acidians; *Franco ; 'Frenth (Canadian); ; *New England; New Hathpshire; Nineteenth Century;

ABSTRACT . . Intended to help readers develop an appreciation of the contributions of Franco-Americans to the cultural heritage co; the i United States, this book, the third -of six volumes, presents 17 readings representing many perspectives--from the historical to the ,., sociological illustrating the thinking and feelings wf those in the forefront of Franco-American studies, This volume focuses on Franco-Americans in New England. The 4ollowing readings are presented "The French- in Ndw England; (William MacDonald); "French Cathdlics in the United States" (J. g. L. LaFlamme, David E. 'Lavigne, and J. Arthur Favreau); "French and .french-Canadians in the United States" (Mason Wade)"The Acadian Migrations" (Robert LeBlanc); "The Loyalists and the " (Masoh Wade); "The Franco- American's in Maine: A Geographical Perspective" (James, P. Allen); " to 'Little ': The Coming of the FrencIrtanadians to NewEngland in the Nineteeht Century" (Ir.is Saunder Podea); "The French Colony.at Brunswick, Maine: A Historical Sketch" (William N. Locke); "The'Franco-AmericaIt' of New England" (George F. Theriault); "The Laborers of Manchester, 1912-1922: The Role ofiFamily..and Ethnicity in Adjustment to Industrial Life" (Tamara K. Hareveh); "The FranCo-American 4 Working-Class Family" Maurence French);. "Traditional French-Canadian Family Life Patterns and Their Implications for Social Services in VerTont" (Peter Woolfson);""TherPresidential Politics of Franco-Americans" (David B. Walker); "A Profile of Franco-American Political Attitudes in New England" (Norman,9epenuk4 "The French `Parish and 'Survivihce' in 19th Century,NewEngland" 1,(Mason Wade); "The Shadows of the Trees: Religiofl and Language" (Jitgues Ducharme) ;:' and,"French National Societies in New England" (Edward Billings Ham). (LH) ,.

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Workers in the Amoskeag Mills, Manchester, New Hampshirenixie this American flag in srp 14 and posed with it in front of one of the buildings of what was at the turn of the century the largest textile mill complex in the world. A preponderant number of the persons employed in these mills were French-Canadian immigrants from Quebec and their children: (Photo courtesy of Manchester Historical Ass'n.)

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1 A FRANCO-AMERICAN OVEtWIEW

in Volume 3

a 1 NEW ENGLAND Part One)

di edited by Madeleine -61guere Profe%.sor of Sociology, Universio' of Southern Maine ul Pot-artful-Gorham

Staff Consultant Robert 1.. Paris

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Published by Evaluation, Dissemination and Assessment Center, ESEA Title VII Lesley College, 49 Washington Avenue, C'ambridge, 02140 Developed by National Materials Development Center for French 168 South River Road, Bedford, New Hampshire 03102 International Standard Book Number 0- 89857 -136 -7 Published March 1981 Ar Printed in the United States of Americ The activity which is the subject of this publics was supported In whole or In part by the U.S. Department of Education. However, the opinions expressed erein do not necessarfly reflect the position or policy of the Department of Education, and no Official endorsement by the Department of Education dhould be inferred. Thallvaluation, Dissemination and Assessment Center for Bilingual Education is a special ESEA, Title VII \iroject funded by the U.S. Department of Education through Lesley College, Cambridge, Massachusetts, and the Fall River Public School System This publication was developed and printed with fund provided by Title VII of the Elementary end -Secondary Education Act of 1965, as amended.

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6 12' 4 s 'ook

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ll TABLE OF CONTENTS

("rapt .r Page

Preface rt

IntroduCtion Madeleine GigtOfe. iv

Orerpiws

AC. The French-Canadiark in New England William MacDonald

II `French Citholies in the United States' LaFlamme, .David E. Lavigne & J. Arthur Favreau 23

III French and Trench-Canadians in the United States Mason Wade 37

Beginnings

IV The Acadian Migrations Robert LeBlanc ,49

V . The Loyalistsd the Acadians Mason Wade 69

VI The Franco-Americans in Maine: A Geographical Perspective lames P. Allen '83

VIIQuebec to «»: The Corning of the French-Canadians to New England in the Nine- ti teenth Century Iris Saunders Podea 113

Communities

VIIIThe French Colony at Bridi4wick, Maine: A Historical Sketch William N. Locke 127 4 IX The FrancotAmericans of New England George F. Theriault 139

Major Institutions 0 The Laborers of Manchester,New Hampshire .1912-1922:The Role of Family and Ethnicity in Adjustment to Industrial Life Tamara K. Hareven 157

XI The Franco-American Working-Class Family Laurence French 173

7 Pp. XII -traditional French-Canadianamily Life Patterns in 10 PeteeWoolfson 193 Their Implications for Socialervices in Vr non/ A.

,.. XIIIiliV)residential Politics of Franco-Amer &)avid B. Walker , 201

. XIV A Profile of Franco-American Politicalt es in New England Norman Sepen ik 213

XV The French Parish ang oSttrvivanc- e» in 19thi 1 4. Century New England Mason Wade 235

t: XVI ..,The Shadows of the Trees: Religiond Language ::r.Iacques Ducharme 255 . f Edward Billings Ham 263 '1 XVII French National. Societies in New England , 0.6

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4. F. PREFACE:'

This series of,volumes, entitled A FRANQO-AMERICAN OVERVIEW, is primarily anthological in nature, -and is intended for the use of those who wish to find out about or to extend their awareness of. to fait franco-americain in the United States today. Many of the selections included in this series have been available elsewhere, but several -s .i- are now out of print or difficult to locate for practical reference. Their compilation' nci lijuxtaposition for the first time between the covers ofta unique series of volumes dedic -ed exclutively to the Franco-Americans will serve to enhance, deepen and expand e ch reader's understanding of this special ethnic troup in its many permutations and guises.

Each volume of this OVERVIEW series revolves around a general themeor broad area of interest such as'the Franco-American populatioh of a definite geographical area of the United States, a'specifiC cultural or linpistip phenomenon, etc. The readingse- lections and studies chosen for each volume represent many perspectives from file his toral to the sociologicaland they illustrate the thinking and the feelings of those who were in the past, or whgare now, in the forefront of Franco American studies.

Volumes 3 arid 4,subtitled NEW ENGLAND,, present a wide army of disyussions and research reports on the two major French-speaking populations of the slew En- gland states (Maine, New Hampshire, Yermont, Massachusetts, and ), ,i.e.-the Acadians and the French-Canadian immigrants from Quebec. The vari- ous selections provide information about these two groups from both past and contem- porary -points of view, with an emphasis on the sociological phenomena of note. Rather than organiie an exhaustive sany of the subject, the chapters of both Volumes 3 and 4 have been arralfged to offer a 'mosaic of facts and impressions about the Franco-Ameri- cans of the northeastern United States. r Recognition is due to the following National Materials Development, Cenler staff who contributed directly to the preparation of these NEW ENGLAND volum-e-s: Andrea Thorne and Lori Cochrane for the composition of the texts, Eileen Brady for proofreading assistance, Jeff Spring for art and design, and Julien Olivier for some of his original photography.

Robert L. Paris N.M.D.C./ French &Portumese

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INTRODUCTION L nE

4 Who are theTin:co-Americans? There «New immigrant 44) such as the French are many answer ranging from«Americans Canadians tame to an Amerean society of French descent»-jo«Americans of quite unlike the world theyleft.AFrom the French-Canadian or Acadian lineagewhose highly personal an, informal r*tionships of ,, ethnicity is manifested culturally acid /or lin- their rural agricultural parishes and . villages guistically and who identify themselves as of French-Canada with su¢sistence farming Franco-Amenicans.» TliF former delineates as a way of life, they entered the urbanin-. potential.toundary of the group, the lat- dustrial society'of New England and,the-bor- ter identifiesfre core of the contemporary der states. There the ancestors of today's

grouping. Somewhere ineteen lies the Francos encountered fnal, impersonal. so- definition informing thedevelopmentof thit Vial relations gear-id to p Activity goals, voluthe, namely, «a collectivity of persons' f within the United States vhose members are The regrtne ing of the C'aridians'into, hound together by a common origin in «Petits. was initialin attempt..to French-.Canada.,;t tire context!ofAr4erican deal with this cold new wodfryontinuing ethistory the arri,.,.q the French /Canadians the kinship, ihtiniky, m teal qupppriNand and *the Acadian. Was part of the «115W im- values of the Canadiivillage. For the new- migratfon»Ifof the latter part of the nines comer, these ethnic groupingS were cItturnels teenth century Own the origin of the major-' of information about jobs, rents,recreation, it), of iMinigrants was Southern and Eastern and ways of making this unfamiliar social European rather than Western and Nqrthern system work for the individual and his fam- European as it had beenearlier.1 They came ily.The French communities jiinctioned in .search of a better means of making a liv- both as refuges from the cold, impersonal ing than was to be found on the crowded world and as agencies for socialize farm lands of Quebec and . tion into the behavior and values of Ameri- 1. They were not searfhing or a new way of can society: There, for instance, onemight life. but for a better me of carrying out learn how to be a «steady» worker--to be the old way of life. As a result they det3el- punctual, not io loaf on the job, to work oped their immigrant communities esfnc- when the employer wanted, whether it was tional replicas of the village parish of (he old New Year's Day or not. country.Both, ,Vithinand without the French commurity this was,often recog- In settling the new world, the Frerich nized and the commumtiez were called colonists brought their distinctive institutiUns «Petits Canadas» or «Little Can' adas.» withem...But these institmtions changed in their traplantation from the old world to o .

the new. The«seigneurie»Was transformed ootu. In the United States, the relative lack from a feudal political unit to a land-settle-0 f French clergy combined with the New ent pattern,,,the «seigilc,drs')> being Ain to ,Englander4 example of numerous voluntary the contemporary developers of suburban associations were..'conduciveto the flowering 44, sub- divisions. The parish changed from of many organizations. Nation!l parishes loge unit with resident pastors toan adminis- were established and from them flowed a trative district with itinerant priesti trriel- whole stream of educational, health, and so- ling 'many hundreds of miles id minister to+ cial service insiiturions.Cultural organiza- theirfloks. Evenfamilyinstitutions tion.P such as musical and literary societies changed: ideal page at marriage, underwenta were. formed. Fraternal groups flourished sea Mange from middle and late _twenties in providing social. centers, insurance .seAlces, nu;trOpolitan' fianceto iprly twenties and...04114..,fradership In-the Franco- American late teensin NeVrance:Isize-ef family,,was both on,a local an I regional level. larger Irr Canada than in the old country,: ett celibacy in adulthood became illegal in the .The migration of the FPench-Canadidns colony (unless moire was a religious) rather and Acadians to the United States was not rriffy.1 beink thestructuraln itoften simply a movement of people and their insti- was in the home country. In New as tutions to a new locality but kalso involved in other succesSM colonies, die majorinsti- a response and adaptation to the new 'social tutions of the mother country were adapted environment. In the prqcess Franco-Ameri- to the exigencies of the new environment. cans became a unique social troup slurring some features with Canadian kin but sharing Similarlywhen the French-Canadians other features with Yankee neighbors. and Aradians migrated from rural Canada to urb United States they brought their in- The selections presented in this volume stil lions with them, but these institutions document the grpwth and development of changed upon contact the new Ameri- the transplanted' French-Canadians pinto a can environment. For example, one of the distinctUnited States ethnic grqupthe characteristics of nineteenth century French- Franco-Americans. Canada was the scarcity of voluntary associa- t

Madeleine Giguere

0 Notes $

I. It is'to be noted_that the Frenchare old settlers 1605- -two years lo ger than Jamestown, the in North America, their first'settlement of Port first permanent Engh settlement.. Royal having been continuously settled since 14tirfr,/l 4T. 1' t, .,:. vp! .'F- fo.'. I.'. 11..., , Y 1 il t r :.,.., 'el . ','E=',ie v,.". ,,.000, ,,,, ,...... r, .. A . ,, ,. v I 1 , , It i': 'Po t:i. I. 41 c if ---,. r . fi 4., , , ,:1 1 1.-. . .,,,t; ,. ., , ,,. .h ri .. ,, I ' ,$ ..0.... _ 1 . :7f. . )i,,," 1 ' i 1"- - - .. ,,.., ')4- i .1: . : }irk. ''.4 )!... - :i.4. , t .. ' i.. fi1, z,I; f, .,.\. .,-4*,,- :.e'.'g. .., r:1';. ' l' i 1. .. / ,...... -, ''',.ii,ij is ,: i I:5; :::. 1,1. ' I 4/ , .,---itg. "'-' i 1'',. 1,1 %... I IAA !.: ' : ' ; i /1 ei 0' ,, ( 4a-' ' . I i lt ,, ,':-.1'.: 01, N -t I s, 1' j'A(.7-73 t.4ik '1 if 1 I .... J. --a ., . 1,I' .. 41..;V....-1 Faiftv, ' '',.' '' ' ivs "4 , .71/1hyli)J,4,hLE. . 14 1,1;');/' . I: 411. kir,,,,. .1 4- .7.. ,. 14 - ' 4, i' .. 'F1'.:4.3)1.41.) " . liftp,is. , ,'1,,,,,,,A f wri,, ,, i lif,,,,, ti, ,4, i'..4., . 1 1 1. ',.. - i"/It &) gh` ..,,,t c.1 I i ,. ,1 ,04. 4 1+11,,I "?,,,' +4 le,,,/ ; ' r faI I .,,,,,,,il 0te' ftl; '''' c'91;70.;1 //'''''411i,,/ 11/1{, ' .. 0/' ' I p ,00. re - 4" I ; til I 1, 1 I .4 I, 7 / '41.4; 't id) kr" 1444iatiai Cr 1 ,1 q . 14 ,.., IM I 11;, Y.1 h 1$: ;1. # fi

\ 4 First published in 1898, in The Quarterly Journalof Economics, William MacDon- ald's article onf. Freqcit-Canadians in New England has for a long time been consid- , ered the ar read in Franco-American history. Professor MacDonald's themeshave, bebn repeated ag in and again by students of Franco-Ainericans.The questions he covi- ered irldded the immigration, size and distribution ofthe French-Cana-lian population in New England, the decline in. fertility, the incidence ofintermarriage, occupation and income, levels, degree of political participation, parish andschool organization,latrage' the probability of arnorp- I maintenance, the development of self-contained enclaves and tion into the 'alibi community. Readers may find itsomewhat condescending in tone from time to time, but it remains nevertheless anexcellent beginning for the serious study of an unknoWn etlinic group.-

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I THE FRENCH CANADIANSIN NEW EsIGLAND

by William MacDonald

The early history of. the French-Cana- had in New England communities,were scat- ' dians in New England is obscure. According ' tered widely over the Provinceof Quebec, to Rev. E. Hain ,1 a considerable number and were rt-enforced by the shrewdactivity had settled there before1776, and soilie of the immigration agents. It is served in the American not surpris- army during ate ing that, to theaverage Canadian habitant. Revolutionary War, receiving,fromCongress, the prospect Should have in part payment for their appeared irresist- services, griints of ibly attractive. His familywas large, his farm landin the vicinity. of Lake Champlain. remote, his life laborious. Taxes andpaftsh After the 'rebellion in 1837many French- charges pressed heavilyupon him, albeit his Canadians sought refuge in themountainous faith in the supreme wisdom andneed of the regions of northern andwesterVermont. Church was little shaken. Taughtby the No statistics for this earlyperioappear to Church that he who brought 'be obtainable; but it many children is probable that the into the world did God service, tieutter dis- population was small, and itsgrowth for parity between the numberto be fed and many years inappreciable. Itwas not until clothed and the wherewitltalto feed and 1851 that the first FrenchCatholic priest 111 clothe them became everyyear more appar- settled at Burlington, systematicefforts to ent. To achieve even a organize and build meagre living was dif- up French parishes begin- ficult: to do morewas impossible. Yet he ning soon after, in 1853, with the elevation_ knew no other life, andwas cut off, by situ- Of Mgr..Lotlis de Goesbriandto the bishop- ation, poverty, and ignorance, from ric of Vermont. nearly every opportunity4dr betterment.

The great movement of French-Canadian But the assurance of steady empkiyment, emigration to New England beganshortly not laborious, and atwages which to many after the close of the Civil War, the chief must have seemed almost fabulous,was a determining causes being thedemand for tangible and irresistible appeal. The labor created by the growth factory of manufac- offered a place, not for himselfalone, but tures, and the relatively high wages obtain- also 'for his wife and older children.The able' by comparatively unskilledworkmen.' more children he had, the larger the sum Before the enactment of the contract labor total of the family income. So theFrench- law, probably the larger part ofthe French- Canadians began tocome, at first in small. Canadians came at the solicitation andunder parties of young men and the charge of representatives of women, then by manufac- families and' companies,then by hundreds turing corporations. Advertisementsof var- and thousands. Those whocame first, under ious kinds, setting forth the advantages to be contract, sent back enthusiasticaccounts of

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the new country, together withdrafts for Ilthwever, that entire accuracy or complete- mor money than thefamily at home had ness was claimed forthem; while much of ever seen.)Othersfollowed in larger numbers the data professedlyrests on estimates. and likewise under contract; and they, too, Father Hanion's book, though indispensable, found employment certain, living cheap, and cleats almost wholly, so far as statistics go, the opportunity for saving considerable.The with the ecclesiastical phases of thesubject. prohibition of further contracts with mill Until 1890 the French- Canadian population agents did not stop, though itsomewhat was not separatelyreturned by the United checked, the flow, those who camettaking States census. Canada, both English and combined / the. ages, -for a while not serious, of French, and Newfoundland were ng work, as their relativesand friends for statistical purposes,, as theystill are in had -found it before them. Such, inbrief, the statistics of immigration; andsince the with only unimportant variations in detail, English speaking Canadian population inthis is the history of the French-Canadianimmi- country has for"many yearsbeen large, and grationor every manufacturing centrein in 1890 ontntitnbered the French-Canadians New England in which they are numerous: more than two to one,comparisons or con- clusions based upon the earlier census je- The presence of this large and increasing turns wouldbe of little value. French-Canadian element, its solidarity, and the filet that in certain manufacturingtowns The best idea of the rapid growthof the and in certain industries it has largelydis-. French-Canadian population between 1865 is to be possessednot only the native American and 1890, and its wide dispersion, workmen, but the foreigners7of other nation- gathered from an examination of -thelist of alities as well, have not failed to receive at- French Catholic parishes, with thedates tention from many writers interestedin of their organization. The table onthe fol- economic and social matters, and particu- lowing page shows the number Of such par- larly from some who affect to see, in thein- ishei formed in each of the NewEngland crease of the foreignpopulation, sure signs Stiftes for each of the yearsindicated, to- of moralipd political decay. Unfortunately gether with the number of mixedparishes for the purposes of scientific inquiry, any in 1890.2 Of the mixed parishes alarge attempt at a thorough investigationof they proportiMi,are predominantly French. subject is greatly hampered by the dearthof .# accurate statistical data. It may besaid at 11,4 distribution of parishes, as shown in 'once thdt, for the periodprior to 1890, re- the table, correspondsughly tothe relal liable statistics, save at one point, arenot tive impOrtance of the manufacturing'inter- to be had. Some incautious statements re- ests of thetlifferent States. Thefigures, how- garding the French-Canadians, in thereport ever,indicite some interesting conditions. of the vassa. chusetts Bureau ofStatistics of No exFvlusively French tigrish- wasorganized Labor for 1881 - ealled forth a- vigorous pro- in YerIflont between 1872 and1890, nor in test, and led to a public hearing, afull report Maine between 187.2 and 1888,although of whim forms part of the reportof the at the end of the periodthere were fifteen Buren(' for 1882. A large amount of. interest- mixed parishes in the former. State andsix in ing matter beAring on the conditionof the the latter. The dispersion, in RhodeIsland h-Canadians in New England was pre- seems to havebeen virtually compkte in sented at the hearing, togetherwith more 1882, although five mixedparishes were re- comple er statistics than are available, sofar ported in 1890. Connecticut appears tohave as .1 k ow,elsewhere. It does not appear, 4been reached last of all, the firstFrench- ) is 3 4f.

French Parishes Formedin New England 41 Me. N.H. Vt. Mass. R.I. Conn.Total' 1868 t.ao 1 2 1 2 3 6 1V70 .6 3 3 1871 I 1 5 7 1872 4, I 2 1 18'73 7 1874 2 3 1875 1 2' 1 3 1877 1 1878 2 1880 2 2 1 2 1881 2 4,882 3 1883 1884 1 4 1885 7 4 1886 4 3 1887 3 1 1 3 1888 1 1889 2 1890 2. 2 I 1 7 10

Total 5 10 ...... 6 40 8 5 74 ..4-111111.41%. Mixed Parishes 6 13 15 13 5 26 78

Total 11 23 21 53 13 31 1.52

Canad4 parish in that Statenot having small beginnings, growi been organized until 1880, ie and impor- at which date .tance as the French thirty-six parishes were in pophlation existence else- augmented. A mitrilkeb have more where in New England.The distinctive fea- than one parish, itco eicesManchester ture in Connecticut, however,is the great AP and Nashua, N. H.,' cket, R. I., and preponderance of mixed parishes, indkating Fall. River, Worcester, itchburg, Holyoke, a population not yet largely massed in manu- Lowell:And Istew Bedfqrd,Mass. The relative facturingcentres or predominating tovdr rank of the States,as regards the number of clher classes of foreigners. Massachusetts parishes in 1890, is shown inthe following and Newampshire show themost steady table: .growth, titgreatest gains in the formerstate being fro 1868 to 1877 and from1883 to French- Mixed 1890. F r all the States theyears 1873-83 Parishes Parishes Total show the smallest proportional gains.It 1. Mass. 1. Conn. 1. Mass. should be remembered, however,that a cor- 2. N. H. 2. Vt. 2. Conn. responding increase in thenumber of par- 3. R. I. (3. N. H. 3. N. H. 4. Vt. ( 4. Mass. ishes in later years is notto-be expected, the 4. Vt. (5. Conn. 5. Me. existing parishes,many of which had but 5. R. I. 6. R. I. 6. Me. 1' 4 a

enumeration of As has been said, an Total French theFrench-Canadttnpopulationofthe Foreign-bornCanadianPei cent United States was firstattempted in the Mc. 150,713 37,776 25.06 census. of I 890.The returns showed 537,298 . 47,719 39.40 States, of 121,101, French-Canadians in the United *104,337 31,343 30.04 England. That Vt whom 331,804 were in New Mass 1,251,926 149,046 11.89 the emigrationfrciin Canada to thiS country R.I. 199,969 34,225 17.1; isby90means predominan yFrench Conn... 374,714 24,337 6.50 fact that the latter con-con- 14.71 ppears from the Total 2,204,7p 324,446 stitute but 31.59 per cent othe whole number of persons of Canadianextraction I French popu- reported by the census. The the preceding, the lation of Canada, according tothe Canadian In this table, as in 1,404,974,3 or 29.07 smallness of the resultis significant. Not census of 1891, was yet but a the total populationof the only are the French-Canadians as per cent of population Of New Dominion. As compared,therefore, with small part of the total population at home, Englan but they form only atrifle more the French-Canadian foreign-born' the number who have come tothe United than one -Senth of the total large. How large it is population. Relativelyeither to the total States is remarkably number of the otal population of population or to the whole in comparison with the French- es, however, maybe foreign-bo n,itis klear that the the New England St of New 'England as seen from thefolio mg ttible: Canadian «invasion» yet attained but verymoderate proportions. Thetiangers attending the presenceamong us of thisclass of foreigners,-if dangers there Total French are, mustapparently be ascribed toother PopulationCanadian either their absolute'or their 1r causes than Maine 661,086 38,556 relative numbers. New I lamps)) ire 376,530 48,470 Vermont 332,422 32,291 Quite the largest partof the Fr' nch- Massachusetts 2,239,943 152,891 Canadian population is tobe found grouped 34,775 Rhode Island 345,506 together in cities and towns.Drawn to the 746,258 24,821 Connecticut . manufacturing centres atthe beginning by and Total 4,701,745331,,804 theinfluencesalreadyreferredto, finding there .employmentnot only steady and remunerative,but also in agreeable con- trast to their formeroccupations in Canada, they have continuedto,mass themselvesin These figures show a'Finch- Canadian factories arid mills, and 'gore than 7 per the neighborhood of population of a fraction tendency to spread them- population of New Eng- show as yet little cent of the total the country. Compara- only, New Hampshire selves widely over land. In two States found along the seashore and Rhode Island, itis as high as 10 per tively few are to be the mountains. Otherforces', also, cent. A comparisonwith the total foreign' or among have operated to keepthem together, among born population givesthe following results which their strongattachment to their re- (the French-Canadiancolumn giving the ligion, and their, essentiallysocial nature, numbers of those having one orboth parents are, perhaps,the most prominent.Taking foreign-born):.

17 5, V I t the six New England States as a whole, (he Places Population largest proportion of French-Canadians will 'Rhode Island befoundinttesmallermanufacturing Manville 1,400

.towns, in a number of which they comprise Woonsocket 7,00D almost the whole of the foreign element. It Connecticut is to be. regretted that data for a satisfactory Baltic 1,925 determination of the numbers and-growth of Grosvenordale 2,400. this urban1opulation are not obtainable. In Meriden 1,150' Putnam 1,600 the three tables following are. presented fig- ures which will serve for purposes -of prk- Total 81,153 tical comparison, although but one of them' (the second) rests on such data that statis- tical accuracy can IN claimed. The first table It will be noted that Vermont does not givesthe. French-Canadian population of appear in the above table. twenty-nine cities and towns, from data col- lected by Mr. F. Gagnon, editor of Le Tra- The next table gives the French Canadian pailleur, a French paper published at Wor- population of cities of 25,06110 inhabitants or cester, Mass., and presented at the hearing over, accordingto the census of 1890.5 given by the Massachusetts Bureau of Statis- tics of Labor in 1881already referred to. Places Population The localities selected were, according to Mr. Maine Gagnon, those «where Canadians are to be Portland 261 found in great numbers.»4 New Hampshire ,eihw Manchester 14,081 Places Population Massachusetts- Maine 1. r 2,623 Biddeford . 6,500 Brockton 499 Lewiston 5,000 Cambridge 1,923 Waterville 1,625 Chelsea 92 New Hampshire Fall River 18,585 Great -Falls 2,500 Haverhill 3,098 Nashua 3,000 Holyoke 9,530 ti Rochester 600 Lawrence , 4,548 Massachusetts Lowell 15,332 ;- Fall River 11,000 Lynn 1,302 Fitchburg 400 New Bedford 4,976 Gardner 766 Salem 3,462 Haverhill 3,200 Somerville 535 Holyoke 6,500 Springfield 3,490 Hudson 6 450 Taunton 1,875 Indian Orchard v1,653 Wdrcester 7,413 Lawrence 3,500 Rhode Island Manchaug 1,047 Pawtucket 2,089 Millbury 1,300 Providence 2,638 New Bedford 1,200 Connecticut Northampton 1,360 Bridgeport 431 'North Brookfield. 800 Hartford 561 * Southbridge, 3,100 New Haven 315 Spencer 3,450 Waterbury 1,567 Webster 2,400 Worcester 4,327 Total 101,226

18 4

O a

Statistics for places of less than 25,000 in- Places Population habitants are not given by the census. Massachusetts, (continued) New Bedford 15.000 North Adas .5,000 The figures in the third table, showing No rthain pto 1,800 the estimated trench- Canadian population Son hbridge 5,500 of thirty-seven cities and towns in1897, Spencer 4.000 were secured by means of circular letters of Springfield 5,600 inquiry addressed to local of icials, promi- Tauntoiy ,500 .1,000 nent French-Ca nad ia and parish Walthaici Woburn. 500 priests. The listis, of cour, ncomptete 4 Worcester 13,000 many of the officials addressed being either Rhode Island unable or unwilling to give the information Central Falls 54000) desired. With few exceptions, however, the- Manville 4,000 replies received from French-Canadian cor- Pawtucket 4,800 respondents' were evidently the result of Woonsocket 16,000 careful investigation. Where different returns Connecticut were received from tho same locality, the Bridgeport 800 Vart ford 1,500 lowest figures have been taken. Most, if not Pew Haven 1,200 all, of the returns rest, doubtlAs, upon esti- Waterhyry ,500 Mates rather than careful enumeration. As Total 231,660 the table 'stands, ,however, itis probably a fairly corrert exhibit of the French-Canadian population of the places named .at, the pres- From the foregoing tables it aOpears that ent time. in1890 less than a third of the French- Canadians in. New England were found in places of 25,000 population or over, and Places Population that, of the number so grouped, 74,465, or Maine nearly three-fourths, were found in the seven Biddeford 10,000 direwer 250 cities of Manchester, Fall Rivet, Holyoke, Brunswick 2,500 Lawrence, Lowell, New Bedford, and Wor- Fairfield 600 cester.Poltland,Brockton: Chelsea, ancl Lewiston 10,960 Somerville had no important Frenchoelement Saco 1,000 or had any of the largeConnectic.ut cities Waterville 3,500 ---eccept Waterbury. In Boston the French New Hampshire At, were less than 1 per cent of theforeign-born Manchester 18,000' Nashua 8,000 population in 1890. For the whole of the tes in the same year the French- Vermont United Burlington 5,000 Canadians havkig one or both parents for- Rutland 1,500 eign-borformed .82 per cent of the whole 2,900 .1 Winooski Falls number of foreign-born. These figures seem Massachusetts to confirm the view that it is not the large Boston 3;200 cities, as such, that attract this class of for- Brockton 800 eigners, but the manufacturing centres, and Fall River '30,000 particularly those' mainly given over to the Fitchburg 6,000 Holyoke 15,000 textile industries. Whether' at the present Leominster 1,250 time the propoitionate numbers in the smal- Lowell 21,500 ler places are as great as they were in 1890 7

French-Canadia French-Canadian Populaion, 1890 Population, 1897 Manchester, NM 14,081 18,000 Boston, Mass. 2,623 3,200 Brockton, Mass. 499 800 Fall River, Miss 18,585 30,000 Holyoke, Mass 9,5'30 15,000 Lowell, Mass "15,332 21,500 .New Belford, Mass. 4,976 15,000 Springfield, Mass 3,490 5,600 Taunton, Mass 1,875 1,500 Worcester, Mass 7,413 13,000 Pawtucket, 2,089 .4,800 Bridoport, Coon,' 431 800 Hartford, Colin. 561 1,500 New Haven, Conn. 315 1,200 Waterbury,Conn.. 1,567 3,500 Total 83,367 135,400

is, pet-imps, less certain. Of the 231,660 re- tions grow the fastest. Manchester, Lewis- ported from thirty -seven places in 1897, ton, Fall River, Lowell, Holyoke, New .Bed- 97,760, or 42.15 per cent, were in cities and ford, and Worcester are fathiliar names in the towns which in 1890 had less than 25,000 Province of- Quebec. They stand.: for the population each. It shonkil be noted, how- greatest achievements of the race in the ever, that nine cities, with a French-Cana- United States, the longest steps toward the dian population of 17,859, which appear in realization of that greater of the table for 1890, made no report in 1897. which some ha_ w dreamed; and they natur- ally attract to themselves the largest propot- How far the data at band will justify any tio'n of the immigrants who now.come. So it 'very positive conclusions as to the growth of has been in the past, and so it is still. the French-Canadian populatir, especially atthe present time, is noilirely clear, Nothing is more common in comMuni- Some light will be throWn upon the matter ties where the French-Canadians are numer- by combining in- one exhibit, in the table ous than to hear it asserted with positiveness above, the places from which returns are that they are multiplying with great rapidity, available for 1890 and 1897. the natural fecundity of the race, together with more favorable 'conditions for survival The fifteen cities in the table just pre- in New England than in the Province of selyted showa gain of 52,033, or 62.41 per Quebec, being adduced as proofs. There can, cent, between 1890 and 1897. Making lib- I think, be no doubt that for a number of eral allowance for overestimates in the fig- years the French-Canadianpopulation tires for the latter year, the indication for among us grew apace. While the immigration these localitiesis of an extraordinary in- was at its height, from 1875 to 1890, those crease. Moreover, not only is the strong dis- who came were numbered by thousands; position of the French-Canadians to congre- and, as they took possession of one locality gate in the industrial centres clearly shown, after another,'and year by year waxed greater but it is also apparent that the larger popula- rather than less, it may well. seemed to .4 8

some that the movement thus inaugurated to I00;..Springfiell,150 td 200; Hartford, would before lonoweep the most of French. 25 to SO; North Adams, 500 in each of the Canada into the lap of New Englapd. In the years-1895 and 1896. Ten cities and towns, early years this great addition'to the popula- having in 1897 an estimated French-Cana- tion consisted, naturally, ahnoft entirely of dian population of 13,350, report either the foreign-born; but, as the number of fami- «very few»arrivals or «none.» Available lies increased, the natural graWth of the- pop- data seem clearly to indicate that the French- -illation began to Make itself felt, so that, Canadian immigration has largely spent its while the real majority of the French-Cana- force, and that for the immediate future, if dians vft.festill of foreign birth, the pro- not permanently, the volume will not be portion of such rapidly decreased. Of the greater than might normally be looked for in 331,804 French-Canadians in New England view of the numbers already here and the in 1890, 93,459, or more than 28 per cent, nearness of Canada to the Unifed States. were born in the United States. In the second place, while theFrenoli- In my opinion, however, there is good Canadians are undoubtedly a pro4ific race, it reason for thinking that the high rate at is Open' to question. whether thenatural which, for a number of years, the French- growth of population among them is notice- ; Cana4.ian population of Nev England in ably greater than among othet races which creased is no longer being maintained, and form parts of our composite Anlerican that the present growth presents no extra- stock. From time to time we are reminded ordinary 'features. The grounds for this opin- of the extraordinary size of FrenchiCan ion are mainly threet In the first place, im- /families, with their twelve; fifteen twen- migration in the last few years hasjreatly ty children.*That such cases are not wholly declined. There can be no question that the exceptional in the Province of Quebec-there current has ceased to flow stronglyfrom the issufficient proof, butIfancy. that One Province of Quebec to any part of 'the' New would have to search widely and carefully to England Slates. Solicited emigration, as has find many such families in Oslekv Englan It already been observed, has ceased altogher; istrue that the French-Canadians -tMry and the labor market is well supplied. Ten r young, and that thebirth =rateis high; but it fifteen years ago the Grand Trunk, Maine As equally true that the death-rlate, particu- Central, Boston & Maine, and Central- Ver- larly_ among children under five years of age,

t, mont Railroads handled the French-Cana- is also high. Nowhere, indeed, does the law dian traffic in carload lots: today, on these of the survival of the fittest work more ob-

same lines, one meets occasional families or Itiously or more ruthlessly than among this , small parties. For tlit,.thirty-seven cities and very class of ourfOreign population. And- towns from which ports were received' in there is no sufficient reason?hy it should J897, as shown in a yrecedi g tOble, the not sp we shall sr later, neither total numberofestimatedann al arrivals in the repiunerati of the Fiench-Canadiant the last two or three 'Years, taking the high- nor yet their' standard of living is higherthaci est estimate tin each case, was only 3,750; hat of others in similar occupati6ns. A init "taking,:, thelowestestimate in, each case, jority of them, especially ,in the larger mai)u-' 2,800. The annual arrivals at Fall River are factUring cities, live in crowded quarters, hot given at from 200 to 500; at Manchester, seldom amid unfavorable sanitary and moral r 300 to 500; Worcester, 200; Lowell, 300; conditions. 'Precisely the saine causes which New Bedford, 400 in 1896; Holyoke, sta few pperate Ito down the numbers of the hundreds»; Pawtucket, 300;°New Haven, 50 lower class ofof laborers everywherelessened , dr, . I

4*

4 t 9

French--Canadian fathers, mothers

A E 1 0 a a 8 8 5 'L)bA

cr.1

Maine 38,556 32,925 2,600 200 2,251 580 New Hampshire 48,470 44,853 1,702 374 1,164 377 Vermont 32,291 23,521 4,968 442 2,854 506 Massachusetts 152,891 136,412 7,595 1,906 5,0391,939 Rhode Island 34,775 32,235 1,097 196 893 354 Connecticut 24,821 22,59 1,024 261 721 223

'total 31,804 292,538 18,986 3,379 11 922 3479

JE.

. 1., initialvitality duto excessive numbers, in preserving tholArity of their blood, it poor,find insaf dent fop.and clotlling, is ,also the case that,amongthose now in the bad *r, dise4se, neslectAre-Txtrie aifiong UnitedStates,intermarriagewith other -I, the FrencliXatiatliiins;.io which should be racial Wicks is not uncommon, and is,on added, as a rattOr lif some consequence, the whole, increasing, .On this point some the widely prelalent use of tobacco-nong interesting statistics were gathered by the cliil ren of tender agi: There isno need of censusof1890. A classification of the argu rent to prove tliat the inherent vitality French-Canadian populationf New Ent -. and, ermanent productiveness ofa race are land, according as one 9r bo arents were shown, not by the size of the birth-ratef born in the UnitedStates, nada, or some but by the excess of 'births overideathsi not other foreign country, shows the results in ., by the number brought i4to thelworld, but the above table. by the numberwho come to ma--ittaity.' tested by' this stanclird,rd, it seems iiiipp ro ble 0 The table on the followingpage shows that. t ie Frei li-Canadians, irleft to them- the prelcipal combinations of French-Cana* selves, will ex ibit a natural increase ofpop- than and foreign parentage:

, ulation materially greater than that of other These. , . races similarly situated.6 hese facts seem to show no invincible reluctance on the part of the French-Cana- Thirdly, even tliough it were true that diiins to marrying outside of 'theirown ra the French-Canadians are more prolific than, notwithstanding the obstacles which n- other races in the sense of showinga greater`' 4 gunge a religion throw in the way of such

proliortionlite incr6iiseain the adult Popula- unions. h f the combinations shown in the, tion, any'such natural tendency among them following table, that of the French-Cana- 4ould 'be likely to be chrecked' to%onie.ex- dians and.:the Irish seems the most remark- tent by intermarriage with other national- able and the one leastt be expected. ities. Now, while it is a fact that the-French- Whether an explanation is to be found in the Canadians have been remarkably Successful identity/1A religious affiliation iss what 1'i 1. 4 N'tv '22 10

rind F.-C. and F. -('. and F.-C. andF.-C. and Canadian Irish lench English German English

5 Maine 476 85 . 80 86 New Hampshire 342 143 105 76 `11 ,Vermonti 281 276 167, 119 19 Massachusetts 1,129 1,209 5'38 503 78 Rhode Island 202 141 95 54 2 Connecticut 94 188 93 49 26

'Foul 2,524 2,042 1,078 887 171

- doubtful, the history of Catholic parishes of years of sojourn in aforeign land, is decid- mixed French and Irish recording numerous edly weakened by increased familiarity with instances of serious clashing between the the and a widening rangeof two races. The small number of. marriages permanent interests.Sch religious and so- between the Frentit-Canadians and Germans cial influences asare-brougfft to bear to in- is, doutAliss, dueatpart to the relatively ducethem to naintain their, solidarity, al- small slumber of the latter in New England, though factors o great importance in deter- the number being considerablylargerin the probable future of the race in , ', , anMinnesota, New England, are after all, as we shall see, where the German population is more nu- essentially forces operating from without, merous. In general, it may be said that, while .'?*- Appealing, for the most part, to no deeper the French-Canadians.prefer to marry among motives than pride of place and name. To their own people, mixed marriages are not regard the French-Canadians as a permanent- e infrequent, the English-speaking. Canadians, 6, insoluble element in New England society Irish, French, and English Lir ing the foreign is,I am convinced, at once to misinterpret elements with which alliances' are most and to-disparage them. readily formed. r , Turning now to the question of occupa . \4 What has been said justifies, .1 think, the Lions, we find that the French-Canadians are conclusion that the maintenahe among ins still, as they have always been in New Eng- of a distinct Prench-Canactdan element, large- land,predominantlyanoperativeclass. ') ly of one common stock,:is not to be looked While the circumstances under which they for. The falling off of immigration, the began to come have materially changed,the abseqce of any unional rate of natural in- field in which they then found assured and .crease, and he tendency tofixedmarriages, remunerative employment has continued to all poiptinthat directionfrPartaking in as attract them more strongly than anyother. full measure as their circumstances allow of According to the census of 1890, 58.17 per the opportunities and advantages of Amer-- cent of the French-Canadiansengaged in the United States . canlife, the impulse to adopt American gainful occupations in ways, and, 'incolAcquence, the American were found inmanufacturing and mechani- point of view., is not likely to be permanent- cal industries, this percentage beinghigher ly resisted; while the dispositionloremain than for any other race. Various forms of by themselves, natural enough in the early 'domestic and personal service engaged 18.1 23 11 1. 11. 111. IV. V. Agriculture, All Domestic Trade and Occupations fishing, and Professionsand personal Manufactui es mining service transportation

0 M. F. M. F. M. F. M. F. M. F. M. F. V

Me.... 9,1004,350 982 14 52 34 2,149 312 955 41 4,962--3',945 N.11... 13,6 ,946 1,163 .78 40 2,603 409 1,413 73 8,4306,420 Vt 16 50 47 1,498 326 548 8 2,319 328 Mass.. 39,13415,64777 22,2143: 12323123 6,3461,2604,258 2521125,96414,000 .. 8,995. 4,217 388 1 72z35 1,515 119 952 36 6,0684,026 Conn.. 6,064 2,143 522 3 45 20 738 117 538 32 4,221 2,241 Total. U,53134,298714345462029914,8492,5438,66444251,96430,960

dt, per cent; agriculture, fishing, and mining, of employments is now wide, and tends to 1 #.87 per cent; tradt) and transportation, increase as the population becomes more 8.73 per cent; and professional occupations, stable, and the comparative advvtages of 1.13 per cent. The proportionof females afferent occupationsare more 4arly per- employed was very high. The number of ceived. To a considerable extent, the French- foreign-born . French-Canadiansingainful Canadians now have their own physicians, occupations in New England in 1890,ac- lawyers, dentists, apd, of course, priests. cording to the classification adopted by the Many are skilled mechanics, especiallycar- census, was as indicated in the above table. penters, painters,lumbers, masons, machin- ists, and engines, while a respectable num- The table below shows, in connection ber are builders a d contractors. Nearly all with the total French-Canadian population branches of tradeare numerously repre- of each State, the totals for all occupations sented, particularly such as handle the neces- and for each of the five classes ofoccupa- caries and more common conveniences of tions as above, without distinction ofsex. life.Larg establishments andwholesale houses, hower, are infrequent. Most large These figures show that rathermore than shops, in comncities where the Erench- halfo_f the French-Canadian population of Canadians are nume i us, find it to their ad- New England in 1WPOsiveie engaged in gain- vantage to employrench clerks atten- ful occupations of various _sorts. Therange dants, as well as American. The French-

Total F.-C. All population occupations 1. 11. III. IV. V.

Maine 38,556 "13,450 1,000 86 2,461 996 8;907 New Ilampshire 48,470 20,633 1,167 118 3,012 1,48614,850 Vermont 32,291 7,276 2,152, 97 1,824 556 2,647 Massachusetts 152,891v AS 4 '7,1 2,257 '446 7,606 4,51039,964 Rhode Island 34,775 13,212 389 107 ,634 98810,094 Connecticut 24,821 8,477 525 65 855 570 6,462 Total 331,804 117,829 7,488 919 17,392 9,10682,924 J2 I2

Canadians do not seem to like the sea, and self and his family, and, if that seems to have very few of them are sailors or fishermen; (Nen attained, he is little troubled by restless but they are found everywhere in the logging eagerness to be doing somethinghigher than camps and in rafting operations, especiallyin thatin which heisat eresent\ engaged. Maine. Frenc It-Ca n ad ian policemen, firemen, Above all, he is reluctant, as compared.with and watchmen are common. Farming is not the Irish, to join labor iinions, aVI is loath to a favo'fite .occupation, although manyhave "strike. His easy satisfaction wilh moderate taken up farms in remote places, and by in- proficiency partly accounts for the fact, re- dustry and frugality have attained fair suc- ported by many mill agents, that compara- cess. In some parts of Vermont onebears tiVely few become competent and reliable complaint of the extent to which they have foremen or overseers, and that the French taken possession of old and run-down farms, Canadians are likely to work best under the andestablishedthemselves where before supervision of someone not. of their own scarce any foreigners could befound. Many, race. of course, are coon laborers, or eke out an uncertain livelihood at suchwork as re- How'far, however, the French-Cahadians t1 quires the mininnipt of intelligence and skill. constitute at the present time a distinct fac- The women, among whom work is honor- tor of much importancein the induktrial able, are frequently found assisting their hus- world of New-England, is a question on bands or brothers in shops and stores, while which it is notr4,i; altdgether easy to pass a con- entering largely into the skilled occupations fident judgement. ftis certain that for .a common to their sex. They are not,how- time, when contract immigration was at its ever, as a rule, verySatisfactory as domestic height, their numbers and their necessities, servants, comparing unfavorably with the tended unmistakably to lower wages in the Irish in this respect. industries in which they were engaged. They were willing to work forless than others, Itisas operatives, however,that the and for that very reason were imported. French-Canadians aremostcommonly But I doubt very much if this is as truenow thought of, and as such that they are most in as it was formerly.The general testimony of evidence. As the statistics show, 82,924, or- manufacturers, so far as I have been able to over 70 per cent of the totalnumber em- obtain it,as well as of manyprominent ployed in New England in 1890, were in French-Canadians and. local officials, is that manufacturing and mechanical industries; the Wages of French-Canadian operatives are and, of this number, quite the largest pro- now practically the-same asthe wages for portion were to be found in factories and others, for the same kind and grade of irk; mills. As we have seen, there are good histor- and, while this is not the same thing as say- ical reasons for this; but much is also attrib- ing that wages have nat declined, any very utable to the nature of the workman him- noticeable decrease d to the presence of self. From the standpoint of the employer, this particular class of foreigners would be the French-Canadian has many of the quali- likely to be remarked by thoSe coltrespon- ties of an ideal «hand.» He is quick to learn, dents .plainlyhostile to the Frenaf-Cana- active and deft in his movements. He is con- dians. Moreover, althOugh the Fregch-Cana- tented with his work, and, usually, with his dian immigration has been large and rapid, wages; and he does not expectundue consid- it is only a small part ofthe total foreign im- eration. Docility is one of his most marked migration which has poured into New"Eng- traits., He is not over-energetic or ambitious. land in the past twenty years. Of thecities His main concern is to make a living for himi. of 25,000 population:or over, noted in a Al3

prec&ling table, Manchester,N. t1.1 wastfle fruitof economical living, that he most only onein which in 1890 the French- frequently incurs the dislike of his fellow- Canadians outnumbered the Irish, whilein workmen, and hears his race clubbed «the Fall River and New Bedford the numbersof Chinese of .the East.» Rarely is hean object__ the two races were nearly eq4.. Onlyin of publiharity or poor relief. It is from Maine and NeW Hampshire did 'Ure number own earnings that he pays his physician, pro- of persons having either fatheror mother vides food, clothing, and shelter for.hiS fam- French-Canadian born exceed the numberof ily, and buries hislead. those having one or both parents born inIre- land. There would seem to beno reason why I am unable to think, therefore, that the any general effect upon wages should beat- presence of the Canadian French any longer4 tributed to the presence of theone class gives to employers advantages which they rather than the other. Asa matter of fact, adf would not otherwise possess, or constitutes to course, wages are the result of the operation the laboring classes in New Englanda men- of competitive forces;- little regardful ofrace ace and a threat. The inevitable tendency to lines; and, evenifthe French-CanadianS uniformityof condition makes strongly were, from. any cause, Willing to workper- against the perpetuation of incidental dis- manently for lower wages, their numbersare tinctions. Employers hiremen, not races. too small to enable them to fixa standard, Certainly, in comparison with many aliens except, perhaps, for some small community who throw themselves upon the hospitality in which they preponderate, and whereout- of the United States, the French-Canadians side competition is not effective. Of 344,610 represent a relatively high grade of intelli- persons employed in manufacturing and me- gence and morality; and, while they have yet chanical industries in New England in .1890, to demonstrate their permanentifworthas only 82,924 were French-Canadians. citizens, industrially they dt notseem to be playing either an objectionableor an un- Where the French-Canadians have the ad- worthy part.' vantage of other classes of foreigners is in their ability to live cheaply and, accordingto For a number of years after the French- their standards, comfortablyon a small in- Canadians began to come to New England, come,.and at the same lime salemoney. To the permanency of thir staywas generally an unusual degree they have the virtues, not regarded as ap open question, with the in- too common among the working classes in dications pointing to a negativeanswer. Cer- America, of industry, frugality, andthrift. In tain it is that the larger part of the firstar- spite of moderate ambitions theyare not rivals showed little disposition tia..make lazy, but prefer to work, if workcan be ha, manent homes in «the States. 'Driven b They live A a minimum; spend less than poverty at homeTOSealempl-ment abroad, they earn, and save the difference. Savings- most of them stayed only ong enough to bank deposits, large holdings of real estate, save a few hundred dollars, and then re- and extensive ecclesiastical properties,not turned to Canada. So therewere to be found to mention the large sums formerly sent to along the main lines of travel two well-de- .Cadada, offer abundant testimony to their fined movements of population:one from «effectivedesireof accumulation.» But the Province of Quebec.to New Epgland; and the French-Canadian is not thereby disposed the other, somewhat smaller and lesS uni- to work for less. He merely saves more. It is form,. from New England back to Quebec. in his evident contentment ang prosperity, With every energy bent to the accomplish- his command of financial resourcesas the ment of the one object of saying the largest

26 14 possible amount of money in the least time, among the millions, largelyfree of encum- the French-Canadians not only accepted em- brairce,the real,estate held by theFrench- ployment wherever it was to be had and on Canadiansismainlyresidenceproperty, whatever terms, but lived often in a manner though in the larger centres the amountof little adaptedto conciliate their English- business property owned by them is consid- speaking neighbors. ft was essentially ashift- erable. While large nombers of theFrench ing population, with scarce any appearance still live, of necessity; in corporation tene- of perManence. Theambit of money sent ments and boarding- houses, oneof the to Canada from themanufacturing towns of strongest desires .among themis to own their New England was very great, andformed own homes; and, in theaccomplishment of another cause of the ill-will with which these this object, they have availed themselves aliens were regarded. Perhaps,nothing illus- largely of the facilities offered by building trates better the marked changewhich has and loan associations. It should be remem- taken place in the status of theFrench- bered thatin many .small manufacturing towns the individualownershlb of real estate Canadians than the almost complete trans--4. fornWi6r1 M _both of these points.Very-few is rendered difficult through-theownership of the French now return tbCanLla to stay, of 'large parCels of land Ay thecorporation, or even lookforwarll to such a possibility; and the requirement that all employeesshall and Ithe amount of money now sent out of live in the tenements of the company.Mr. the country, while considerable, is verysmall Gagnon, in his testimony before theMaSsa- comparison with fbrmer figures. chusetts Bureau of Statistics ofLabor in 1881, gave aowl case inpoint.7 Grosven- Among the surest indications of adispo- Con ,including Mechanicsville., sition to permanency in a foreignpopulation had a Frenchanadian population of 2,400, are, first, the increasednumber of real estate of whom only twelve we real estate owners; owners, and, second, thenumber of voters. Gardner, Mass., with a nch-Canadian pop- Oneither of these points, so far asthe ulationof only766, had -'seventy-three French-Canadians areconceerne#, doesit owners of real estate.It is probable that a erty every- seem practicable toobtain statistics at once good deaf of the_ residen --f accurate and complete; butsuch figures as where represents a relatively higcost to its owner's; much of it having beebought on are to be had arein the highest. degree in- structive. The thirty-seven citiesand towns various schemes of partial payments, athigh from which returns were receivedin 1897 re- rates of interest. ported 7,409. French-Canadian ownersof and per- real estate, Iditig property of aka.xessed These figs show substantial value of $13,579,158. This does notin de manent gat less remarkable is the pro- the very large amount of real propertyde- gress int e direction of citizenship.The voted to refigious and educational purposes. same cities and towns,from which statistic4, I have taken the logvest estimatesin each ' of property-holdinghave just been given re- case. There can be noquestion that the port 17,448 French-Canadian votersin 1897; totals for all of the New EnglandStates, if and this number, like the other,is undoubt- they could be procured, would-far exceed edly much smaller than thetotal for New these figures. Both in number andin value England. Taking into account all the circum- the holdings have increased rapidlyin the stances, the showing ishighly creditable. It conditions last ten years, and the increase stillcontinues. should not be forgotten that the in Aside from church and schoolproperty,the on which suffrage is granted are less easy value of which must now bereckoned New England than in many of theStates of 4 15

-4t Estimated Estimated num- Estimated Places number of ber or owners value of voters of real estate real estate Biddeford, Me 600 200 . S300,000 Brunswick, Me. 150 58 100,000 Lewiston, Me. 800 202 623,030 Watervilli Me 600 350 500,000 Mac cliesffltt, N.H. 1,350. 600 900,000 Nashua, N.11. 500 * ( Winooski Falls, Vt. 350 300 400,000 Fall River, Mass 1,500 -t 2,000,000 . Fitchburg, Mass 326 328 481,325 Holyoke, Mass 1,000 ,_* Lowell, Mass 1,300 305 975,000 New Bedford, Mass. 472 375 902,053 North Adams, Mass. t 450 147, -,-816,000 Southbridge; Mass. 400 225 400,000 -Spencer, Mass. 350 1,000 200,000 Springfield, Mass. 500 150 1 2,000 t Worci(ster, Mags 1,407 350 1,0M,000 Central Falls, R 1 650 253 710,000 Manville, R I 250 200 Pawtucket,-R.I./ 420 650 350,000 Woonsocket, R.1. 1,300 500 1,500,000 Waterbury, Conn 600 130 340,000 * No definiteieport. t«350 pay taxes of 1150 or over.» tApparently an error. the Union. While nearly one-third of the. never been sought after and catered to, in States extend the priviledg of voting to any 'noticeable degree, bytither ofthe great aliens who have resided in the country for political 'parties; nor has their disposition to various. periods, not exceeding twoyears, quality for the franchise been greeted with and declared their intention to become citi- cordiality by any class of Americans. On the zens, complete naturalization, conditioned other hand, it may be doubted whether the on five years' residence, is required' in all of rank andfilehave as- yeteveltSped a very the New England States. Further, in Maine, keen interest in the subjec.It is the leaders' Massachusetts, and Connecticut, the voter who, convinced that thece has come to must be able to read the English language; stay, have determined' to secure fOr their a requirement of some seridusness in the cotintrymen, as rapidly as posMble, the priv- case of a foreigner already in middle life. A ileges and rights of American citizenship. suggestive feature of the matter is seen in the 0 . fact that, as a rule, the impulse to seekna- It will be convenient to combine in one turolization has come from the French-Cana- exhibit .ihestatistics of voters, property dians.themselves, in thepersons of a few of owners, and valuation,,for a number of cities their leaders. The French-Canadians have and. towns having a large French-Canadian

28 r

16 population, as reported in 1897. There remainstobe considered the threefold question of religion, education, It does not appear that the French-Cana- and language. It is at these points that, from dians are inclined to attach themselves en the time of their first arrival in New England masse to any one political party. Although to the present "day, the French-Canadians the general introduction of the secret ballot have been most seriously disparaged and has almost atholly done away with the coer- most bitterly denounced. cion and intimidation of employees which formerly disgraced elections in not a few The French-Canadians are, with no ex- manufacturing towns, the French-Canadians ceptions worth considering, Roman Catho- are still somewhat prone to take their na- lics. Brought up in Canada in the faith and tionalpolitics from their employer, not practices of the Church, they cling to it here through fear or servility, but rather from a as there, and their children do not forsake it. feeling that the employer,, with his obvious- In the early days of their sojourn in New ly greater interests, must be right. In local England the Church in Cinada was indis- elections it is frequent testimony that they posed to exert itself can their behalf..Their are not to be counted on tosuppoii either coreligionistsintheir new home viewed party or any general policy, but are jiable to them with suspicion and dislike as disturbers put their votes up for sale, not for money, of the economic peace, and their latignage but for political or social concessions. The stood as a barrier hetAen them and the French-Canadian is not venal, in the sense of ministrations which they craved.In the being open to bribery with money, but his mixed parishes of French and Irish there was instinct of self-government is rather rudi- frequent clashing, sometimes open rupture. mentary, and his docility makes 'MA the So far as religious and moral training were easy dupe of demagogues,- who play upon concerned, they were as sheep having no his ignorance, his pride, or the selfish and tem- shepherd. It is to Bishop Goesbriand of the porary interest of. hiscliss or race, some- diocese of Vermont that -the credit belongs times with disastrous results. of first endeavoring to care systematically for these scattered and neglected French. A respectable number have held political Father Hamon has vividly recounted the office. The legislatures in each of the New arduous and self-denying labors of this zeal- England States have had, as some of them ous prelate, and the long' struggle forthe ac- stillhave, French-Canadian members; and ceptance and realization of his policy. That the raceis frequ ntly represented in city policy was, in brief, to gather the French- councils and boas of selectmen in com- Canadians into separate parishes under the ,munitiesinwhiclFrench-Canadians are chargeof French-speaking prists, Bishop numerous. Other of ces commonly held by Goesbriand being firmly convinced that in them are those of d: I uty sheriff, justice of this way only co* the loss to the Church the peace, ndtary ps lic, assessor and col- of many thotisands of its members be $ lector of taxes, coron ,and postmaster) to- averted. The extent to which thispoly has gether with positions o various State boards, been adopted may be learned frontthe list local boards of health,nd school comMit- Of parishes given on an early page of this tees. Comparisons at thi. point, for any pur- article. Opposed for a time by the hierarch.), pose, should of course1. made with the at Quebec, and viewed askance by the auth- number of voters, not withe total French orities of the Church in New England, it has, population. nevertheless, won its way rapidly to a posi- tion of general acceptance. At the present 29 S 17

time, wheiever r onsiderable numbersof politic;aprograms,financiland business Canadian French are gathered, Frenchpar- undertlings; and, on each and all, his ishes and French priests, opin- are the rule; and, ion cam he ulmost weight. In, themain- while mixed parishes are still numerous, they tenance,of law and order his influenceis in- will usually be foundto contain either a disOnsabfe. Manya community of/Canadian small. proportion of French-Canadiansori'. French owes its general good peage.andor- else a small proportion ofany other race.4' derliness far more to the priest than to the police. Along with the organization ofseparate parishes has gone, somewhat lesswidely, the But the parochial school and the Church establitment of parochial schools.These are also immensely potent in confirming and schools, under the 'direct chiiige of the parish perpetuating the use of French as thelan- priests, with teachers drawn from thevarious guage of common intercourse. With system- Catholic sisterhoods, give instructionin the atic instruction in theuse of French, with usual elementary subjects, in bothEnglish French-speaking .teachers and priests, and and French, a .11aIf day's session being itsual- with French as one- of the media .intheser- ly devoted to exercises in each language. Pro- ,vices of the Church, the Canadian findshis bably a large majority of theFrench-Cana- incentivetolearn English mainly in the dian children are to be found enrolledin needs of his industrial or business life. Few these schools, although I havenot been able French-Canadians, when theycome to the to obtain figures showing the number;and limited States, can speak. English;and the to a large proportion the parochial schoolis older people, especially thewomen, often do the beginning and end of theeducational not learn it at all, even aftermany years of course. Save in a few of the larger cities, the residence. With the young people it is differ- public schools make littleor no provision for ent. To them the mastery of the !anne children who cannot speak English;and, sufficiently to make themselves understood. while the public schoolsare free to all, many is not difficult, and is,moreover, a valuable of those who most need educationderiie part of their stock in trade. But in learning scanty benefit from them because of theob- English, they do not cease to use French. In stacle of language. Notmany French-Cana- nine cases oat of ten theyoung Frenchman dian children completea grammar school learns to speak an imperfect English, because course, although the number is much larger his chance of earniiig goodwages is thereby than formerly; and comparatively fewreach enhanced; but he worships in French, and the high school. The love ofknowledge French continues to be the language of his among them is not keen, and the temptation home and his friends. of the factory and shop is strong. In the perpetuation of the Frencii lan- These two forces ofchu4and school guage quite the stisegeSt influence, next to are the two most powerful agencies for the that of the Church and the school, is wieldedR. maintenance of distinctive racial andsocial by the societies of St. Jean Baptiste. These characteristics among the Ficenclkanadiaps. -societies, in character partly social andpart- The authority and influence of the priestare ly philanthropk, are to be found in nearlyor very great. He is not only the religious head quite all the French-Canadian parishes,and and guide of the parish, but theadviser and in many mixed parishesas well. The mem- counsellor of every member in it. Tohim are bership comprises the leadingmen of the referred the greate t variety of questicins,.1- parish, through whom, consequently, the personal an y troubles; labor disputes, society conies to exercise great weight in

30 p

18

parish affairs. Conducting all their proceed- erty-holding, no generalexercise of the ings in French, the spirit and objects ofthese suffrage, and no patrioticdeclarations or organizations are well summed up in the services will suffice to removethe impression motto, «Notre Religion, notre Langue. nos that they are still, in essentialspirit, aliens Moeursd) To safeguard and advance the in- and foreigner, living among usbecause to and notbe- terestsofthe French-Canadiansinthe do so is pleasant and profitable, United States, to preserve the unity and cause they genuinely meanto become one of identity of the race, and especially its Itor guage, customs,and religion, are the chief M aims of the national society of St. Jean Bap- While,however,theattitudeof the tiste; and to these they have adhered,and French-Canadians at this point seemsto me still adhere, with resolutepess and tenacity, to call only forcondemnation, I am not in- result notwithstandingalltheliberalizingand clined to think that the evils likely to Americanizing tendencies of the Roman from it, save to the good nameand influence themselves, are very Church, and in spite of the condemnation of of the French-Canadians putting the iialtiMore CO.nire'SS, in1889,in its de-. serious. The very policy of isolation, claration that «national societies; as such, the race as it does on thedefensive, seems have no reson for existence in theChurch doomed in the nature ofthings to failure. the theory that a country.»: For that policy rests upon distinct national type, formedin one coun- It can hardly be necessary for ine,to say, tryduringgenerationsof undisturbed in this connection, dig I hold no briefeither 4* growth, can be made topersisil in another for or against the rrench-Canadians; andI country where nearly everyessential condi- where am certainly n9t unmindfulof the enormous tion of lifeis wholly different, and impulse to social betterment emanatingfrom- every economic andpolitical consideration the Roman . I can butthink, demands readjtistment and change.For such howeve,4hat the Trident purpose of French- a theory thereis no sufficient justification Canadian leaders, 'lay and clerical, to pre- in egperience. Indeed, thereis no 'teed to situation in New serve, if possible, thedistinctive character- look beyond the present istics anil the language of their race inthis England, so far as theFrench-Canadians are country, justly exposes them andtheir fol- concerned, tosee howlittlethe theory work. In lowers to criticism and suspicion. Protesta- actually works as it is intended to doubt- spite of every effort to preventit, the use of tions of loyalty and patriotism, while life is less sincete, nevertheless ring hollow tothe Prench as the language of common of indus- average osan, whenaccompanied, as in this steadily giving way before demands and systematic measures to try, the desire for activepolitical equality, case, by zealous public schools. keep themselves apart. Whatever thereality and the influence of the free generation may be, the appearanceis. un-American. Among the younger native-born Neithyr the spirit nor the conditionof in particular, the desire toremain in any sense a peculiarpeople is veryentichWeak-_ American life ir favorabletor the mainte- 4N distlikt groups of populatiog, ened.jhat New England has any reasonto nance of imperiuin bounded by lips of race, and kepttogether apprehend the creation of an religious, by the twin forces of a commonlanguage imperio, either 'social, political, or little ground for and a common religion;,.621sollong as the I think there is exceedingly Prench-Canadians, either of their own mo- believing. Nor do I believe thatsuch an idea, whatever its particular form,has at the pres- -4 tiot or under the direction of their leaders, occupy such a position, noamount of prop- ent day the firm holdthat it once had, even -..-

31 I9

among the French-Canadian leaders them- the substantiality ofa pleasing hope. They selves. At the same time, thereactionary still speak of Canada with affection,but it policy of which I have beenspeaking has a is here that they will end their days. moral influence which shouldnot be under- estimated, and which is likely to retard, In matters of every-day hebitand ap- though it cannot prevent,,theinevitable ab- pearance there is still much that is distinc- sorption of the race m thecosmopolitan- tive, and not a little that is American people. picturesque, about, the life of the French-Canadiansin a New England community. Theyare Absorbed or not, however, the still French- much inclined to live by themselves,in a par- Canadians are in New England to stay. When ticular section of the townor city. In some the emigration first Beganto assume consid- larger Awes a few individuals erable proportions, the and families' threatened depopu- have attained ameasure of social 'equality lation of Canadian parishes,and the prOb- with native Americans. For the able losii to the Church of most part, many who. went, however, they are regardedas a class apart, causcd.., wide-spread.. alarm in ecclesiastical and associate but -little- withpersons not of quarters; and bishops and clergy madeevery their own race: Nowhere do they effort seem to be to. discourage and check' the move= looked upon, as a, class, with entirefavor; ment.. Failing, in this, and the -occasioefor and in private are often spoken ofwith con- opposition being ,partiallyremoved by the tempt; but their work is organization of French-Canadian necessary, their parishes trade important:and their politicalsupport among the emigrants, there was started the not to be despised. The agitation known women are fond as repatriation, having Lor of dress, and in their earlyyears are often .its object the return of the Frenchto Canada. unusually attractive; but, with In 1875 thf legislature of hard work QuebeCappropri- MO many children, they fadeq6ickly. TM: ated $60,000 in aid oT immigration, to en- 4older people complain that theyounger gen- courage the °gelling and settl ment ofliew eration spends its money too freely, lands. Part of this and that sum was us '1 uce frugalitrentrthrift are less general thanfor- French-Canadians in New Englandto return, merly. Whether such is the 4, case I. have no ,and an agent was appointedfor the purpose; means of .knowing. All classes but the whole scheme failed are fond of almost com-, ceremonies, and make- much ofweddings, letely, so -far as the United States were con- funerals, and church festivals.Even under erned. Today one hears nothing of repatria- untoward conditions the generaltone of life - Pion. The Churchill Canada no longer active- -is buoyant and friendly,as of thole who opposes emigration; and Father Hanlon's `" take the world witha light heart, book, with its outspoken championshiof the policy of the French-Canadian leads in in Whattheimmediate New futureofthe England,isdedicatedtoCardinal, French-Canadians in New England isto be Taschereau: Of the thousandswho have belongs rather to prophecy thanto; such a 011ie, a very small number haveever gone discussion as has been hereattempted. It hack permanentjyto their old homes. Many may be pointed out, however, in conclusion, have essayed to do so, only to find their that their pekmanent worth,as an element former surroundingsno longer attractive; in the, population, is Dietty and in a short time they have cane certain to Abe again. measured by the'extent to whichthey con- The old people still cherish theidea of an tribute to the economic sanity and the a good ultimatyeturn, to theland of their fathers, citizenship of which the country isjust now 'but' witillthe others such an idea has hardly particularlyin need. Whether ( they have

32 20

with the within themselves the ability to passfrom identifythemselves completely profess to love. the position of laborers,operatives, and American spirit which they small tradesmen into that ofleaders of in- The time (or apprehension, ifsuch there ever dustry, (nly time can show. At presentthe was, lest ourinstitutions should be over- indications are not altogether hopeful.Poli- borne by this «horde ofindustrial invaders,» future are for the tically, they are too few in numberto....exer- is past. The dangers of the cise More than local influence;and even that French-Canadians, not for us. will assuredly be minimized,unless they

t

a,

33 2I

Footnotes ti

4

1. Rev. E. Hanlon,Les Caner/lens-Francais de la 3.Objections were made to this figure, and the Nouvelle-Angleterre(Quebec, 1891). The book census does not claim entire accuracy for the falls into two parts,,the first being an elaborate enumeration. discussion of the condition and prospects of the French-Canadians in New England, and, the .4.Thirteenth Annual Report of the Massachsuetts second giving a detailed history of the various Bureau of Statistics of Labor (1882);18. French-Canadian parishes, with invaluable sta- tistical data. A galled and imperfect transla- 5.Compiled from Tables 52, 55, 56, 61, and 62 of tion of the first part has been printed as an theReport on Population,Pill 1: «anti-Catholic» tract. Father Hamon's volume, the work of an ardent but broad-minded Jesuit, 6.In an interesting article on «The Growth of the has been a mine whose treasures later writers French Canadian Race in America,»in the have repeatedly appropriated. Annals of the American Academy of Political A and Social Science. ,(Septomberi1896), Profes- 2.The table is based on data given by Hanlon,op. sor John Davidson has shown that the rate of cit.,181, 228, 232, 310, 312, 346, 350, 361, increase of the French in Canada is not abnor- 366, 396, 400, 418, 422, 450. The parishes of mal, and that «aftef the first year the proportion Burlington and Swanton, Vt., organizedin living at any given age varies little from the pro- 1850 and 1856, respectively, are not included, portion' among other Canadians.» Taking the nor twelve parishes in the Madawaska region of census decades from 1851 to 1891, only in the Northern Maine, composed almost entirely of latter year was the average size of families great- : The , found er in Quebec than the, average for all Canada, chiefly in the extreme northern parts of Maine, and in both 1881 and 1891 it was considerably along the New Biunswick border, appear not r exceeded by the average in Prince Edward Is- to have been greatly affected by the emigration land, where the French are comparatively few. from the Province of Quebec, although French- Canadians are doubtless numerous among them. 7. Thirteenth Annual Report(1882), 20.

1

34 A Franco-American point of view is found in the following article of 1906 by J. L.K. Laflamme, David E. Lavigne and J. Arthur Favreau.This arti- cle is particularly informative concerning those aspects of institutional life most impor- A tent to the Franco-Aire cicans of the period: the parish, the religious ordersand the schools; the Franco-American press, and the ((pro viden t organizjitionsu as the article terms the national societies, since st societies had been condemned in 1889 by the Baltimore Congress of the Catholic CAirch, In these few pages the authors managed to respond to the stay-at-hoine FrencirCanadians' criticisms of their compatriots wholeft for the States, to the effect that the latter were forced to leave by their own habits of /u x Ory and dissipation,m and so were causing a epopulation of the farmingcommuul- ties in Quebec. The authors cite the difficultiesf a large family system under cotMi- , flans of land shortage. combined with the' long-term neglect of the economic conditions leading fp high levels of deprivation of the rural population. With regard to the Catholic Church, the authors tread a-narrow path between the French-Canadiairmilitants who in those days willingly called themselves Franco-Americansterm the article does not

,useand the assimilationists who were dominant in theChurc7h.

4 FRENCH CATHOLICS IN THEUNITED STATES

by J.K.L. Laflamme 'David E. Lavigne J. Arthur Favreau

The first Bishop of Burlington, the Right from complete, but enough has been done Reverend Louis de Goesbriand, ina letter to demonstrate the progress of the French- dated I 1 May, 1869, and which appeared in Canadians and their devotion to their Church «Le _Proteweur,,.Canadien»ia-Fretlelt-news- and to their adopted country.-' paper then published at St. Albans, 'Ver- mont, made the following statement: any The immigration of French-Canadians to convinced from positive information, that the United States began before the War of when we say that there are 500,000 French- American Independence (1775-83). French- Canadians in the United States, the figures Candians had then already immigrated to are far below the truth.» The sources from New England, and we find them in large which the late prelate drew his information numbers in the armies of Washington. After are unknown to the writers of this article, the war the American Congress, in recogni- but itis a fact that today the Diocese of tion of their services and to prevent their Burlington ha aCatholic population of being prosecuted in Canada on the charge of 76,000 souls, 4 which 50,000 at leastare of high treason, gave them land on the shores French-Canadian birth of origin. It is alsoa of Lake Champlain, where their descendants fact that the French-Canadian element has are still to be found. That concession of land, increased, both naturally and by immigra- situated in the State of , has long tion, to such an extent that it now numbers been known as the «Refugees' Tract». In nearly 1,200,000 souls in the United States, 1837, after the rebellion in the Province of that it has made its influence felt throughout Quebec, a new immigration to the Eastern the Eastern States, in all walks of life, and States took place, to the State of Vermont, furthermore that, in point of numbers, it is more particularly, where the «Patriots», van- the Predominant element in several dioceses, quished in battle, sought refuge with their and an important part of the population in families. But the chief influx1from French manS, others. however, except in their own Canada to the United States took place after newspapers, or a few little-known books, the Ciyil War. Notwithstanding the fact that scarcely anything had been said of the part they had at that time but few organized taken by these immigrants in the'civil andre- parishes, the French-Canadians were here in ligious life of their new country, until,very sufficient numbers during the war to furnpli `recently,they took into their own hands the 40,000 soldiers to the Union. The immigra-, task of reviewing their history, of gathering tion at the close of t14 war has been ascribed statistics of their numbers, and of recording to many causes, the most considerable of their achievements and the progress- they which are the unprecedented industrialpros- have made in fifty years. The task is still far perity that followed the Civil War and the

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inbornlove of the French-Canadian for now better known in theRepublic under the travelling, together with the desire to earn name of Wench Americans, are, aslabourers the high wages and to share in the vast ?p- and artisans, the most solid and reliable pil- portunities which the Republic offered to its lar of industry in New England. And New citizens. England has received withinitsborders, more than two-thirds of their totalimmigra- Some wri --and mbny of thesein tion. As Catholics, ik is obvious that they earnesthave givens the principalcausteof have played a role no less important, as may thisFrench-Canadian immigration, three easily be seen by the perusal of Catholic fourths of which tookace between 1865 Directories.Father Hamon classifiesthe :and 1890, the necessity in' hich the farmers French-Canadian immigration as temporary, of the Province of- Quebec found themselves fluctuating, and permanent. Figures show of seeking a new home after leading a life of the relative importance of each of these _luxury and dissipation. Undoubtedly this classes and demonstrate the spirit which ani- was true of sne, but thegeneral moral mated the whole movement. The temporary character of the hundreds of thousands who ,immigration comprised a class of.lariners crossed the border is the best proof that the who came to the United States with the true cause of this movement must be sought avowed intention of going back to their old elsewhere. The Jesuit, Father Hamon, writing homes as soon as they had saved enough on this subject, des not hesitate to say: money ,to clear their farmsfrom mortgages and all other financial incumbrances. This The rapidity witholvhich this.0nigeation class became less numerous fromlay to day; was accomplished, and the ease with so much so, that it waspractically unnotice- which these Canadians transplted into able, as early as 1880. In many cases the in- a foreign land, have immediate recon- tention 9f returning to the old home was stnicted the Catholic mould of tparish never -cried out, Frequently thisclass, by that made their strength in Cana a; the revealing to their neighbours the opportun- energyshown by them inerecting churchesand convents,ingrouping itiesoffered across the border, induced themselves together, and in organizing many of them to follow in theirfootsteps. flourishingcongregations,supported As to the fluctuating immigration, only a Within by all that nourishes Christian mere mention is necessary.Always on the piety, protected without against perni- move, from one country to the other,from cious influences by the strength of asso- city to city, from mill to mill, those who ciation, and a press generally well in- formed thif class led that kind of. life which spired;all these elements of Catholic relies, as Father Hamon says, on the Provi- life, organized within a quarter of a cen- dence of Gad for ifs support. Thisroving tury in the very citadel,of'old Puritan- class is still less numerous than the tempor- ism, seem to indicate a Providential ary group, and it is to be found notonly in action as well as a Providential mission, all classes of newcomers, but in settled popu- the importance of which the future alone will reveal. lations as well. The permanent immigration has been the most numerous, and, naturally, Those who do not look higher than ma- the most substantial. It is these permanent terial contiderations in studying the causes French-Canadian immigrants who have or- of national movements will not give much ganizedparishes and parochialschools, credence to this opinion of Father Hamon. erected churches and convents, andnAw Nevertheless, it is today a fact recognized by constitute the labouring power par excellence noted economists, that the French-Canadians, in all 'the industrial centres of New England.

3 . Most of them, if not all, came from the rural emigrants might have founded families of districts of Canada, especially from the East- colonists. But the nature of this emigration ern townships, from the Dioceses of Trois was such that it could not be checked by Rivieres and Rimouski, and from the Coun- any special legislation. The movement Shad ties of Beauce, Beltechasse, and otherson set in, and it was too late to forestallan the borders. Their farms had become insuf- event prepared, by many years of economic ficient to support large familis; in theEast- conditions misunderstood or wilfullyig- ern townships their titles to the land they nored. The stream had found itsway across occupiedwere disputed, and they were the borders, where new industries, phenom- forced to give up the fruit ofmany years of enal opportunities, and advantages unheard labour; they were the victims of the indif- of before, were ready to absorb and utilize ference shown by their governments, both this new and valuable poser of production Provincial and Federal, towards coloniza- tion and the opening up ofnew farming In order to present a strictly accurate districts. The increasing populationwas thus idea of the importance Of the French Anted- compelled. by circumstances, to look elso. *eim -element,- both numerically and from a where, foi more-land and greater,pporttinRies. Catholic standpoint, the following sources' At the same time, the iiportssent of information have been used fqr "-this home by those who had taken part in the article: (1) the Twelfth Census of the United earlier immigration had widely advertised States (1900); (2) local-enumerations made throughout the whole Province of Quebec, in New England since 1900, and as lateas the material advantages of the United States. the present year (1908); and (3) the Catholic This migration was called at the time «the Directory of the United States. desertion of the Fathetlanth. But those who- spoke thus were forgetful of the historical The accompanyingt- table, compiled from fact, that the French or-America have from the first of these three sources, shows, first, the very beginning felt perfectly at home in the number of born in the whole northern part of the continent, Canada and, secondly, this first class.com- on the soil. of which their missionaries, their bined with those of whom at leastone par- coureurs des bois, explorers, and warriors ent was born in Canada. have left their footprints broadcast. In spite' pf all opposing efforts, hundreds of thou- The figures given foil" are, of sands of French-Canadians,most of them course, exclusive of all other inhabitants farmers, between 1870 and 1890, left their of French extraction; those relating to Cali- rural occupation to adopt themore arduous fornia are exclusive of the large population life of the New England factories and the of immigrants, from France established in 4 various industries of the Western States. that State,, more especially in the city of This movement took plke 'quietly, slowly,. San Francisco' There were also, 115persons without creating any disturbance, and al- of French-Canadian parentage in , and most unnoticed. It was, in a certain sense, 4 in , besides 502 persons of thesame a repetition of that other movement which, parentage in the military and naval service .lidvocated by Horace Greeley, sent toward of the United State's, stationed abroad and the .Golden Gate so many youngmen of not credited to any State or Territory,. Com- the East.. bining with these small figures the totals for the five divisions given hi the last column of Doubtles, this depopulation ona large the table,, we get the grand total of 810,105 scale was a great loss to Canada, where the persons of French-Canadian parentage living 4.

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Distribution of French Americans under the United States Flag. But these figures only represent the first and second Foreign- Qf Foreign born Parentage generations,i. e.original immigrantsstill Maine 30,908 57,682 living, and their immediate descendants. In New Hampshire 44,420 73,359 Vermont 4. .14,924 40,097 this connexion the director of the census Massachusetts 134,4 16 244,586 says: Rhode Island 31,533 55,771 Connecticut 19,1 74 36,867 New York 27,1 99 . 69,236 A small number of the persons-reported 1,118 2,140 as of foreign birth, are themselves of 1,468 3,603 Totals for North At- native parentage, so that, to a very small lantic Division . .305,160 583,341 extent, the number of persons of for- Delaware 41 77 eign bir.th reported at each census is not 87 178 included in its entirety in the number of District of Columbia 97 236 104 194 persons reported as of foreign parentage. West Virginia 72 165 The figures are sufficiently comparable, North Carolina 36 69 however, to show the large body of 31 56 population which must be added to the ,..... 80 203 88 200 foreign born element itself in order to Totals for South At- ascertain, even approximately, the num- . 636 1,378 lantic Division . ber of persons of foreign extraction at '2,903 7,034 an)/ of the census periods considered. 948 3,242 Illinois 9,129 24,477 Moreover, this is the best figure that can Michigan 32,4 83 75,584 be given as expressing the element of Wisconsin 10,091 27,981 our popultion which is of foreign ex- 12,063 32,406 traction, as the census inquiry does not 1,059 3,536 Iowa 1,519 5,613 go beyond, the immediate parentsof 3,162 6,512 each person enumerated, and it is im- 3,516 South Dakota 1,138 practicable, at least under present con- Nebraska 1,039 3,003 , 1,485 5,547 s, to endeavor to determine the Totals for North Cen- rigih of the people beyond a single 198,451 tral Division 77,019 generation. Kentucky 1 36 397 Tennessee 1 19 312 89 211 It is obvious, that an inquiry which does 75 141 not go beyond the immediate ancestors of 400 1,004 Louisiana 253 _759 each person enumerated "cannot convey an Indian Territory 48 173 exact idea of the real number of those who Oklahoma 1 79 702 may still be distinctly classified asFrench- 161 411 Totals for South Cen- Americans, even though both of their par-' tral Division 1,460 4,110 ents may have been born' in the United 3,516 5,725 States. And when it is remembered that the 150 385 French-Canadians were early settlers in the Colorado 960 2,300 New Mexico 84 270 northern part of the State of New York, that Arizona 153 264 they .were, practically, the first settlers of 128 505 the State of Maine, and had foUnd their way Nevada 222 486 Idaho 395 846 into Vermont as early as 1830; that French- Washington 1,899 3,862 Canadians were the pioneers of the Western 874 2,169 2,410 5,392 States, where they founded,, or assisted in Totals for Western founding, great cities like , St. Louis, 22,204 Division 10,791 St. Paul, Dubuque, , and , "/

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itis not difficult to understand that in cer- be classified as of French Canadian extrac- tain parts of the country at least three gener- tion. As this immigration of French-Cana- ations of French Americans have beenre- dians was almost exclusively an immigration corded by the census of 1900 as native of Catholics, we are led to inquire what pro- J whites of native parents. How far short 'of visions were made for them in the different the actual number of French Americansare dioceses. the figures of the National Census,may be estimated by considering the localenumera- The French-Canadians had left behind tions taken in the New England States since them in Canada a perfect Catholic organiza- 1900, with the following results: tion, with parishes flourishing in all parts of the province, with episcopal sees in Quebec, Maine 91,567 , and the Westan organizationcom- New Hampshire. 84,011 prising today many ecclesiastical prOyinces Vermont 58,217 witharchbishops,bishops,anumerous Massachusetts 366,879 Rhode Island 76,775 clergy, both secular and regular, as well as .Connecticut -46,083 educational and charitable institutions of the highest order. It was not to .be expected that TOtal 721,532 ties immigrants shduld find in their new country the religious organization they had These figures, compared with the total possessed iii Canada. Nevertheless, they had (508,362) of those given in the Census of to be provided for, and it became a serious 1900 for the same six States, show anexcess problem for the hierarchy, of New-Eiigland of the local over the national enumeration of especially,to determine how these new- 215,170 persons, or more than 42.3 per cent, comers should be oared for spititually. The for New England alone. This excess, ex- question of language stood in the way from plained in ,part by the fact that the census the very beginning. The French-Canadians, inquiry of 1900 was limited to only twogen- though willing to betome staunch Americans, erations, is also attributable to the contin- did not know-the English language, and even uous flow of immigration and in greater when they had learned it, they still preserved measure to the large birth-rate which is still a strong attachment for their mother tongue. maintained among/the French Americans, it That this problem puzzled the bishops of having been scientifically established that. New England, is shown by the time taken the French-Canadiansat least in Canada for its solution, and by the fact that in some double their numbers by natural increase instances they were reluctant, or often un- every twenty-six years. Taking consider- able, to dealwith,the situation in the ?nly ation the increase (42.3 per cent) shown by proper way, which was, to give to these the enumerations in New England over the people priests of their own tongue andna- figures given by the National Census, and tionality. Even today this problem is not also bearing in mind the fact that the figures adequately solved. It was feared at the begin- quoted above do not include the French ning, as it is feared now in some quarters, from France (reported as being 265,441 by that to grant to the French-Canadian immi- the census of 1900) and the French-speaking grants priests of their own tongue and na- Belgians, scattered throughout other States tionality would encourage them to form a than those of New England, we may con-, sort of stateithin the state, thereby caus- elude that the French Americans. in the ing great harnto the nation as a whole. UnitedStates today number more than Time has shown the fallacy of that argument. 1,500,000, of whom nearly 1,200,000can The patriotism of the French American

40 28 , element is undisputed-. They possess the ster- Xavier at Widobski, dr1868cthe Diocese ling civic qualities desirable and necessary to of Springfieltl, Massachusetts, the parigwf promote the best interests of the repuillic. Notre-Dame du Bon Conseil, at Pittsfield, As a matter of fact, the French-Canadian im- was organized in1.867. In all, 22 parishes migration has created 'no new slate in the were organized by French Americans from state; d the French Americans have wil- th t date t6 1890, besides 15 parishes of tingly,earned the English language while re- population, wherein the French maing as closely attached as ever to their were associated with theirEnglish- mot er tongue, in which they see the best speaking brethren. In the Diocese- of Provi- safe uard of their faith. dence, R. 1., the parish of St-Jacques,. at N!asstrganized in 1872, that of the The progress accomplished for God and Precieux Sang, iit.Woonsocket, in 1873, and country through theorganization of French that of St-Charles, at Providence, in 1878. In American parishes all over New England is the DioceseV Hartford, Conn., the parish of the conclusive proof of their excellency St-Laurent, at Meriden, was organized in from every standpoint. It proves, at the same 1880 and five other parishes between 1880 time, that further progress, religious and pa- and 1889. In the Diocese of Boston, the par- triotic, can be accomplished by pursuing the ish of St-Joseph, at Lowell, was organized in same policy. At first, it was necessary to call 1869and that of Ste-Anne, at Liwrence, in priests from the Province of Quebec. That 1873. In the Dioceseof Portland,'Maine, the policy, inaugurated in the Diocese of Bur- parish of St-Francois, de Sales,tat Waterville, lington in 1850, by the lamented Bishop de was organized in 1869, that of St-Pierre, at Goesbriand, has proved to be a blessing Lewiston, in 1871, that of St-Jciseph, at qid- wherever it has been carriedAk. These early,'deford,iin 1872, and that of St-Augustin, at . French-CanadianmissionalW,of whom Augusta, in 1888. In the f Man- , many arestill livin knew their people, chester, New Hampshir , the parishq of St- understood their charkter and customs, had Auguain, ster, and St-Louis, at Hie sante mentality as their flock, and easily Nashua, were organized in 1872. Sit filar re- succeeded in organizing flourishing parishes sults were-accomplished in the Dioceses of entirely devoted to the Church..As early' s Ogdensburg Albany, and Syracuse, and in 1890 Father Hamon notes that these new- the Western States. The accompanying table' comers alreadypossessed 120 church4 and shows the actual religious organization of chapels, ministered to by tanad4n priests, the French-American Catholics in New Eng- and 50 large schools, affordingAucat)on to land their clergy, parishes, etc. more than 30,000, children. Let us recallA few dates whichark the beginning of this Religious Organization in New Eqgland new impulse given o theCatholic Church in Diocese Pprishes MissionsSecularRegular the United States. PriestsPriests

Boston..... 20 2 . 33 31 .The first French American-parish in the ,- 16 United States, afteer the foundation of De- Hartford .. . 13 7 14 Springfield.. 38 5 59 1.4 troit, Michigan, was that of St. Joseph, at Burlington.. 39 31' 48 11 Burlington, Vermont, founded 28 April; Portland... 30 40 40 16 1850, with the Rev. Joseph Quevillon as first Manchester. . 25 15 38 17

. 42 8 pastor. In the same state, the parish of the Providence . 21 17 Nativite de la Sainte-Vierge, at Swanton, was Fall River.. . 16 ,1 28, ..organized in 1856, and that of St-Francois:. \Totals .. . 202 1,04, '302 130

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'To complete these figures for the United 19 March, 1907. States would necessitate a study of 11 the dioceses, as there are French Amerrans in The religious orders ofmen and women every state and territory of the Union; a few have been worthy co-labourers withthe statistics, however, of the priests of French priests in the building-up of parishes. To extraction in the principal dioceses will help them have been entrusted the education of to give a more definite idea of the organiza- children and the care of the sick and orphans. tion as a whole: Baltimore has 21; Chicago, This mission has been especially well fulfilled 62; Albany, 19; St. Paul, 14; San Francisco, in the French. American parishes, where the 3; New York, 25; Oregon 5; Philadelphia, 3; convent of the sisters and the school of the pubuque, 7; Milwaukee, 9; , 96; brothers are the necessary complements of Syracuse, 5; and Ogdensburg, 63. the church itself. One dqes notgp without

.10 ti)e other, and as a rule the school is built be- Of the distinguished clergymen whose fore the (*welt and is used for a church also. names are associated with the work already The- minitler of members in the differerd\re- desctibed, the following have already been ligious 'communities of women is given in the called' to theif reward: Norbert Blanchette, accompanying table'. A first Bishop and first Archbishop of Oregon City; I. B. Lamy, Archbishop of Santa Fe, New Mexico; Monsignor Magloire Blanchette, -11 Female Religious in New England Prothonotary Apostle, of WallaWalla, Total in All 4,In Fre Washington;theRev.P. M. Mignault, of 1711Clese Communities Commu Chambly, .Quebec, who in fifties was ., vicar-genval of the Diocese of Boston, with Bostoi. 1*'. 1567\\: 200 Burlington'.. .,. 268 1154 the speeidl mission of caring for the spiritual 41' Fall River 322 , 254 \ oeeds of his compatriots in the United States; artford 1115 ,I,. 219 the Rev. Joseph Quevillon, of Burlington, M pester -. 435 300 Vermont; Monsignortrochu, of Southbridge, Portland 48? 355( Provjdirce. .c-' 551 ,22 2 -the Rev. Jr. Primeau, of Worcester, the Rev. L.,G. gniir, of Springfield, and the Springfield 792 320 ....Ai Rev. --J. B. Bedard, of Fall ItiVer,'Massachu- Totals 5532' "1985 §Nts; the Itev. J. Roch Magnan, of Muskegon, Michigan. Mei$ion should also be made of hese 198 women are distributed'in-0 dif- the Right. Rev. Bishop Michaud,' lately- de- . rent orders; bearing the following names: ceased, whose father was a French Acadian, Congregation de Notre-Dame de , and who- had been for many years at the Filles de Marie (Fpnce), Soeurs dete-Croix `head of the Diocese of Burlington, proving de Montrftl, Soeurs de la vidence de .himself a worthy successor to Bishop de Montreal, Soeurs dela Pre tation de Marie -Goesbriand. Among the livingthere are deStilyacinthe; Soeurs d Ste-Anne de La- scores of o s who' have been -true pio- chine, Soeurs Grin de Montreal, Soeurs de neers of the th, and to whom is due great la Merci, Soeure Crises d', Soeurs de virsreilit for havingso well organized a new and l'Assomption, Soeurs du Bon Pasteur de loyal membership of the Chich in the Quebec, Soeurs Dominicaines, Soeurs Fran- United States. Recently one of their number ciscaines Missionaires de Marie,'Soeurs GriseS has been elevated to the See of Manchester, de St-Hyacinthe, Soeurs de Jesus-Marie de New Hampshire, in the person of the Right Siile y, Ursulines des Trois Rivieres, Congie- Rev. George Albert Guertin, consecrated gation Notre-Dame- (Via Maria), Soeurs de 4, a*

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Catholic Parochial Schools in New England Pupils in Diocese Total French Total Schools Schools Pupils French Schools 0 Boston 76 15 ..,ti,f13,192 7,263 Burlington 21 17 ,951 4,009 Fall River $ 21 l4 9,300 6,171 Hartford 69 10 30,275 3,508 Manchester 36 19 12,800 8,833 Portland 23 13 9,138 6,073 Providence 26 14 16,000 7,414 Springfield.. ., 55 31 22,18011,712 Totals 327 133 154,43654,983

la Sainte Union des Sacres-Coeurs, Soeurs du Connecticut and Massachusetts; the Peres du Saint-Esprit, Soeurs du Saint-Rosaire, Sacre-Coeur, in Rhode Itsland and Massachrii de la Sagesse, Petites Soeurs des Pauvres, setts; the Peres Maristes in Massachusetts. Soeurs de St-Joseph (Le Puy), Soeurs du Sacre-Coeur, Soeurs de St-Joseph (Chambery), The French Americans have 133 paro- Soeurs. Servantes du Coeur Immacule de chial schools,' in which 54,983 children re- Marie,lesFit leles Compagnes deJesus, ceive Christian education. To these must be Soeurs du Bon s Pasteur (Angers), Petites added the secondary (high school and uni- Soeurs Franciscaines de 'Marie (Malbaie), versity academic courses) college established Daines de Sion. TheAnost important of these by the Peres de l'Assomption from France, are: the Soeurs de Ste-Croix, with 18 con- at Worcester, Massachusetts, in 1904, and 14 vents and 149 memberS; Sdeurs Grises, with small academies, commercial colleges, and 17 con4ients and 268 members; Soeurs de la boarding schools in which there are about Presentation de Marie, with 16 convents and 1000 pupils of both sexes. In cammexion 193 members; Soeurs, de JesUs-Marie, with with the subject of higher education, it may .19 convents and 171 members. be w711 to remark thlt about -3500 French American children attend annually the com- There area fey/ communities of brothers: mercial and secondary colleges in different I Freres de la Charite deSt-Vincent de Paul, cities of Canada. French religious orders, 27 members; Freres Maristes d'Iberville, 47; both of women and men, also have charge of Freres de St-Gabriel, 7; Freres des Ecoles 2618 orphans in NewEngland.1French nuns Chretiennes, 7; Freres du Sacre-Coeur, 31 have charge of 1865 sick and aged adults, making a total of 119 members. Besides wayward women, and working girls': these orders entirely devoted to education, the regular clergy has been given charge of a Beside ?their religious woit, vast and number of parishes which stand today among praiseworthy as itis, the French Ca ian the most, numerous and flourishing. For in- immigrants have also displayed industr and stance, the Dominican Order has two par- activity in other walks of life, and in their ishes, Ste-Anne, at Fall River, Massachusetts, closerrelations with their fellow-citizens and St-Pierre, atLewiston, Maine. The they have shown qualities and traits found Oblates are established at Lowell, Mass., and only in the best of citizens. In other wprds Plattsburg, N. Y.; the Peres de la Salette, in they have stood well up to the standard in 31

t. the body politic and in manyways have that meeting they adopted resolutiops assert- exercised over their surroundingsan influ- ing their loyalty to the republic, and advising ence for the genera good of the community the French Americans to show themselves such as to fully justify, at leastso far as it re- true al were American citizens, to pro- fcrs to them, made by Vice- mote naa nation, to preserve their mother President Fairbanks, that 'in the American tongue, to learn the English- language, to Nationflows the richest blood thatcourses maintain parochial schools,. wherein both in the veins of all the peoples in allquarters languagesrshould be taughton an equal foot- of the globe.» In fiftyyears, they have built ing, and to ask for priests of theirown na- up a press that is not surpassed, from the tionality to be their pastors. The resolutions Catholic point of view, by that ofany other also requested the Holy- See to appoint, group of immigrants in the United States. when feasible and proper, bishops of their Thatpressis composed today ofseven nationality, familiar with both the English dailies«L'Independary»,ofFallRiver, and French languages, inall dioceses in Mass.; (yL 'Opinion Publique», of Worcester, which the French Americans constitute the Mass,; oL'Etoileo, of Lowell, Mass.; «La majority of the Catholic population. The -Tribune», of Woonsocket, R. 1.; eL'Avenir first French newspaper to appear in the National)) and «Le Revell», of Manchester, United States was «Le Courier de Boston», N. H.; «LEcho 'de la Presse», of New Bed- whiCh was published weekly during a period, ford, Mass.; two papers issuedevery other of six months in 1789, the first number ap- day «Le Messager», of Lewiston, Maine; pearing on 23 April, and the last on 15 Octo- «L'Impartial»..ofNtshua,N. H.; one semi-: ber. The editor and publisher was Paul Joseph weekly eLe JeanJ -Baptiste», of Pawtucket, Guerard de Nancrede, later a bookseller and R. 1.; and the fifteen weeklies«L'Union», stationer at Boston, and instructor in French of Woonsocket,R. I.,official- organ of at Harvard University from 1787 to 1800. L'Union St-Jean-Baptiste d'Amerique; «Le The next French American newspaper was Canado-Americaino, of Manchester, N. H., published in 1825, at Detroit, under the title officialorganof L'AssocjationCanado-. of «La Gazette Francaise», which issued Americaine; «»,of Bideford, only four numbers. In 1817, the Detroit Maine; «La Justice», of Central Falls, R. I.; Gazette published a French column during «La Justiceo, of Holyoke, Mass.; «L'Esta- four months and then abandoned the ven- fet te»,of Marlboro, Mass.; «Le Progres», of ture. The second French American news- Lawrence, Mass.; «Le Courriero, of Law- paper in New England was oLe Patriote ), rence, Mass.; eLe Courrier de Salem», of published at fit. Albans, Vermont i 39. Salem, .Mass.; «L 'Echo de l'Ouest», of Min- Since that time near ers pub- nealVolis, Minn.; «Le CourrierFranco-Ameri- lished in the have appeared caino,of Chicago,III.; «L 7r:dependant), and disappeared, leaving only thosemen- (weeklyedition),of FallRiver,Mass.; tioned above. «L'Independanto, of Fitchburg, Mass.; «Le Progres», of Woonsocket, R. and «Le French American activity, whit' effec- Citoyeno, of Haterhill, Mass. These news- tively applied to the enterprises of religion, papers are thoroughly. Catholic in spirit, as education, and the press, has not neglected well as sincerely American. 'Heir Q5litors and provident organizations. The first FKench publishers met in convention, at.Woonsocket, institution of this kind was the Sociefe de R. I., on 25 September, 1906, and organized Jacques Cartier, founded in St. Albans, Ver- the AsSociation desJournalistes Franco- mont, in 184while the SocieteSt -Jean- Americains de la Nouvelle Angleterre. At Baptiste ofIlenork,organized in 1850, is va

Pe'

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Membership of National Societies Cquncils Members or Courts L'Union St- Jean - Baptiste d'Amerique 255 1.9,576 Association Canado-Americaine 159 11,158 Ordre des Chevaliers i e Jacques Cartier .... 4 897 Ordre decliorestier. Franco-Am6ri,ns. .. 40 8,500 Artisans Canadie-Francais 100 15,000 L'Assomption 17 1,500 still in existence. In 186 they hittl 17 benev piety, the Ordre des Forestiers Franco-Amer- olent societies, and since then they have or- icains, was formed by the secession of a few ganized more than 400 others, of which thousand members from the Foresters of Acne 142 are stillin existence. Moreover\ America, and it now comprises 40 courts. they have established fedwatans, which \ All the French American societies, with the hive more than four htindred and fifty coun- exception of the Forestiers, give life insur- cils or branches, with thousands of members. ieence, and without exception, they provide To these organizations ape due, in a great r sick benefits. Millions of dollars have measure, the existence and prosperity of the n distributed by them to the widows and most of the parishes. Many of them have in- orphans of their members and to their sick serted in their by-laws articles recommend- fellow-members. The Societe des Artisans ing naturalization. To obtain membership in Canadiens-Francais, though a Canadian Soci- any one of them the applicant must, in all ety, and the Societe L'Assomption, a society cases, be of French origin and a practising of French Acadians drawing the greater part Catholic. The local societies which still sur- of its membership from the maritime pro vive are distributed among the different vinces, also have members in the United states as follows: Massachusetts, 62; Ver- States and are therefore included in the mont, 18; New Hampshire, 25; Maine, 12; above table, which shows the number of Rhode Island, 11; Connecticut, 14making councils or courts and the membership of a total of 142. It was in 1900 that, in re- the four national societies in New England. sponse to the ,acknowledged need of a cen- tral organization embracing all the groups of These societies are all Catholic, and in the French race in the United States, the 1905 the Union St-Jean-Baptiste d'Amerique Union St-Jean-Baptiste d'Amerique was or- and L'Association Canado-Ainericaine were ganized, with headquarters in Woonsocket, instrumentaLin organizing the Societe His- RI I., through the federatio'n of a consider- terique Franco-Americaine du Denier de St- able number of the local societies. The move 'Pierre, whose sole object is to collect funds has proved to be a very wise one, as is shown. for the tHoly See. Tie Societe Historique by the rapid growth `of the new society, Franco-Americaine, incorpora4ed under the which hag enrolled over 19,500 membersin laws-of the State of Massachusetts, was or- eight years. The Association Canado-Ameri- ga. med in Boston in 1899,

15 33 a the evolution and formation of theAmeri- of French Americans',to which allthe can people.v With this end in view this soci- groups of this element, as well as all their ety has met regularly twicea year since its societies, were invitedto send delegates. organization. Noted Ambrican historiansand These national gatherings took place as` fol- writers, as well aoseveral from-Franceand lows:1880, Springfield Nass.; 1882, Cohoes, Canada, have deliver* before it addresses N. Y.; 1884, Troy; 1886, Rirtland,Vermont; which have contributed inno slight measure* 1888, N'ashua, N. H,; 1893, Chicago, Ill.In to enrich thestore of French Americanhis- 04ober, 1901, delegates (to the numberof torical literature. AnothorgInizationwhich 742} of the variousgroups and societies of seems destined to play an important role,at French Americans in New England and the least, among the French Americansof tomor- State of New York met ina «Congress» at row, is they Association Catholiquede la Springfield, Mass. Theour great subjects of JeunesseFranco-Americaine,whichwas deliberation were Anti galization, benevolent formed at Baltimore, Maryland, 4 January, societies, education, and the religious situa- 1908, by twenty-twoyoung French*Ameri- tion, and the spirit of thenumerous and for- cans who were students in various universi- cible addresses madeon these heads is fit- ties of that city. This organization aimsfirst tingly and admirably reflected in the resolu- of allto form true sons of the Catholic tione Thiscongress, undoubtedly ,the most Church and useful citizens of theAmerican successful gathering of French Americans Republic. Piety, study, and actionconstitute held up to that time, appointeda permanent its threefold motto. Its firstcongress, held at commission Consisting of the president ,of Wolcester, Massachusetts, 23 and 24 August, the congress and two delegates. from each 1908, was attended by delegates fromcir- state represented, authorizing it to take all cles formed in different New England local- 'necessary measures for putting the resolu- ities. tions of the congress into effect, and giving it the power to call anothercongress, local Besides the admirable work they haveac- or general, according to its discretion. complished by means of their parishes,press, _,- and in order to render their effortsmore ef- Besides- these general conventions, others fective, the French Americans have heldat have been held at different times and places different times conventions calledfor vari- for the purpose ofsonsiderin4a particular ous purposes. The first of these gatherings, question"'or the interests of the French destined to promote the interests of themu- Americans of a particular stateor diocese. tual benefit societies then existing,and held For in§tance,the French Americans of under their auspices, took place at New Connecticut have held eighteen conventions York City, in 1865. Thereafter similarcon - inthelasttwenty-three years.Political ventions were held annually, theyear 1877 organizations have *Igoflourished among excepted, until 1881, as follows: 1865, New citizensof 'French-Canadian, origin,and York; 1869,Detroit;1873, Bid&ford, naturalization clubs can be found inevery Maine; 1866, New York; 1870, St. Allmins, city, town, or village where theyare suf- Vermont; 1874, New York; 1867 Troy; ficient in number to maintain such institu, 1871, Worcester, Mass.; 1875, Glens Falls, tio .In June, 1906,, therewas organized N. Y.; 1868, Springfield, Mass.; 1872, Chi- ,,, inhe State of Maschusetts the. Club Re- cago, Ill.; 1876, Holyoke, Mass.; 1878, Troy, p blicain Franco-Am6ricain, with headquar- N. Y.; 1879, Boston, Mass.; 1880, Northamp- ers at Boston, at the first banquet of which, ton, Mass.; 1881, Lawrence, Mass. Since in April, 1907, Hon. Charles J. Bonaparte, 1880 there have been six generaaconventions a member of the Roosevelt Cabinet, was the

46 4 34

guest of honour. The French-Americans, in ent time, prominent amongthose who serve 1890, had 13 representatives in the Legisla- the country abroad are the followingFrench tures of Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Americans: Arthur M. Beaupre.(Illinois), Island, Connecticut, and New Hampshire, Envoy Extraordinary and MinisterPlenipo- besides numerous public servants in the city tentiary to the Netherlands;Alphonse Gau- councils and the municipal administrations; lin (Rhode Island), Consul-Generalat Mar- in .1907, they elected senators inMaine, Mas- seilles, France; Eugene L. Belisle(Massachu- France; Pierre P. i sachusetts, and Rhode Island; their represen- setts), Con 11 air Limoges, tatives in New England numbered,. in 1907, Demers (w Hampshire),Consul at Bahia, asfollows: Brazil;.seph Alithier (Rhode Island), Con at Guadeloupe, West Indies. Representatives Senators In chid life, belongint to thegeneration Maine 5 2 though their .. 6 departed for a better world, Massachusetts. of New Hampshire.. 18 name's are still present to the memory Connecticut 2 their fellow-citizens and compatriots, were Mass., the Rhode Island ... . 4 2 'Ferdinand Gagnon, of Worcester, father of French Americanjournalism; Dr. a total of 5 Senatorsand 35 Representa- L. J. Martel; of Lewiston,Maine, his worthy tives. In many instances their candidates for associate in the advancementof the Flrench high political honours have been successful American elementinthe New England at the polls. Such haS been the casewith the States; Major Edmond Mallet, ofWashington, Hon. Pierre Broussard, Congressmanfrom D. C., recognized as an authority uponthe Louisiana; the Hon. Aram J. Pothier,of history of the North-West, andwhose library Woonsocket, R. I., elected governor of his (preserved intact by L'UnionSt-Jean-Baptiste state in November, 1908, afterhaving been d'Amerique) is the largest and most com- ?; lieutenant-governor and mayor of his city; plete collection of documentsrelating to the the Hon. 'AdelardArchambault, also of French Americans ever ,gathered;Frederic Woonsocket, and who has likewise filled the Houde and Antoine Mousette,pioneer jour- offices of lieutenant-governor and mayor; nalists; Judge Joseph LeBoeuf,of Cohoes, Judge Joseph A. Breaux, of Louisiana;Pierre N. Y.; Pierre F. Peloquin, ofFall River, Bonvouloir, of Holyoke, Mass., whose ser- Mass., and a score of otherswho for years vice as city treasurer covers a periodof fif- had been foremost among theircompatriots 4 teen consecutive years;Hugo A. Dubuque, as championsof their rights, both civil and of Fall River, Mass., ex-member ofthe Mas- religious. Legislature, and citysolicitor] sachusetts the French Alex. L. Granger, of Kankakee, Ill.,district To sum up, the record of has been attorney; Aime E. Boisvert, ofManchester, Americans in their new country native origin, N. H., district attorney; and Arthur S.Hum, sucho,that , prominent men of of Plattsburg, N. Y., also district attoniey. writers and politicians of note,have sung Studying an earlier period, wefind the their praise on more than oneoccasion. In remember the mines of Pierre Menard, firstLieutenant- this respect, one will readily Governor of Illinois; the Rev.Gabriel Ri- homage paid them upon differentoccasions chard, second Congressman fromMichigan by the late Senator Hoar, ofMassachusetts, (the only Catholic priest who ever satin as well as themarks of high esteem liown Congress), and Louis Vital Bougy, United them by'governors and membersof Congress,. 1908, Senator States Senator from Wisconsin. Atthe pres- As recently as 20 March,

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Henry Ca otoce, of Massachusetts, speak- broad sense, Americans for ing generations, «Immigration» before theBoston and their comtg to the UnitedStates, City Club, made the followingstatement: ismerely a rgovement ofAmericans across hn imaginary line, fromone part Later than any of these (movementsof of America to another. immigration) was the Immigration of French Canadian's, but which has as- In truth, the sentimentof hostility and sumed large proportions, andhas be- sus- come a strong and most valuable ele- ,picion, which rebuked the FrenchAmericans' ment, of ourpopulation. But the at their arrival in the republic,has subsided French of Canada scarcelycome within before their splendid conductand magnifi- the subject we are considering,because cent spirit, and is replaced todayby that they arc hardly to be classedas immi- tribute of respect which mankindacknowl- grants in the accepted ense. Theyrepre- edges as due, andnever fails Co grant, to sent one of the ofst settlements on men of talent,industry, generosity, and this continent. Thy have been, in the patriotisnt

ti

48 -'d

36 theNew Catholic Encyclopedia of 1967 carried anarticl by Maso ade based on 's article is not an entire lifetime ofacademic interest in the Franco-American only brimming over with information,but the facts are laced togetherwith the sure and in- hand of a scholar of North Americanhistory-and highlighted by the experience of the Catholic sight of his French-Canadian studies.It is to be noted that in this edition Encyclopedia the section on the religious lifeof the Franco-Americans treatsforthright- ly, if not in depth, the controversieswith the Irish-Americans, withProtestant proselyt- ism and with the authorities in theCatholic church.

I

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J 49.

r FRENCH AND FRENCHCANADIANS IN THE U.S.

by Mason Wade a.

J

\Theseveral million Americans of French in turn despaired of enumerating the scat- or French-Canadian origin, who are among tered, shifting population of the hinterlands the oldest Americans of European stock, are of New France, , and Louisiana: the for the most part human vestiges of the vast U.S. census did not make any distinction be- continental French empire in North America. tween English and French-Canadians until The Catholic tradition of this extensive region I 890;land the Canadian emigration records goes back to the days of the French regime, similarly make'no distinction. Thousands of formissionaries always accompanied the individuals have titl Rely disregarded border French explorers and sometimes preceded formalities, refrding all of North America them, and the French outposts were mission as their own while unilingualism on centers as well as trading and militaly posts. one side and bilingualism on the other have At the time of the French cession of Canada confused the is.sue., The number. of Franco- in1763 some 80,000 French were to be Americans of Canadian stock is probably found in the French possessions: 60,000 in four or five times the figure of 1,106,159 New France, 10,000 Acadians (of whom reported in the U.S. Census of 1930. some 7,000 had been dispersed among the English colonies in1755), and 10,000 in Acadlans and Other Early Settlers.The Louisiana,inadditiontoabout 50,000 mingling of the French-Canadian and U.S. who had found homes in the populations began with the expulsion (1755) English colonies. of 6,000 or 7,000 Acadians from their homes on the Bay, of Fundy, which had come under Most Franco-Americans, as they generally British rule by the Treaty of Utrecht (1713). call theitiselves,are of French-Canadian origin, These Acadians were deported to the English for there were only 633,807 immigrants to colonies from Massachusetts to Georgia, the U.S. from France between 1820 and 1950, while. another 3,000 or 4,000 took refuge while French-Canadians pro ly made up from the continuing English manhunt in the more than one third of the total 0 77,446 woods of and surrounding areas. immigrants from Canada during the same Some of the deportees eventually made their period, and more Than one half of the90,,367 way over the Appalachians to the French of French stock reported in the U.S. Celisys settlement /of Louisiana and the Middle of 1790. The statistical probleM remains un- West, while Others drifted back home after solvable,for while the censuses cif ;:the 18th the peace treaty of 1763, many of them set- century may be assumed to be fairly accurate tling in the St. John Valley of Maine and in for the St. Lawrence Valley and the i'ew --INew Brunswick. Some remained hi-the E Orleans districts, French and British offtcials,1)lish colonies to swell the French populati

37 50 38

whose nucleus was the HuOenot immigrants Franco-American newspapers that have since who had been barred from New France since appeared and for the most part disappeared. 1628. About 1,600 Acadians who went to Continued agricultural depression and the France under the terms of the Peace of 1763 decline of the St. Lawrence timber trade were brought to Louisiana as settlers in1785, drove an increasing number of Frelicb-Cana- where tl ey were reunited with 3,000 or 4,000 dians to emigrate (luringthe 1840s and earlier Ac dian refugees who had found their 1850s. way there from the English,colonies orthe Frenoh Antilles. These were the forebears of Early Settlers of Louisiana and the West. the , who are,still predominant in the The history of the French population of the bayou country. area and Mississippi Valley is less clear and less well documented than that of The broughtlin- the main body of French-Canadians in the St. other, though far smaller, migration from Lawrence Valley. Under the Quebec, for some 150 French-Canadians, (1763), the middle of the Mississippi was es- largely from the Richelieu Valley, who had tablished as the new boundary between the made common cause with invading Ameri- British colonies and Louisiana, which had not can forces in 1775 and 1776, wereforced to been included in the cession of NewFrance. flee after the collapse of the invasion. They But France had already ceded Louisiana to received land grants in northern New York Spain under the secr,Et Treaty of Fontain-. ... in the Refugee Tract and in the Western Re- bleat' (1762). Though the transfer of Louisi- serve, thus foundingFranco-American com- ana to Spain was kept secretuntil 1764, munities whose numbers increased as casual orders were immediately sent from Paris to immigrants folldwed the Champlain-Riche- the commanders of the posts east of theMis- lieu-St. Lawrence trade route. Crop failure sissippi to evacuate their garrisons as soon as overpopulation of the old seigniories aloe the British arrived to take over.Many of the the Richelieu and St. Lawrence, andpopular French colonists of Kaskaskia, St. Philippe, dissatisfattion. withGovernor Sir James and Fort Chartres crossed the Mississippito Craig's anti-French «reign of terror» in Low- St. Genevieve on the west' bank, whilethose er Canada (1807-11)produced 4 swelling at Cahokia moved across theriver to Pierre stream of southward migration.Three hun- Laclede's new settlement of St. Louis at the dred French-Canadian families crossed the. Mouth of the Missouri. Under Spanish rule border into Vermont in 1808; and the arrival St. Louis remained French In all respects,ex="--- of immigrants from Quebec was reported at cept for the presence of of fewSpanish offi- Winooski, Vt., in 1814; at Woonsocket, R.I., 'dais and the partial use of Spanish in afew in the sametear; at Manchester, N.H., in official documents. 1830, at Lewiston, Maine, in 1831; and at Southbridge, Mass.,ln 1.832. The rebellions of The French population oflowervtiiuisi- 1837 and 1838 in Lower Canada forced Ana, for the most part drawnfrom France or/ others to seek political refuge in Vermont (he Antilles, was swollen by the arrival of re- and New York, with Swanton, St. Albans, fugee Acadians. The French in Louisiana Burlington, and Saratoga serving as head- stubbornly resisted Spanish. rule from itsin- quarters for the patriote fugitives.Ludger stitution'in1766; Louisiana remained a Duvernay, the founder of the St. Jean Bap- French colony at heart,lough it was under tiste Society of Montreal, began on Aug.7, Swish rule for 34 yeariTin the secretTreaty 1839, publication of Le Patriote Canadien at of San Ildefonso (1800) Napoleonfinally Burlington, thefirst of more than 200 persuaded Spain to retrocede Louisiana to

51 *W. Ar

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France. 's ofa colonial em- these explorers' records indicates how much pire came to an end with the sale of theter- they were indebted to the Frenchvoyageurs ritory to the U. S. in 1803. Southwestern or mountain men who guided them over the Louisiana remains more French thanany age-old Indian trails. k other part of the U. S., and the VieuxCarre of New Orleans- rivals Quebec Cityas a living Immigrants of the Later 19th Century. memorial of the French empire inNorth A new wave of French immigrationto the America. Middle West began in the 1840s, when the lumber and copper booms in Michigan, Min- The chief trading postson the Great nesota, and Wisconsin attracted Canadians Lakes, Niagara, Detroit, and Mackinac,which from the overcrowded St. Lawrence Valley. passed into U.S. hands when theBritish final- By t840, 1,000 French-Canadian families ly gave up the Western Posts in 1796,long pre- ha& located in KankakeeCounty, 50 miles served a French flavor. As late asi 860a tour- south of Chicago, Ill., and in the 1850sRev. ist found the French languagedominant in Charles Chiniquy ledmany of his followers the Detroit marketplace andon both sides of to Bourbonnais after he was disciplined by" 41 the St. Clair River. Therewere other French Bpilgnace Bourget. Many French-Canadians colonies at the lesser posts of Sault SainteMa.- settled also in the sawmill townson the east rie, Green Bay, Fort St. Joseph (SouthBend), shore of Lake Michigan, and others found Fort Wayne, Utica, Peoria, and StarvedRock, vmployment in the copper mines along the while along the Wisconsin and St. CroixRiv- south shore of Lake Superior. The California ers French groups were to be found at Fort gold rush of 1849 attractedmany French- St. Croix, Fort Pepin, Fort Winnebago,Fort Canadians; the 1860 census 'indicated the .St. Nicholas, and Prairie du Chien. presencethereof 5,000 Canadian-born. Quebec records reveal how the gold fever Thet.S. was manned princip- swept the depressed St. Lawrence towns, ally by French-Canadians, although capital threatening to depopulate Trois-Rivieres. and management were for the mostpart in the hands of English-speaking settlers. French By far the largest influx of French Cana-. names, often hopelessly corrupted as in the dians to the U. S. after 1850was to New- case of the Picketwire (La Purgatoire) River England, which by the end of thecentury of southern Colorado, commemoratecount- seemed to anxious , in danger of be- less French mountain men who carriedon coming at last part of New France, despite the fur trade on the plains and in the Rockies. their ancestors' victories over the French and All who spoke French and. had Fiench names' Indians. About the middle of thecentury were commonly called Canadians, though the migration from Quebec, whichat first some had come to the West via New OrleanS had been seasonal, began to becomeperma- directly from Fsarceor. the Antilles. The nent and to increase as the newcomers found slendernumbers16' of theoriginal French steady work in the brickyards and- textile traders .and' settlers in the Westwere soon factories of New England's expanding indus- swelled by Metis or halfbreeds, whowere trial economy. Between 1857 and 1863 the particularly valuable to.Dthe fur trade because migration dropped, thanks to prosprrity 'in df their Indian connections. The historyof Canada brought by the Reciprocity Treaty the opening up of the American West is of 1854, the construction of railroads, and ofttn centeredon the great names of Lewis the Crimean War. The Civil War also checked and Clark, Wilson Hunt, Robert Stuart, and the flow, and from 1860 to, 1864 the total John C. Fremont, but an,, exmination of number of Canadian immigrants dropped 'to

52. 40

10,958, the lowest figure since 1844. drawn from Quebec. By June 1873 it was es- timated that one-fourth and perhaps one- But the Civil. War had contrasting effects third of Quebec's farmlands were unculti- on what was now an established patternof vated becanse of the desertion of farm fam- *migration. Onthe one hand, Britian's neu- ilies and the shortage of laborers. trality and proclamation of fines or imprist mullein for Canadians who violated the For- Rev. P.E. Gendreau, appointed-by the Ca- eign Enlistment Act, backed by the-guebec nadian government to investigate thenumber bishops' warnings against the religious gangers of Canadian-born residents of the U.S. and the of foreign and by. American possibility of repatriating them, estimated in advice to remain at home until employment 1873 that approximately 400,000 French -Ca= N.) opportunities improVed in the New England nadians were living in the U.S.: 200,000 in mill towns, induced many French-Canadians New England; 150,000 in the Midwest; and to remain at home or to return there from 50,000 «scattered.» Gustave-Lanctot estimat- New England. the other hand, many ed that 200,000 more crossed.the border be-. wereattracted e liberal bounties offered tween 1870 and 1890. It is probable that, at for enlistment after the first year of the war, least 500,000 French-Canadians migrated to which by the end of the conflict totaled as the U.S. between 1865 and 1890, and perhaps much as $1,000. «Crimpers» also were par- half a million more between 1905 and 1929, ticularly active in Lower Canada\ (Quebec) a period when Canadianimmigration again be- recruiting for the , using Money, came heavy. In 1940 the U.S. censusreported drink, and other inducements. Estimates of the number of French-Canadians born in Ca- the number ofFrench- Canadians who served nada or of Canadian-born or mixed parentage in the Union Army (few joined the Confed- as 908,000. This figure, of course,does not .erate forces) vary widely, with 20,000 prob- take into account the descendants of earlier ably nearer the truth than the traditional in- immigrants. flated estimates of 30,000 to 40,000. Small as the wartime migration was, it paved the CAUSES. The causes of the great exodus way for the great exodus from Quebec that from Quebec in the lat terpart of the 19th cen- developed in the postwar years and contin- tury were primarily economic, though politi- ued until the 1890s, when prosperity re- cal and social factors may have had some in- turned to Canada. fluence. The Amekan abrogation of the Rec- iprocity Treaty in 1866 deprivedthe.Quebec INCREASE AFTER THE CIVIL WAR. The farmer, who was already beset by exhausted total migratibn from Canada increased six- soil and overdivided lands, of his natural mar- fold to 101,020 from 1865 to 1869; doubled ket and reduced him to a subsistence econo- againto198,693 from 1870 to1874;t my that was notsufficient for large families. slumped to 125,611 during the depression The financial panic.of 1873heighte1eda de- years of 1875 to 1879; and reached a peak pression that prevailed in Canada until the of. 454,460 from 1880 to 1884, which was opening of the West in the 1890s. The decline not surpassed until 1920 to 1924 when of the St. Lawrence timber trade and the slow 526,853 Canadians sought refuge in the U.S. development of industry, which provided on- from postwar depression in Canada. How ly 200,000 jobs between 1839 and 1939, much of this total Canadian migration was forced the French-Canadian to emigrate «not made up of French-Canadians cannot be de- in quest of a higher standard of living but to termined precisely, but there is abundant avoid a lower,» according to the seventh cen- evidence that a very large part of it was sus of Canada.

53 41

A rapidly expanding Irandthe devel- opposed the migration to New England from

opment of a national markfor New England . the start, favoring agricultural pioneering in industries provided the employmentoppor- Quebec or The U.S. Midwest instead,onle tunities that were lacking in Canada. This grounds (balsas day laborers in citie anS was particularly true of the textile mills, factory towns, the emigrants lost everything whose machinery ran night and day to meet that Canadians held dearest: religion, lan- the demand for cottons and woolens,and guage, and nationality. whose Managers welcomed the newcomers who were willing to work from dawn to dusk Not until 1869 did the Quebec bishops for lower wages than the Yankee farmgirls answer Bishop Goesbriand's reiterated 'appeal and Irish immigrants who inturn had pro- for priests. In that year eight French-Canadian vided the earlier labor force. Theheavy priests went to New England to workamong manpower losses of the Civil War and the the emigrants, and these pioneerswere soon postwar-westward movement began thede- followed by other diocesan priests andmem- cline of the native New England stock, which bers of religious orders. The Oblates of Mary was increasingly replaced by inunigrants. In Immaculate played a predominant role-with most of the New England mill towns «Little missionary centers in 41,urlington and Lowell Canadas» sprang up, whichsoon came to (Mass.), as well as three parishes in northern provide a major element in the totalpopu- New York. The Dominicans establishedpar- lation. By 1900 French-Canadians madeup ishp inLewiston, Maine, and Fall -River, 30 per cent of the Massachusetts textile Mass.; while 'the Marists took over St. Anne's, workers and more than 60per cent of those Lowell(1882);Notre-Dame-des-Victoires, in NeVampshire and Maine. Boston, Mass. (1884), and St. Bruno's, Van Buren, Maine. Nuns and brothers of manyor- French-Canadian Religious and Social ders soon followed to staff the schools, hos- Life. In the absence of appropriatecensus in- pitals, and other institutions. Eventually clas- formation, the founding of French parishes sical colleges, such as Assumption in Worces- provides the best index' of French-Canadian ter, Mass., and Rivier in Hudson, N.H. were development, for from the first the parish founded. provided 'the basic social unit for the immi- grants. The first French parish iii;New Eng- FRENCH -IRISH CONFLICTS. One great land, St. Joseph's, was established at Burling- stimulus to the foundation of French parishes ton, Vt., in 1850 as a result of the Canadians' in New England was the friction between determination to have a church of theirown. French-Canadian immigrants and their Irish The Quebec bishops had long turned a deaf coreligionisk which was reportedas early as ear to reiterated appeals from thAbishop of the middle tf thelP.tWeentury, and produced Boston for Canadian priests for Vermont some of the Iiitt6es1episodeg in the Catholic, and Maine: In 1828 Bp. Benedict J. Fenwick annals of New Erg add when the Irish' hier- was unable to obtain a single French-Canadiali, archy opposed the tinuatioh of national priest, and in response to his second appeal parishes. Though Frenteh and Irish shared the in 1841 Bishop Bourget replied that he could samefaith ,their differences of religiouscus- do no more than send a priest to northern"' toms, parochial habits, and temperament, as New England three or four times ayear:. well as language, were so great thatone When Bp. L. de Goesbriand, first bishop of Franco-American priest wondered whether Burlington, took charge of his see in 1853, God was goinito separate them in heaven. he appealed vainly to Quebec for French- vt.. speaking priests. The Quebec clergy had Though the earlier Irish immigrant had

54 42 been looked.down upon by the Yankee as a mixed parishes in which- both French and «foreign papist,» he spoke the language of Englip were -used: The parish has remained the country -andsoon made himself at the bulwarkof, the Franco-American's re- home. The 'Irish tended. to look down in turn markable desistance to assimilation in the upon the later French-Canadian immigrant general population, which surpasses thatof because he spoke another language, refused any other Americanimmigrant group. to change his native ways, and waswilling to work harder and longer for lower wages. For While New England and northern New his part the French-Canadian immigrant, ac- York were the chief destinations of emigrants customed to a well-endoWed, semi-established from Quebec, there is evidence that consider- Church in Quebec, found new economic bur- able numbers were sin( attracted to- the Mid- dens iwpracticing his religion in the U.S. His west, where Chicago, Detroit, Bay City, and. reluctance to contribute from his hard-earned Crookston became notable Franco- merican wages, which sometimesamounted to only centers. Employers who had becomefamiliar $4 a week for 6 days-of dawn todusk labor, with the good qualities of French-Canadian coupled with the fact that he was crowding workers actively recruited them. But the the churches built at bitter cost by theearlier most effective recruiting agent was theemi- ti Irish immigrants, made him unpopular with grant himself, by means of his lettershome and his occasional visits to his native village, Irish pastors, often insensitive to French sus- 3 ceptibilities. There was a temperamental in- where, dressed in city clothes, he personified compatibility between French-Canadian and success impthe U.S. His penchantfor:making Irishman, reinforced by eachgroup's chosen invidious comparisons between his new way people complex, strong group consciousness, of life and the old bit was still being satirized and mutual aid tendencies, which led tothe in the 1940s in Quebec's most popular soap demand for separate French parishes as soon opera, laude Grignon's Un homme et son astheFrench-Canadians were numerous peche. enough to support them, NATIVISTCONFLICTS. Therapid Worcester and WoonAcket were theonly growth of the Franco-American group in New England centers that frad French colo- New England did not take place without nies nearly as old asBurlington's,and French friction with the Yankee populace, TheCana- parishes were established I in these citiesin dian immigration first took on notable pro- 1869 and 18'73. But soon-Waterville,Lewis- portions at the time when anti-Catholicfeel- ton,and Biddefdrd, Maine; Manchester, ing explOded in the form of «Know-Nothing- Nashua, Supcolok, Rochester, a Berlin, ism» (1854-56). The «Protestant Crusade» N.H.; Lowell,..1awrence, Lynn,Salem,Fitch- of the 1850s was professedly sectarian, but burg, Gardiner, Spencer, Holyoke,North- itrested also upon the political basis of amptort, Adams, Pittsfield, Taunton, and changing institutions and upon the;economic Fall River, Mass.; Providence, Center Falls, basis of the immigrant's challenge to the in- and Pa*tucket, R.1.; and Putnam,Williman- dividual Yankee's security. The troubles of th tic,Meriden, and Waterbury, Conn., had the French-Canadians were increased by ,«Little Canadas,» which establishedFrench hostility of Irish Catholics who were not e parishes. By 1891 there were 86?Franco - thusiastic about the establishment of foreign- American parishes, with 53 parochial schools language (national) parishes and schools. The attended by 25,000 children. Suchparishes Irish believed the rapid Americanizationof numbered more than 100 by 1900, and178 foreign-born Catholics mould relieve anti- by 1948, along with 197Tscanco-American Catholic feeling. The rigidauthoritarianism

-.55 , ti 43

r. '46 of some Iris!) prelates and pastorsacting on missionaries played a part. The crusadewas these princi6les gratedon the individualistic stimulated in part by the influx of Scotch French- Canadians, whose insistenceon pre- Irish from Canada and Britian, whose clerical serving their language andcustoms, whose leaders regarded the French Protestsas cohesive tendencies, and whoselove of the useful allies, as they had baietkiin Canada. full measure of religious solemnityseparated Rev,. Calvin E. Amaron,son o iss Baptist them from those whom theycame to call -missionaries in Quebec, head of the French 'lire «Irish assimilators.». Protestant InternationalCollege in $pring- field, Mass., editor of Le Semeur Franco- VT-tATERNALSOCIETIES. In addition -American, and pastor of the French Protes- toestablishingtheir own churches and tants of Lowell, was the foreigner' who schools,the Franco-Americans earlydis- sounded Ale loudest nativist trumpet. His played a tendency to organize theirown fra-. bobks, The Evangelization of the French- ternal and 'insurance societies, of whichthe Canadians (1885)' and Your Heritage: giek Societe de Jacques Cartier.( 848) and the So-, New England Thteatened'(1891), put into cute de St-Jean-Baptiste of-Slew York (1850) print the dark fears that haunted YankeeS. were the first. By 1869 there were 17 such be- Amaron, outlined measures to keep New nevolent svcieties, in which membershipwas England .«Protestant and Aniericah,includ- restricted Jo: French CApolics. Subsequently, Mg the establishment of separate French lore than 400were established. Many of Protestant churches to bring the Franco- these societies became federated in organiza- Americans «into contact with Protestant in-. tions that! ld national conventions,to which fluences, and this is all that isnecessary to leading Quebec political and religious figuits make of then true Christian citizens, loyal came tp speak and to renew the participants' to the Constitution of the nation.» ties with Quebec. Franco-American leaders attended similar gatherings in Quebec. The This movement, at first mainlya Con- great Montreal St-Jean-Baptiste Day celebra- gregationalist effort and thena Baptist one, -?* tion in 1874, attended by 10,000 Franc was notably unsuccessful,. for religitm wns Americans and the leaders of their national identified with ethnic status and griffin) loyal- societies, disturbed some Yankees by itme- tytoan unusually great extent for the velation of the number of the- iinmigrantS Franco-American.Survivancepreservation and their divided loyalties,as did such slogans of religion, language, and customs- -had be; as the Franco-American journalist Ferdinand come an obsession with the French-Canadians Gagnon's«Loyaux,oui,maisFrancais as a result of their struggle since 1760 to toujours.». At first both the clergy and the maintain their identity under British rule. "lizigdersof the national societiesopposed The Protestant missionary effort probably naturalization, but the 17thnational conven- did more to strengthen the'cohesive tenden- tion, held at Plattsburgh, N.Y., in 1886,re- cies of the Franto-American, and to stimulate solved in favor of «naturalization without nativism and anti-Catholicism amongthe assimilation.» Naturalization clubs,were sub- Yankees, than to win converts. sequently foni*d in the Franco-American center's. NATIONALIST CONFLICTSRESOLVED. The troubles over national parishesat Fall PROTESTANT PkOSELY'11§,kf.. There- River (1884-86), at Danielson, Conn.,(1894- alization fiat New Englandwas becoming in 96), and at North Brookfield, Mass.,(1899), good part French-Canadian- rouseda' new were outbreaks of a .conflict that was latent nativist reaction, in which French Protestant almost everyWhere in New England. Allthree

v

56 44

incidents reflected a hardening of the Franco- content to be merely transplantedFrench- American desire for priests of their own lan- Canadians and soon became integrated into guage and ethnic origin. The Americanhier- American life. Since 1900 the Franco-Ameri- archy of the day was divided on the question can record in industry,business, government, of territorial vs. national parishes. One group and .military: service has completely refuted sought to hasten the assimilation of Catholic the 19th-centunonativises dire forebodings. immigrants amuch as Riossible; the other Frictions continue in the ecclesiastical world, favored the conservation of theareign heri- but the Franco-American has become as typ- tage in national parishes under priests of the ical in New England as the vanishingYahkee same stock, while .encouraging. thedevelop- and the well- established Irishman. In other ment of patriotism to the adopted country. harts of the U.S. the Franco-American often Although the issue was settled by in goes unrecognized as such,for nowhere out- favor of the assimilative party in 1896, there side New England has survivance been sup- have since been major difficulties involving ported by such an array of religious andmilr French parishes in Maine and Rhode Island, socialinstitutions,oftenassistedfrom and the tendency in New England to turn Quebec. Recent efforts fro'in. Quec to re- national parishes intolerritorial ones contin- unite the Franco-Americans with the French- ues to be fiercely resistedby the'Franco- Canadians by cultural ties have not found ,American old guard, the so-called patriotes. much support even in New England. As early as 1908 Sen.Henry Cabot Lodge declared The former drearh of some nationalist that the Franco-Americans weje hardly tobe leaders who sought to create a New Quebec classed as immigrants, because «they have in New England has been doomed, however, been, in the broad sense, Americans for gen- by the attitude of Rome and of the American erations, and their coming to the U.S, is hierarChy, by the end of massive immigration merely a movement of Americans across an from Quebec, and by the growing American- imaginary line, from one part of America to ism of-the Franco-Americans, who were not another .»_

S.

fr 45;

Bibliography

p No single work is both comprehensive and objective. Brebncr, J. B. and M. L. Hansen. 1940.The Mingling The following are good introductions to the subject. of the Canadian and American Peoples.New Haven. L'Association Canado-Americain. 1936.Les franco- 4 americains peints par eux-memes.Montreal. Ducharme, J. 1943.The Shadows of the Trees.New York. Benoit, J. 1935.L'Arne franco-amoricaine.Montreal. Lanctot, G. (ed.) 1941.Les Canadions-francais et leers voisins du Sud.New Haven.

Special Studies

Brouillette, B. 1939.La Penetration du continent Podea, L'A. 1950. «Quebec to Little Canada.»ibid. americain par les canadlOns-francais, 1763- 23(September):365-380. 1846.M treal. Robert, A. 1952.lnventaire franco-americain.Man- Caron, I. 19 g . Plessis et les &Critics catho- chester; N. H. liques des nis.»Transactions of the Royal Society of Canada.Vol. 23. Rumilly, R.1955. Histoire des Frarico-Americains. Montreal. Ilam, E. B.1939. «,Fkench National Societies in New England.»New England Quarterly-12 1955.Histoire des Acadiens.Montreal, 2 vols. (June): 315-322. Wade, M. 1950.The French Parish and 'Survi- ---. 1938. «Journalism and the French Survival vance'.»American Catholic Historical Review. in New England.»ibid.(March):89-107. -Iv 26(J uly):163 -189.

Statistics /I

Langlois, G. 1935.Histoire de la population cana- Truesdell, L. E. 1943.The Canadian-Born in the dienne-francaise.Montreal, 2nd edition. U.S.New. Haven.

Statistical Abstract of the U.S.1964. Washington.

AO%

O 4. v,ov, 1. The forced migration of the Aced /ens In the last half of theeighteenth century has never been more clearlydelineated than in the following selection by Robert LeBlanc, first published In the December, 1967 Issue of Cahiers dc Geographiede Ou 4bee. LeBlanc provide* a most useful geographical pervective on the history of anImportrint segment of the Franco-Amerkan popttion.

4

1

L 4*. J ACAIANMIGRATIONS

by Robert LeBlanc

4

r INTRODUCTION tions, their ephemeral homes and their final settlement pattern. The cultural diversity of people and shifting national boundaries have often led, to political instability by the creation of THE SITUATION OF kADIA and exclaves of Minority groups. One measure by which such problems may be re- Acadia was settled b rench colonists solved is the forced migrations of peoples early in the 17th century. Its location; along across international boundaries. Perhaps the the littoral of the Bale Francaise (Av. of most recent and well-known example of this- Fundy) is important to an understanding of were the measures taken in the Central Euro- its history (See Map 1). First, Acadia was peanShatter Beltfollowing World War II isolated from,,,the major French settlement in to eliminate the minority problems that ex- the St. Lawrence Valley. There was little isted there before/the War. The colonial his- contact between the two andthere gradually tory of North America prdvides a compara- emerged a cultural distinctiveness despite the blesituation:During the course of to common antecedents of both groups. Acadi- -French struggle for control of North an contact with France was at a minimum. America,new boundary was placed on the There was little increment to the Acadian political map of the continent. The Acadi- population via immigration from France af- ins, French and Catholic, formerly within the ter 1671 (Richard, 1895: 32). Frenchcolonialempire suddenly found themselves political members of the English More important was the location of empire. The political instability generated by Acadia relative to the New England colonies. this new status eventually led to their expul- In a sense the French and the English faced sion in 1755, 'on the eve of the cutninathlg each other from the opposite sides of a lake struggle between the English and the French. '(the Gulf of Maine) which provided easy ac- For many years thereafter; the Acadianex- cessibility. Some relatively peaceful contacts iles sought either repatriation or a new getierd0 ofa cmhmercial nature were made: homeland. They moved across the map al- Although the Atadianswere primarily agricul- ways seeking but seldom finding a perma- turists, they carried on some fishing activi- nent home. Their efforts toward repatriation ties and as a result, contact and sometimes were ultiMately frustrated. Not until 1800 conflicts occurred with the New Englanders did 'theAcadiansfinallyachieve some on the fishing banks. Increasingly, .Acadia measure of locational stability: Thispaper becime1 a battlefield for the English and will concern itself with the Acadian migra- French:- The Freitth garrison,at LOuisburi

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9 ACADcrAN MIGRATIONS AlIaRATIONS AcADIErVES 1749-1754

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- was often the military objective but the vul-. lated. Those who were forcibly removed nerablei position of Port-Royal, the major were distributed throughout -the American Acadian settlement in the 17th century, colonies where, they 'were not as a general made it 'the object of plunder by flew En- ,rulegiven a very cordial welcome. 'The glanders on several different occasions. By Virginia colony 4cat public expense»soon *the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713. Acadiawas shipped off to Englaiid its allotment of cededto the English, and the Acadianswere :1,100 exiles. South Carolina and eorgia made, nominal subjects of the Biltish Crown. made no effort to prevent (and in someses I aided) the Acadians in their a With the peace there begana period of return to Acadia b Some few exi es prosperity for the Acadians. Their number Ivere able to pe and made their way increased from 2,000 in 1710 to 8,000 in gverland t .John River (New Bruns- 1719 ( Rameau, 1177: 354). New settlements wick). Ot most of the, exiles w re were formed at the northernmost extremi- scittered,throughout the colonies, disperbed ties of the Bale- Frimoise. As, the Acadian in small groups-in many towns.

population grew, .so did the _anxety of the.

English. ,The tenuous English control of During this period nearly zpoo Acadians 1\ Acadia Wasighlighted by the potential removed themselves to the refuge area of Ile threat of rene ed hostilities with the French Saint-Jean. Another .1,5'00 sought ,refuge in and the facthat their recalatrant French the area. With _the exception of subjects refu to .take an oath.of allegiance this latter gtoup which was soon established to the English rown. The events. leading up on, the seigneuries of the St. Lawrence, the to the expulsion lame increasinglycom Acadians were- in places which would not ,plex and cannot be dealt with here. Suffice provide a permanent home. To the fear and it to say that Governor Lawrence-made the distrust of 'the English colonists for the decision without the approval of the, English Acadians we must add the, ambition of the government.' In latesummer and, fall of exiles to aye their prison -pe homes. For 1755 the exile wascarried,out. those who sought on Ile Saint-Jean it was to be but a temporary ome. THE MIGRATIONS 1755-1757 P THEP MIGRATIONS 1758-1762 Of the total of 16;000 Acadians in 1755,. only 50%*wert under English jurisdidioa The major migrations during the period (LeBlanc, 1V44 see Map 2). He Ro ale 1758-1762 are illustrated on, ap 4. Most of (Cape BretOn),Ileltut-Jean (Prince and themovements,took place in Acadia and Island),iteVeIF.day "New Brunick French Canada. PoliSical and military events were retai yothe French in 1713. These were rapidly reaching, the culminating point were notttiet4110:43144Sof Acadian settle- inthe Anglo-French Strugglefor North mentit ser.V.,., a refuge for many who America. ,, fledt(large 4e:ttlemedts in-anticipation, es- . pecially in the petiodt-1749-1754 (Harvey, In July of 1758, the fort at Louisburg 1926: 133-3f). Approximately 7,000 Acadi- fell to the English and with it fell the hopes ans were exiled; the remaining 1,000 fled to of the nearly 51000 Acadian refugees on Ile safety. Map 3 shows the salient features Saint-Jean and Ile Royale. By the end of the which characterized the niigrationfriof this year, the English had embarked 3,500 of the period. First, peninsular Acadiawas dtpopu- Acadians for transport to. France. Of these, '17

73'

.r 'Oaf git

700 perished when two ships sank in an At- his plans. In June of 1760 the first contin-

-lantiestorm.. It' gent of 650 families from Boston and Rhode Island arrived to take up The vacated Acadi- The capitulation off` the French forces at an lands (Brebner, 1937), By 1763, 12,500 Quebec, in September, of 1759 gave encour- New Englanders had been successfully set- agement to some of the refugees in that city tled in oldkeedia. who sheltered the hope of returning to their homeland. More than 100 took the pre- Despite the resettlement of their,home- scribed oath of allegiance to the English king land or perhaps out oeignorance of this fact, and were\ given permission by the British au- the Acadians were continually turnipg up in ihorities to yeturn to Acadia LI,Ockp arrival in Acadia. Their grouping numbers aroused an Acadiatheywere impriienedby 'Governor anxiety in English officialdom. Lt. Governor Lawrence. Most of these Atadians as well as Belcher,.Lawrence's successor; wrote. in ask- others who had been 'captured by -British inipermission, to expel the retailing Acadi- raids at Cap de Sable and Baie des Chaleurs ans: were sent to France in 1760. - «there are man} of the Acadians in this Prov- This apparently arbitrary action on the ince 1, altfrough they have surrendered part of Governor Lawreve was not without. themses, are yet- -ever ready and watchful )41. for an opportunity ....to disturb and distress its reason. It had long Wen his plan to reset-, the;,,neW settlements lately made and those tle the vacated Acadian lands with New En- . now forming; and Lam perfectly well con-- glanders. He was determined to keep the vinced from the whole course of their- behav- Acadians -away from their original homes un- ior and' disposition/ that they cannot with any til his scheme had been achieved. The depor- safety to this province become again the in- tation of the. Acadians in January of 1760 habitants of it(cf. Akins, 1869: 321). was in fact on the very eve of the fruition of

Once again the decision,was made to re- move the Acadians. In August 1762, 1,500 Table 1Location of Acadians in 1763 t, left Halifax on five transports bound for a 1 Place Ntonber Boston. The Massachusetts legislature which had continually objected to the dumping of Vassachusetts 1,043 exiles in thetisolony, now refused to allow Connecticut 666 New York 249 the new arriglis to disembark. They subse- Maryland 810 quently were returned to Halifax. t Pennsylvania 383 ti South Carolina 280 a It was during ,this period that Acadian Georgia 185 refugees coming from the St. John River es- ett 1,249 Nova Scotia tablished settlements in the Trois-Riiieres Jphri, River 87 Louisiana ,300 district of Quebec. This.!same area was to England 866 eventually' attract' numerous refugees from France 3,4110 New England in1767. This' period also -2,000 Quebec 3 'marks the establishment of Acadians in Lou- 300 isiana. The prospect of joining with their Baie des Chaleurs 700 French brethren proved attractive to many Total 12,618 of the exiles, especially those in the southern American colonies. .----- 74

..`"-"`"7."^,7'-':'"- 63

THE MIGRATIONS 1763 -1767 North America. If there was some semblance of a return to political stability, the treaty The location of the Acadians in 1763 is meant littleto the cjrcumstances of the shown in Table 1. It has been compiled from Acadians in Nova Scotia and of themany a variety of sources and includes someesti- others returning in this period. Lt. Governor - mates- of this writer wherever figureswere Wilmot genuinely feared the Acadians. He not available. - sought permission of his superiors to send the exiles tolhe West Indies but was refused. .With:the exception of the Acadians hi The Lords of Trade insisted instead that Quebec and Louisiana, nearly allwere in lo- they be given land agreeable to th,emselves. calities where forces were opbratingto dl Of course the only land falling into this cate- tate their removal. This is reflectedon Maps gory would have been their old lands on the 5' an'd 6, As concerns the numbipiolved, Bay of Fondy, lapps which werenow occu- the migrations of thik .period tVertsec n44 .Pied by thousanili of New Englanders. only in importance to t'original expul.ion tempts to resettle the Acadians generally in1755, pie spiriatdillcationwasven The inferior lands allotted to them greatets k lab 061 the restrictions placed upon their group - 'ling led evtntually to their dissatisfactionand Acadian movements duting this period voluntary migration to the WeitIndiess Lou.- fall into Arterial-al Categories:"IFiritire isianti, and Saint-Pierre and Miquelon (re- was -a containtrxodikkof-Acaiiiiinsp taihed by France in 1763). Nova .Scatja. Parado361ilti Illiiritcurred at p JrN the saneline f,the refugees The. 900 exiles,xeturnhig- from New En- were retu ig .10 larg,knumbers, gland did, however, establish themselvessuc- pratillyo he necan corOnies. Final! cessfully and permanently along the shores lys,the Carilobelin area frame increashil6a of St. Mail's Bay, south of old Port-Royal: focus oflaclian-movements.. 410. Most of the .44011eViles remaining in the THE MIGRATIONS 1768 -1785'

Aitierican onles left 'during period. e 0 atte is made by local authorities to In 1768 there remained only two major disperse, ein in many communitieswere areas of. Acadian, instability (Map 7). WW *""n(lt successful,as the Acadians "continually 1767 the facilities of Saint-Pierre and MiquAr up in major port cities. Bostio, New Ion were so strained by the stream of refugee York, New London and Charleston servedas Acadians that some were encouraged' to ,..sughgatItering points. Large groups left Bos- leave for France. (See Map 5). It was not totigverland for Acadiaor the St. Lairtience long after their arrival in the French ports Valley. From the middle and southern colo- that many: expressed lhe desire to return to nies the movement was to the Caribbean' the tiny archipelago in the Gulf of St. Law- ',tea, either ,directly to Louisiana'orto that '-rence. 285'. made the return journey in 1768. refugee haven 'via *Santo 'Domingo. By this By 1715:tbe population of the islands num- time news of favorable treatment andpros- bered l',"500, againF plappg..a strain pit local perity of the first ariivals in Louisiana had 'resources (Most of the exiles 'had tp be sup- reached nearly all Acadians. ported by the goYernment)r A neiv turn of

6 ',- -political events provided a temporary ,solu, The Treaty, of 'Paris in 1763 ended the don to this problem. hostilities between England and France in 4tr a 4

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The sympathy of France forthe Ameri- THE FINAL SETTLEMENT PATTERN War eventual- can cause in the Revolutionary. ly led to French support of the American By theeidof the 18th century the loca- military effort in 1778. The English h retali- t ion of the Acadians had taken on some ation sent, an expedition to the strategic ar- measure of peirna,neney. Withthe exception chipelago and deported to France- 1;400 of a few subsequent moves involving small Ado:liens. By the Treaty of Versailles in numbers, the fifty year period of migrations 17831, Saint-Pierre and Miquelon wereretro; 'had come to an end. With the exception of ceded to France and soon after 600 Acadi- the,..Acafkan population of the Maritime ans returned once rude fromPrance (Lark. Provinces bas egan an accurate ecclesiastical 1803ronly estimates are available 4.4 vriere, 1924: 2: 110-315). k' Aob - census in for the numbers of each majoNrea (Rameau, France, surprisingly, 'did not serve as a 1877: 360-611. Table 2 gives an approxinie- permanent home for the exiles. The large tion of t1'Acadiap ation and its Foca- number or Acadians which arrived from He tion in 1800. Saint-Jean in 1758 was the nucleus of an ex- ile group whIch remained in France for near- 714614.-lhan 8,9; Of the' Acadians were lo- ly 30 years. In 1763 the Acadiangroupin - eated on two prat, Eastern -Canada and V lAirrisiana. Scattered elsewhere in the United . England (of the original 1,100 froni Virginia only 866. rernained) was brought to-France, States, the French ports, and the,Caribbean while some', of the Acadian arrivals from lere another 3,000. 4 Saint-Pierre and Miquelon throughout this period remained behind. Various attempts to Map 8 shows mosttof the placeswhere 'settle the Acfans in France, Corsica, the Acadlans were located in stern Canada in Falkland Islands ',and French Guava- all .1800.-Jn the three areas drsettkmeht inthe failed.. For the seater part of this period in St. Lawrence %Bey, near the, cities% of Que- France, the.exilwere supported atgovern- bec, Trois-Rivieres and Montreal, theAcadi- merit expense. Te destitution ofthe Acadi- ani generally lived side by side withFrench ids, the desire ofthe French government to Canadians. Elsewhere, along the shores of solve a 'proliemhich was a severe drain on the Baie des Chaleurs, Eastern Brunswick, the treasury, andhe eagerness o n to and Nova Scotia i the stirttlemcnis are more strengthen its claito Louisiana 'active distinctively Aoclian. One striking featura of colonization all leato the last of ajor the location of the Acadian& in maritime Acirdian migration. In 1785 more'than...,region is their absence from their oldhome- 1.,61:00 were transported to Louisiana by the it land on the sherds of Baie Francaise. Spanish .(Winzerlipg, 1955). Of. the nOw'areas-Acadian settlement Table 2 Acadian Population in 1800, following the niigrItions, none, in the course of tithe, .becamt as ,distinctive as southern Place NumberA, Louisiana (Map SR. The major areas of settle- Maritime Provinces 8;400 ment were inth4ttacappas,theppelonhsas, Quebec 8,000 along the' south OfBaton. Louisiana, 4,000 The. 1,000 Rouge,I nd along Bayou La,lourche. United tes physical isolitioeof*most of these settle- France -1,000 Not spec 1.,stgo ments permitted a high degree ofculture re- ' 'tendon by the Aeadiang, Total '23,400 0. 4

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CONCLUSION EPILOGUE 400 In 1800, for the first tithe since the sign- The terminal date for this study is 1800. 's, of the' Treaty ofUtrechtin 1713, the It was selected because it was not until the cadilins were located inareas where they end of the 18th century that the map of were free to pursue theft agrarian life and Acadian locations began to show some mea- where there was a con I able measure, of sure of stability. The half century period of , security from the vaga of international their migrations had come to an end. The lo- politics, of which they had so often been the' cational stability of the Acadians, however, victims and of which they had beenso igno- was by no means permanent. The Acadian rant. Their anomalous position in the first map for 1968 would find them scattered in half of the 18th century, a French popula- various locations over most of the United tion in English territory at a time when En- States and Canada. gland and France were struggling for suprem- acy in the New World, must be cited as the The new migrations of the Acadians' most important factor which precipitated were distinct from those o the 18th century aiktheir migrations. The hostile receptioh they because of a new motivating foirce. No long- red in the American colonies combined er were the Acadians moved about with little with their resignation to return to Acadie consideratip given to their own desires. precluded from the very beginning any per- They now- became willing participants in manent home for them on the Atlantic sea-- movements which 'had as their goals an im- board. trance, by virtue of the strong cnitnr4' proveine4 in economic conditiollis, thesame al.ties N4hich existed betweelahe French and motivation, infact, Which propolkiii the the Aclians might have proved a permanent large migratiOni of European people 'to the home f r the exiles had not The treatment United States in the latter part of the 19th they received' there been little better than and early 20th centuries that received in the American colonies. v4r. The fountainhead of the new migrations # The new Acadian settlements in the New was the Acadian Ovulation of Eastern Cana- World afforded the stability whfh had been da. From 1850 until 1900, Acadians,princi- lacking in the Americaraicolonies or France. pally from the Isles dkla Madeleine in the In the ,oratitime rejions of Canada they ap- Gulf of St. Lawrencit established settle- propriated land which was not previously /m on the north shore of the St. Law, settled. With land allotted to them or provkl- River east of.Sept-Iles, on the isladd of ed for their use in the St. Lawrence Valley Anticoiti, in Labrador, and in Newfound- they were rapidly incorporated. with their land. By far the most important of the new French brethren. All of tlfese Acadians were migrations' was the large scale movement still, one might say, squatters on English ter- from the St. Lawrence Valley to the growing ritory, but by this time the Anglo-French industrial centers of New England, which be- struggle for North America had been re- Ian around 1866. It has been mostcommon solved and the French settlers no longer posed to treat /this migrationas one made up en- a serious threat, whether real' or imagined. tirely of . The likely reason The*Acaqians. of Louisianawere well re- is that he Acadians are so similar in culture ceived the Creoles and achie4dIhere the to the /other French inhabitants of the St. peace and security which had long eluded Lawrence Valley -that there seemed little thenr1 point In distinguishing one from the other, assuming that researchers have beenaware of

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the distinction at all'. It seems reasonable to in 1923, one authority (Lauvriere,,2: 525) assume thatthe Acadians contributed to this claims that 50,000 a Acadians. Elsewhere migration in number& reflecting their relative and in smaller numbers they are found today numericalstrengthinQuebec. Of the in much of Anglo-America. 800,000 Franco-Americans in New England

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Bibliography

Akins, Th. B.Selection from the Public Documents peuple acadlen de ses origins dnos fours.Paris. of the Province of Nova Scala:Publishedunder Goulet. 1924. 2 vol. da resolution of the House of Assembly passed March 15, 1865, Halifax, N.S. Annaud.1869. Rameau de Saint-Pere, E.Une colonie Moil* en 755 pages. Amdrique; l'Acadie 1604-1710.Paris. Didier. 1877. 367 pages. Brebner, 3. B.New England Outpost; Acadia Before the Conquest of Canada. New York. Columbia Richard, E.Acadia, Missing Links of a' Lost Chapter University Press. 1927. 293 pages. in American History.Montreal. Lowell. 1895. 2 vol. Harvey, D. C.The French Rdgime In Prince Edward Island,New Haven. Yale University Press.1926. Winzerling, 0. W.Acatlian Odyssey.Baton Rouge. -` pages. Louisiana State University Press.1955. 224 pages. La1rie5re, E.La trageidie d'un peuple, histoire du

Notes

1.Some authors have not accepted politicalexpe- point to the greed of Governor Lawrence. See, diency as the cause for the expulsion butrather for example, Richard, 1895: 60-63. 9.

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t 68 England In The French-in-New England, Acadiaand Quebec, published by th& New Provinces and Quebec. Center of the Universityof Maine at Orono in 1972, MasonWade documented in his own thoroughand well-balanced manner tht movementof the Acadi- ans to theMadawaska territory shortly after theAmerica Revolution becadse pf the ReVolution's 'effects on the region along thelower St. John River. It should benoted that American migration datawere inadequate in the eight th and nineteenth centu- city of official data, it is ries, and are still reletively unsatisfactory.Given the relative surprising to find excellent migrationstudies on Franco-Amerins.

I

O THE LOYALISTS AND THE ACADIANS

. by I Afason Wade 1

The period between 1764, whentolera- dispersed to settle on his lands, promising tion rather than expulsion becameBritish provisions, the services of a priest, and the policy toward the Acadians and theybegan free exercise of their religion.' But evena to return to fheir former If4mes from diverse Jersey Protestant was suspect to British of- exiles, and the 1830's, when they beganto ficialdom at the close of the Seven Years take part in provincial._ public life, might be 4 W he had a Fren0 name, and Jafques called the «Diirk Ages of Acadian 'history. ailedto get his Miramichi grant, Little attention has been paid to this period why ent instead to the Scot William by either English-speakingor Fre06-speak- Davidson and. John Cort. Three year& later ing historians, for the former have beenpre- the Robins did 'begin to trade at .AridanT occupied by ,the resettlement of the Loyal- Petit de brat on Isle Madame, Paspebiac and ists and the latter have devotedmost of their Bonaventure on the Gaspe Coast, and Cara- attention to the remarkable achievements of quet on the North Shore. Thus was founded Pere Jean-Mande Sigogne' in the Baie Sainte- the business still in ,existenceexistence today. under Rade 'region. Thispaper discusses the early the name of Robin, Whitman. The interaction bet*een the Loyalists and the Robins brought out considerable ndmbers of Acadians in , chiefly in-New «planters) recruited from the Acadian re- Brunswick, since this writer has becomecon- fugees. at Saint-Malo in France, and they vinced that the Loyalists, farfrom dispos- employmentmployment as fishermen to many sessing- the Acadians, playeda larger part in other Acadians who had taken refugeon the the rehabilitation of the Acadians thanany- shores of the dulf of St. Lawrence from the bod)Y ii.71.seexcept a few British officials, .a English manhunts of 1755-1763. Jersey fishing entrepreneur, anda Swiss pro- fessional soldier. The last, two iudividuals Though in stheL niheteenth century the may be dealt with first, since their efforts nameitobin was rarely used by Acadian fish- preceded those of the Loyalists. ermen without the adjective Craliditop since t the Robins were ,regarded as ruthless ex- As early as May 1763, Jacques Robin, a ploiters who bOught cheap and sold dear, fishing entrepreneur of St. Aubin in' the Isle relations were cordial enough in the early of Jersey, proposed to establishafanning, days. In 1769 Charles Robin spent the and fishing settlement on the North.kore of Christmas holidays'.with the Petit de Grat New Blunswick at the minith. of the Mirami- and Arichitt fishermen, And left this account chi, offering hinds thereto the «French Neu-. oft his New Year's celebration with. Claude trals.* He dispatche9 numeiolis4letters invit-, Dugas, Louis, Boudreau, Rhene Theriault, ing the Acadians «from all quarters wherein and Anselme Bellefontaine:

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...begantorink-Wine, Rtun And". waiNdifficult, if not hopeless, And nd this fact Punch' plenty together & were very Proved the doWnfall of most of the Robins' merry, by the Time) our Dinner wits competitors in the 'long run. In any case, the ready none of- us were in a conditidn Robins deserve creditfor "'providing the to know whether we were Eating or ,Acadians with land and -work when they Drinking: Soon after we put 1.,ewis made their way back to the region, from Boudrot & Anseline Bellefontaine to which they Jiad been driven in tl* Grand bed.1 joyned with the others dancipg, Derangement. Claude Dugat got under the lamp &'

was pretty well annointed, after that . we went to bed. We escaped for a few The Robins were much prompter in broken.glasses.2 undertaking to resettle the. Acadians than were the British officials of,,NOva Scoga, des- The two late' stayers 'had four 'glasses of pite. the fact that Lord Halifax and tliFLords rum before breakfast the next morning, «fc. -of Trade.had laid down such' a poliCy in the near as many after.» The friendship was not spring of 1764,3 Michael Fraucklyn, mrareied merely a liquid one, for Robin_ proilded a to a granddaughter of Peter Faneuil, tir mainsail for Theriault's schooner, and Belle- pent Boston Huguenot merchant,was the (.0 .. fontaine's wife and her sister cooked for the first Nova Scotian governoilo plant landsio bacliekor Robin When he had the Theriaults'the returning Acadians in 1768, withthey. Whitehall,detpite the for dinner. firmapproval of. objection of Massachusetts -born Chief JUs Itis clear from themarkable com- tice Jonathan Belcher that lands coilldit4 plete records of the Robienterprise that be legally, 'granted to-- Catholics.Francklyn these Jerseymen deserve considerable credit for his part assured the Ae,adians that «the: for developing the Bay of Chaleursfisheries';Government has not the :leastdegire' td, andforproviding employment forthe molest or disturb.iheni on account of their - Acadians they induced to settle there; who religion,»and he exempted them from soon developed a mixed.economy of fishing militia training,- «which they corkeived as a and subsistence fafming. The latter rarely hardship being unprovidedwith.arms,>>,4 He flourished and sometimes the crop failure alsoinstructed a subordinate: «it -is :the 4 Roloins had to advance King's Intention, and:1 do expect; tiey be . was total, so that the provitions from their stores to keep the treated by the Officers of Government.*Ith!i. populace alive until the fishing season began.'all Possible Mildness and Tenderness- upon 4, But this industry its-elf was also cyclical, and everyoccasion.»5 The Acadians Were once. waters which had produced rich cat he& one morejci be welcome in their own land, and which.amends were to be made for the harshness . year might prove barren ththe... fie 9. meant more credit had to be extended:If With which they had been treated during the the traditional fisherman's view was that thehysterical wartime francopliobia of 1755 to Robins exploitedthin ,by buying .fish 1763. cheaply and selling provisions dearly, ,titus keeping them at in debt, there was also nother Acadian *esettlement project another side:to 't he story. For when ' ciimpe- was so' launched in 1768 by J,KW. pet tition was VI* the fishermen -who had Bar a.Swiss Huguenot who had served it' 'accepttd advances from the 'Robins would,a sulialtern at Louisbourg in 1758 and'at

take their fisht1 :,,,other\--Merchant- wto Quebec 1759. Frain 1763 to 1773 he stir-

4, offeredbetter lerint or 'more attractive veyed the- coast of Noya Scotia and Cape go'ods. Recovery of debts from fishermen Briton, and, in 1777 he published. The Allan

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tic Neptune,a magnificent mOner's guide. farmers & do notseem to improve; to the North Atlanticsooask 768 he ob- but the whole Countyare bad farmers & tained an enormous grants.of Acadian lands do not seem likely to' do Justiceto the on Cumberlan4 Basin, which he called the Lands, anif the Acadians are Worse in. fMenudie Estaie* or.! ahe Elysian Fields.* some points, than our Sort are, they are It consisted of 7,000acres, of which 3,000 better Inn- others. 1 do notsee any oRisat ' were dyked lands,cleareduplands and things being done by any in the County. orchards. That 'same year 'he installedten but the. Yorkshire peopleIam not de:- cided that:the resf the County People .families there, giving each 200acres.. The ,do upon the. whole better the Acadians. eighteen original tenantswere _all -Acadians, They readily see' the Imperfections bearing such familiar nameslos Bourg, on Me- 'part of the Acadians,as the Byitish in .lancon, Bain, Foret, Leger, Comeau.and Canada do the faults of the C.aqadcans, Brin. The- iliarsheSwere to be dialled- and beca'use we are .8 Saucy ion- too dyked at pefarres' jcost, andthereate ready to despise others, because'we maintained at the -tehant's cost:. He supplied have happened .to be the 97riquerors his settlers with breeding cattle.and was tolt We are of a different '4101, receive !Alf this third of the or &c: &c: Having taken them in 1. grain, andone cina1717hebceeds of the % an. stage, we have destroyed them mills, h f whose- Oat h% issu and al 9course of Ateir prospectiveIn- provement 4n their owl'' way, & all that , . .0 has succeeded 'since we proudly attrib- 1795 Captain ;;John, -M maid of ute to ourselves. instead of giving Traeaciii repotted te_DelBarre5,4ho any mean-. edit for-the unavoidable impr ment while' Wad' served- as,lieutenant-'goverhor grotvtb in America of 36 y or Cape Breton from 1784 to- ,1781, and_was time;while *Ix- do' not percee the later io be lieutenant goverugfof PrinceEd- . faults on bur becailse theyare is ward Island from' 804 to 1812- on thestate and their ways differ, fromours. of ahe,,Elysian and its A9dian ten- Sure am we are' wt more virtuous or ants.,The dwellings were not imilfes`sivf,liut ppy than they] arE and 1 fear we have . ,:an. their Barns they are ':more' Surptious m 'de 'worse men' And .less hdppy than a the agent rioted. Macdonald made they haxe,.been, . - some interesting observationson the Acp- , A Captain Macdonald's :Viewson the Acadian re- dians, *hem he erisidered. Ka harmless; in- flect a tolerance ambunderstanding efficient,people;* - e typi- cal of the Scot 'than the Englishman,an Was to be immigrant SeptsandAmeirican L;oy- !gnorant, & tiorefore., as' well as because in the Count?'are' not the best aliSts who wduld help the Acadiaui-to' regain peoplepeople:-fn -fn .tife world, Suspicibus.of the 'Status of first-clais citizens inthe Mari- most everyone, They keep at a distance ;times. pit ihiSdoctiment of 1795 revealsan from!-the 'Intercoursectf ethers, by attitude already far moreenlightened than the which, if they improveiless soneere- prevailing. views of the Acadians thirty years specis; they degeneratelesS ip other before..., And in 1816' Oes Barrisgave to spects, They have customs of their own, flouis Brodeur and his sticcessors,,Missionerg , of which they are tenaciousitsOpe Of,. -tolpe Roman qurOh at 11emiamcook,*1thapel the ...c. 'Which tare WO and .dle treiter than right to guildthurch an act un- our CustomsrTh ighTot4 blame diem. iiinkriBlevs; halfa cOtUry for being' bad farnie s and agt makink of 7 the linds what theyml., ".-lit've. done; * (A AM, FkIldS Gauci0; Paptert d'Agiexis Landt9, ..true they, ate -inseveral respects pad - *and Otto R61cligud), _ _ '1;4' - - . . '0 1 . ; . / i

72 ,

Before recounting the relationship of with their ties to France and theIndians, the Loyalikts with the Acadians, it js neces- were the principal obstacle tothe progress of sary -to point out thatearlier immigrants British settlement. It was these groupswhich from the American colonies had already set combined in 1755 to make thedecision to an endering yankee stamp onthe Maritime, expel the Acadians and 'to replace themwith region, which Thomas Chandler Haliburton, a (loyal andIndustrious population.* No the Loyalist writer and lairyer, noted in the sooner had Louisbourgfallen in 1758 and 1830's: (the old stock ,cOnie from New Eng- Prince Edward Island been cleared ofAcadi land, and the breed is tolerable pure yet, ans than Gove5nor CharlesLawrence issual, near about one half apple sauceand other in lyrical terms, a proclamationoffering the half molasses, all 4, except 'to the Eastward, Acadian lands for settlement. After. a further where there is a cross of theScotch.*7 Aca- proclamation providing guarantees ofcivil considerabk,immi- .la dia had long been' (New England's outpost,* and religious liberties, a and once it passed from French to British gration to Nova Scotiafrom.New England rule and 'the danger Of French and Indian and thy Middle Atlantic colonies gotunder- 'raids. Was ended there'was an exodus of the, way.t continued until 1768,4hen the land-hungry frOth the overpopulated Ne* opening of the Ohio country for settlement England colonies to Nova Scotia. New Eng- by the Treaty Of FottStadwbrdiverted.mi- landersweary ofcultivating rockbound gration westward. But by the/beginningof fields had long looked with covetous eyes on' the previous year Nova Scotia alreadyhad the rich dyked marsh lands of the Acadians. 7,000 American settlers out of a total popu- The men of the New England seaboard had lation of 13,000.-.0 becoine familiar with Acadia in'tlieir fishing . and trading 'expeditions; others whohad The coining of these pre-Loyalistsfa- served in New Ensiand's conquest of Louis- vored the re-estoblishment of theAettdians Hall: bourg in 1745 had acquired firsthand know- and helped ,to change the mind of the witliout fax Council; which still.was of the stubborn ledge of a fertile British province of British settlers, in which a conquered people opiniop in March 1764 (That the .safety` were prosperingwitliout feeling any, obliga- this Province depends on the total expulsion tion to their new rulers, .The founding of of;the FrenchAcadiens.*8 For the resettle- Halifax in 1749 had opened a new, market mene.of the province was checked by the for New England building materials andSup- effect% of the terrible gale of November, along Ape°, plieS, and New; England tradesmen respond- 1759; which leveled ,timberlands high fall ed to the demand for skilledcraftsniem,New. South Shore, and 6y raising the Englanders^ who had served in the recent, tines of the Bay .of Fundy anothir-ten feet campaigns were Offered the saMe induce, podded vast elpanses of dyked landsith ments askuroffeen settlers,in Nova Sbotia, salt water, thus making them *this ree The thoOniVinnnigratitkfrom the;'Ameri- Year to come,incapable of bearingGrain.* can colonies inilalifek'i firstPPM tivere,de-. The dykes, which had beenneglected sincej. scribed "as (the best Of ,settlers,) with pre- the'expnIsion of the Acadians, were largely ferable to the .(King's bargains *,' from clestroyec1.9 When Governor LaWiencr visit W hed the 'Minas townships the following yearr, tie ddminant element,inHalifax, leaders- in be. set on foot the re,building of dykes-bythe;;; and public as well asOmmercial, new .settlers,- troops from Fort Edward .1, Acadian risoners,. twho were.best.acquajnt: In-the minds of both the Britishofficials. ed with Works of thiskind.)10, Sine 'and these :.New Englanders, the'Acadialt latter were theonl5rsons with skill; e

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matter, they-directed tln,continuing work in Olt Acadians of Baie Sainte -Marie formed, the -,spring of 1761. The AcadianIltsisoners two companies, while eyewhere., except in were converted intoa labor corps dill:work .. Halifax and Lunenb6rethe militia refused on theyktis and roads. When the Board of to serve, since &lost of'` the «Neutral Yan- Trade r fused:to pay their wages,kthe gOvern- kees* of Nova Scotia, Who Wad replaced the ment a d land proprietors continued touse once «Neutral French, found themselves these fiprisoners of war for-the restoration «divided betwixt natural :affection' toour of the dykes.)1 The Acadians became indis- nearest relations, and 'good Faith and Eriend- pensible both as technicians andas common ship to our King and re.00ntry.*13 A few labor. Fourteen tilers (41 Horton, Acadians, headed, by Captain' Isaiah Bou- Windior, Fahno ,and wport petitioned treau, did participate in Jonathan Eddy's ef- the govern() 1765 to maintain the «mili- fort to capture fFort CuMberhmd, but this till? provision allowanceso, that the Acadi- attempt to makeoNova Scotia theVourteeth an laboureil could work for -lowey wages, Colony was almost exclusivelyan enterprise sincewe find-that without their further of the New En"nd settlers of the Isthmus assistance many of us cannot continueour of ehignecto ,;;Ofthe,lower ,St.John Improvements, nor plOugh norsow our Valley. , 1' 11 Lands, nor finish the Dyking still requited' to a secure our lands from Salt -.Water.%12 The It -washe aftermath ot the American Acadians had, peciome *rally hewers of Revoluti6;rathIr iliKtite,,:Revolution itself, wo and draivers of water for thenew which hamajorimPacton the Acadians, ,. t owne of their old lands- who fothe, last twenty- ye'a s had been. striv- I ing to filake a new'Place for 'theniselves Though many remained an thisirole in their qldfrand. of '§ome 35,000 A. the old Acadian .country about the head 'of loytits,$o .the 'tin* Provinets.had far the Bay of Fundy, to which the returning ',6Lnorelitrish§tic effects upon the Anglo-Frenih exiles seemedArawn. as by, thagnet, others lociety 'cihichit'had teen slowly developing in ventured to acct lands in the new °town- 4 the region since 'the' Treaty' of Utrecht, in of Clare, on' the northwestern Fiindy 1713 than did the arrival 46some 6,000of t 'shOre, .whichwas` ,laid out for them byt them in the Province of quebec. While the,' .., ., Franckly_n ;In:July.1768. This Bale Saintei arrival of tht,Loyallsts did not create, as-if% a 1. , .:. , 1 Marcie region' ,was largely settled by refugees'. . ,, did in 4:).,Ieloedasi (ANdo-Freneh society in . -.. ,.- returning. frOm Massachusetta.' Thi;Clare :the 'Maritimes, which already had o; it dig: '' . *,1 : '. settlers began by-planting VotatOes \N".. wever, radicaltyAlter the billalice i.. .. . tween the trees and then as the lads vv'ete cleared - ch and 'English in a region :where- tn '' they turned to 'wheat and oats. They relied _._17there had been a total pulati6n ,ofJr-:' 1 on ,the sea for much of their food and by the 17 to 18,000 of whom :two- s or three& 1780's 'Captain Plerre.Doucetwas already'''''quarters wore'New.Englan and only. 1 4. trading by sea to tte West Indies. On this 1,500 'Acadian's. Henceforth aciians. «French. ShOre* grew.up the largest' and were to be, still more' 1 -Tin a , w most proaperous Acadian aroup in Nova region-.which was to pri being SCotia. Under the leadershif of their ''snis- ore-eminently loyal andltliialt to the. ... .,, sionary,'Pere,lean-Maude Sigogne, theyi were As in, .Quebec, the coming' of tig foyatisty. to enjoy a close relationship with the Loyal- -., forced the division 4 the *old Proilice 45 ists of Weymouth and Annapolis. In 1775, Quebec into Uppe and Ldwer fanada, so in. when Govern& Legge called out the-militia - the Maritimes it Ipd to the7tivisimi 'in 1784. ' i0 against the prospect of an 'American invasion, of the old Province of Nova Scotia the' , ., 0 85 ..., I

74

I creation of the new provinces of New This rea. m had a long French history. .Brunswick and Cape Breton. Thereifter the It had been dccupied by the French since Loyalists were firedominant in New Bruns- 1686; when Bishop Saint-Vallier of Quebec wick and .3 major force in -NovaScotia., had singled it. out as a likelylndia'i'scion while the Acadians were once mote dis- center. The Acadian village at St. Ann's petsedin four prOvipces, lost in an Point had been destroyed in 1759 by a English-speaking sea aslhe biftetesf enemy party of New England-rangers,wfio bume of the «Neutral Frencip'in prekexpuision 147- houses, 2 chapels, and altthe far days could have desired. Not until recent buildings, killing and scalping six Acad ans times have they been able' to..overcome the end taking other iirisoners. Tho'se who'es- eff'cts of their- divisiOn among the three cape() fled to the woods and Hied Indian- rn Maritime provinces, in only one of style until it was safe to returto their 14 whi h do they form a significant and Witt- devastated liffines. In,the summerf 1763 ,enti Iminority., constitutingne.arly40%of Major Gilfred Studliolme was instructed to heopulation .of -New' Brunswick with an order Ahem to remove. They appealed to ft dofficial capital in Moncton, onck Ben- fire G(gernor of Nova Scotia to be allowed tjamilf Nuklin'se PennsylvaniaGerman to remain over that winter: r . settlement oft(lhe Bend».

. If you insist 9n our removal before the Emotional historian's of thd Acadians harvest, most of us, being without have laMented)thAt, bar* reestablishesFin- .1 - money 'or supplies or any means . Ow St. John Valley after thefirst expasiiin-, conveyance, will:be driven to liV6 lilte .. , the savage, wandering from 'place to they Were NI/en:out once'againhyttiie.iri- '2 -* place. But if you allowuslto stay the comingLoyalists.T14:(-1-04 e a spo-nol seem tob.: , 4 ,stinporj this. vievklienoverndrjhomas Winter, in ',order to secure our crops, ,cultivateathe earjeton arjive4 t6 egtabliShr a government ' we shall-"then be -able Co .3" .- lfinds wherever you may izidus go': Wq in. the new- province of New littins%SriCk In . `--- need not tell youItata farmet *I16 '1784, landmants were. his first major busk- takes up new land'and Aliithout.haying ness.?Granisrwere issued not only to Loyal-: supplies..fof a year,,must.inevitably`be its .but also tqctlke «old-inhabitants»(the:4 ' ruined; an.d-of oti *use to'the,goyern- pre-Loyalists)Jand to _the -AcadianS;,..who ment he belongs to.,Weitope, sir, tltat had previously been, regarded as squitters.--.:v `_will. be good-trrOlghio grant us a '- Just 'three d4ys lifter Carleton'sadtval 1W- t of (Ric faith. Such d'concessions - I..^5.4- r ai apetition from- one AugOstin would enittle Its--te bear with fortitude received oft tbfanc, in behalf of Z

dcmstwithstagding both reitvards -were ;. Acadian settlement was established a( the offered.ina afterii4rds threat's made use,of fienchh Vijiage, near -the-month of the !it by The Amirieilts to prevtilOA' them, to Kentietecpsis, some ottvp'llaieir inhabitants-. join in4thellate Rebeillop.* Jh due course "were einPfoyedtby thepre-Coyalisersiew.- the iietitionertleceNed arant of 2,665. bury.10t triaert nazi*, Simthonds, -arid acres, a' few mitesAtkove. St. 'Ann's and ni b6ilding iiflyke on-the great marsh below KeswickStrealh," ' .t .--hgt. of-Saint John. The request forpriest° ' 5, ^

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I was granted in 1767, when the Alibe Charles- The Ably6 Bailly's parishregister shows Francois Bailk Ale Messein, laterco-adjutor Cormiers, Cyrs, and Heberts from Bishop of Queirc, foundeda mission at Beaubassin;Martinsfrom 'PortRoyal; Aukpaque on the St. John. Mercures and Theriaults from IsleSaint-Jean; ,4 4 $ yioiettes fromLouisbourg; and Mazerolles. Sli 11 hewing, to the officialline of from Riviere Charlesbourg. Theirhomes settling veterans of the °French And Indian were 'scattered along the. St. John fora War in the St. ,Johl! Valley, Pro* Slecre- dozen miles above St.'' Ann's.During the tar)! Charles pulkqey wr-otet th :.,1u -tie&of American Revolting', whichthe AClidiim the Peace John Andersonand Fra cis Pea- called fLa folkguerre,,o Major Studholme bo y tlypfolloiyiri&ear: ZaheLieut. Gtiver- emplotsd the Mercure andMartin brotlprs - . nor dsires lltAt yob will give-notice- fo all as couriers, to Canada, and he commended Acadia xcept about six f rnilies whoth . no less than fiVe inembrs of the hitterfain- Mi. Bai shall- name, to reNove fromSt. ilyfor exerting tfieinklves inthe King's- John's :v it not being the intention of serviCe, In November, 1783,.Governor III' that they should settle theref of Quebec informedjovernor parr of but to -acquaint them thaton their applica- Nova Scotia that «Mercurethe Acadia n» re- lion they should have lands- Other parts of ,po.(ttidthat«manyof hiscountrymen the ,Province.» 16 Buf evtdi no action wished to emigrate into thisprovince for the -way-taken, since in 1A3 Studholine's sake of, enjoying their religionwith More .thcpioring partyfound an Acadian_colony liberty and less difficultyltiprocuriiiipriests t above St. Ann's numbering 354 souls (61, .My plan is to grant (hemlands at the tutn, 57 women, and 236 children).Its re- '. Great Falls on the River St.John, which in. plot declared: / time may form settlementsto extendalmost to the River St. lAvvrelice; whichWill con- AbOve St. Ann's we found ' , a consider- tribtite Much to latilitlitethe communica- able number of French settlers, nfany tion so much to be desired p. of whom had .been- in possession for . between the two a provinces, andrwhich number of years.. '4'lleyin general may -lie attendedivitli appeared to be an inoffensive people;, circunfstances very favilrableto their mutual b fecv if any have a legal titleto their :..interests.)4' %Ileboundary between Quebec lads'2as, theyare in general pearlyin and Nova Scot'was. then thought to be at one and the same situation, we thogilt grand Folls.dif this proposalmay be, found unnecessary to .be very 1partiaulr in j the roots off the-highlyindsperiflent «geb- accourntoof every ipdividtial. Th he of IlladaWaska,which links:Que .0.-." who lire more than simple posseissi New Brunswick, 'hutregards itself asa. to plead in their favor live.halve proper- *ntity from both. ., notfced.17 - When the Loyalist f tvops re-ceiVedetheir The .tw Idest inhabitantswere ibssph rt;ginTieittal Martin block grants on the St. Johnearly V Alto° cantoin1758, and JOseplu ,,.in July, 1784, they DOlicet, Who* arrivedin 1763. Thirty-six showed scant regard for 'ttie settlers already established Arhether the 61 famites had come foIhe regionwhen, p ;Loyalist or Acadian. 'One Irish:settler the Abbe'Willy' in fatmchect ,the mission. (bex. Stnn'S'protestedito thegovernorlhat the. were reported tdhave been Eugitives,from :Iewcomers- otopleepossission ofthe tiaras, the Beaubassin Regionwho hailltaked refugia.;.burntf his fences, threateiced..hislattdrney's in Canada in 1755, only to quit it forthe St., person, and ^even.went so firas to give.. . - John. Valley{aittr Ithe -cession 17i3.11f urinal:: notice linders" the 0 0 pretext of they . 4 \ es. ;s s 76

sanction of the.Government, to desistfam River St. John,ItFeb. 1.7.85 2P An-Acadian memorial Sir- his impro ventents.* I have the honor to write youthis similar grievances: of February 1786 T.counts letter to assure you of my veryhumble respect and at the same time todesire ;rbitants, The Memorial of the French I you to have therodnesi to inforrif which have been deprived .of=eir lands Monsieur [Pierre] libl-upeird if itis pos- by the disbanded Troops, as alsoof sible for us to have some land below Joseph Daigle and 'Paid Potier now resid- MadAvailc4. ing atMidawaskaHunib4 Sheweth: infiew of the difficyjties pat ex- That thintiemorialists are reduced to a acedunt of their ist-on the River13t. John on most deplorable condition with Monsieur Duperrd and Provis- new settlements, numerous Families for want to my brother and I areresolved to go tttZler the Neces- V ions, some having been early in the spring anti settle ourselves at sity of selling thetew cattle they had to is possible to obtain* Thatltr;.; that. place, if it prevent them from starving. grants of land. [John] Biddle- [a 'surveyor] now Possess For my own part, Sir, I have the atry, theProitortidn of Land allowed by honour to tell you that I have managed tdonesof the Memorialists, g ov rnment my affairs very well.His Excellency the name Joseph Doucette, without Governor has done 'me full justice.BO making him the least restitution for it. sating so much difficulty ahead on the ?int Bona [Benoit] Roy, another ofsaid River St. John and scvmuchmiserable ' unfortunateMemorialists leas been for- dissipation, 1 do not want to remain at o- cibly compelled to leave his House and o the place. received no consideration. Monsieur Duperre will speak to ThattheMemorialists thtiscircum- tfte interests of the French at this of you in stanced was under the necessity place. bavingrcourse to yourlxcellency for lude, hoping to see you sir; re-drea- of their complic4ted miseries I am your humble servent4 and a supply Of provisions.1 Louis Mercure2.z air

4. reSident since 1763; - I Joseph had been who Paul)Potier since 1767; andJos'eph Daigleic Mercure included a. list of 24 persons couriers, since" 1769. wanted to apply for lands toneand a half one of Stpdholme's Madouwaska.* ti The meakiorial -was referred forinvestigation miles- below -the...Falls of ,- Isaac Allen, a newly ,., to Lieutenant Colonel, Mid* Mercure appointed puisnejudge& whose-2nd New Jer, t Aside front. Louis and Pierre Dtiperre, there seyVMhteers had received theKingsclear and military CaOtajn preoccupied with were numerousLizottes, DusAltihins; grant. Allen was already an Ayotte, the case of two disbandedsoldiers accused Daisies, Cyrs, as well as a Gau namedTierre ben'oit! a Fournier,and a Simsfacon. xteen_ were of 'shooting an Indian eiglotanadtats.. Ale same The pair wereprompt!y found guilty., an& Aeadifing and s. and the other -pardoned, group also ep11letolew Brunswick for one was executed and his council -Tall / tothe satisfaction of the Indiarhs, grpts, and, Carfl ton , !Acting Loyalisti--decided,(T June 21, 1785: . The highhanded and swashbucklingbe- owed to soil their pres- havior ` of theLoyalistmilitarysettlers .Tbqy will be. probably led Louis Mercure toappeal to entimp ents to theheitadvantage, surveyor general of toilettier 'with the lands--reserved for Samuel Holland, the them, and titles will be given to the pur- (f?ttbec: land in Madawaska: ,

ti 41.

*

p 77 O

-e" chasers.Mercure has permission to lot MemorialofDanielGpdong- settle. the petitioners on the lands they' huMbly sheweth that he.. is A Old iri- may choose at the Madawaska and a habltabt In the Loer. french Village, grant will pass in due time to each that he Built and Cleared a farin which head of family' with tjie usual front of COI°, Ailing VOW toald him that hee 60 rod,s.2 3 should have andlperetary Odell toald that hee should have his num; this The council also agreed, sthat the lands be- day Capt. Lee has forwarned me Nit . tween the MadawaskiantEriviere blanche, or to do Aneething on the land more.. White River [actually .Riyiere Verte,or Green Your memorialist -humble prays that Kier) should be reserved fOr theproposed you Will be so Good as to giv mee my French settlement.* Land that I have improved and not to 1,7,et anee other man injoy my Labour In general Lieuttnant Governor Thomas and shall rest as in Duty Boundshall Carleton, Provincial Secretary Jonathan O- everpray. delland Surveyor George Sproule (Odell Loer french Village the 29 April 1789 Daniel Godong.2' ,011 , was a New,

hunotred acres elght if the 'isituation" will LOSralists. arrived. In.tlw.latter region th'ey admit. The Afadians settled at te mouth Settled at CaraqueS", Tracadie, 111/10eolu Vin of the K wick were confirmed ifI5ossession, ,Cocagne, Bstctoche, and at Memr ook on 'of the la ds they t ccuPied, t ough, these the Isthmus ofaChignecto: The makerity On were in .a.traet assigneit to the al guides ihe west side of the St. John wentto Mada- and, Pioneers. Joseph T Alt nd his wire waska. This 'new dispersion was a voluntary. Marie sold to Captain Freder ek De Peyster of one, and the nnelocations 0110.eehoienby the N.Y. Volunteers their Sugar Island farm theAcadiansthemselves. The:basic reasons tOrof one .4huncired acres fo; E874/0s Daniel for the move were .the desire for snore land Gandin'of Lower French Village was ordered'". anti the regular servicesqf a priest., as it re- to ret4ive $100 recomiense for his imprOve- vealed in the ypetition ofthe Thibodeaus, ments, in response to the following memorial Tlietiaults, and Violettes of French Village:

411-;;Tv.'

- C , A 78' it That your petitioners are el icumbered Gaspe coast, but. in1774 he visited the with large Families for whose settlement Acadians of the St. Johli Valley and the inlire thdy- look forward with much North Shore. Named vicar-general for Acadia, anxiety and it .is their earnest wish to he helped to keep Malaceets in the British see them settled around them on Lands interest during the American Revolution, of their own, which they cannot expect and so came to be highly regarded in official in the part of the Country where they quartersatboth Quebec andHalifax. now dwell. That yourpetitioners..are in- Staunchly.-loyal, the Abbe Bourg dutifully forMedthat Government offers. en- reported to the justices' of the peace on the couragement in Lands to such persons as shall settle high up the River St, St. John River in 1781 that one Joseph John, 'whichyourpetitionersare -terriot» hakdescribed them as «justices of desirous of doing, not only, in order to the devii.»26 tut with the coming of Father obtain such lands fdPitheir families, but James' Jones of Halifax in 1785, the Abb.!). that they 'May' have the assistance of a Bourg retired to Gaspe, leafing the southern PTieht in the perfOrmance of the rites half ofhis immense 'territoryinJones'. a and ceremonies of their religion and charge. 4.% the superin endance of their children's education.2 The desire of the St. John Valley Act'- cliatis- for French .priests was. one of the And so the 'petitioners requested thegrant - major reasons for their removal*, shown ing of landS «proportioned to the number of by the memorial of eight heads of amily at their families» at a «place called the Mada- Sugar Island in 1786: waskas.» This was a large -order, as Oliver Thibodeau had 8 sons,Joseph Theriault 6 The Memorial of Wee whoa names is sons, And Francois Violette7 son all beer Unto signed Humbly', ptay that three ofamilies tailed 39 /gersollf-- 'Con- your Excelency Will be pleasid to Give fronted, with' this remarkablrtecundity, the us Land jdyningtotarrecut [Caraquet] governor in. council. ordered:«May sit down Village to Begin at the Loer-end of °H- on vacant 'landsfild repoil their situation, evertastiear Mar.sh and so to run Up a which will be secured by proper grants.» Long Said Marsh for. Eight famelys, as . We would Wish to tbrm a French village` 4 -as we areAssured of a Chaplain as scion 7,. Since- the Bishop of Quebec was short- as their a fel,RiModkrz;melys Sanlid ,.. handed for priests and the goVernc. f Nova their an We as in Duty Bod ?lilt ere Scbtia 'was suspicious of French priest ,ever pray. f: , the activities of-the Vbts Le,k4utre and 4 Joseph tareyo, John Bati etargyo: k MaUlard'in the French. itrent before 1763, airtet tareyo,Victoar- tareyo;.: the Acadians-of t!* Sit John Valley received franooS tarbyo:arnen genet,5 s'Cotme.27:- wry only occasional_ visit( from themissiontirieg, per penet hiller. ,i 4 i.4. a .`" .41 fauk!" whi). were Charked.4ifith.. , their. spiritual fare. Notable...8mill% It hem was the Alt The desireto be unlont th people - , Joseph-M4tguin- Bowie one of four yoking ,Iind under .the spiritual giiida .oirFrensjit...'.;' .4' Acadian refugees (reined fctr the Priesthobd ritth.thak Iiish op. Scoltfsh, priests wore.*.. ' ' AfigiAcadilinexo.6s e.' 0:- at,Saint-Maio, ind, consecrated bye ".; poweI motives for 4.. Hriand 'at Quebec in i772.. Thefollowing ,:, fro e St. hilinVai4y.r: 4IP year Bourg was givericharm itf the itilssion . of *Acadia,' G ;':arid, :the North'Shoredo While wine vt ti* loyalist- rat&.and.. ,He Made his heaqii!Ners at Carletoen.a, Ok;stearfir reerdeil thenfselves sp.a ,,,;. .1. '1 I . , 1. 11^ * tto.

It: s.sn,' a

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castehose services to King and country en- builders of dykes and reclaimers of, marsh- titled ttein to disregard the fights of earlier lands. Some Acadians chose toremain seblers, whether pre-Loyalistor Acadian, among the Loyalist settlers on the St. John this was not the attitude.. of the top British and were eventually assimilated by them, 4 officials and the leading Loyalists. In 1787 losing their language and their.. traditions. Lord Dorchester advised his brother Thomas But for the most part, because their national Carleton that the Acadians, like the Indians, and religious spiritwas strong, they estab- .should be treated «with civility and kind- lished themselves in crew communities 'of ness.» He had heard that they Ow not their own. Thus were founded the «Inde- only been driven off their lands, but in other pendent Republic of Madawdska» and the ways ill treated. To prevent a misfortune of almost solidly French North Shore. Northern the kind in the future,a Grant should be New Brunswickand part of Northern Maine made 'out for them in due form.»28In. the was tobe. French, and "southern New. case of the Indians Dorchester had observed: BrunswickEnglish. This distinctionstill «Besides the policy of this conduct,com- largely persists today. mon justicerequires some attention and compensation to these peimle, whose lands, If the Loyalists, overran a considerable we ere to occupy.» Clearly such consider- part of the , Acadia, at the close ations had weight with Thomas Carleton and of the eighteenth century, the Acadianswere his Loyalist council in their treatment of the to returntlj inpliment by flocking to Acadians. In New Brunswick, \as in Nova New Englan e great exodus of the later Scotia, the leading Loyalists befic'ended the eenth ury from the Maritimes, as Acadians and aided in their rehabirtationas well as from Quebec. The «ancient limits Of full citizens.'Their motives in doingso were Acadia,» so long disputed betWeen France not exclusively high-minded, but we !so And England,surely must now be considered expedierd. There was a desperate shorte of to include much of industrial New England, laborand- of local expertise Among4he and notably Waltham, Vassdchusetts, the Loyalist newcomers, and the Acaillansw e birthplace of La Mutuelle l'Assomp- valuedfortheirabilitiesas woodime tlin .wilire is now the financial fortress, of frontier farmers, lumbermen, fishermenan the Acadian people in Moncton.

.;#

. .PY . 1 44 .41.11 w.7. 0.4 80

ti Notes,

1. PANS, NS., A71, 32, Jacques Robin-Gover- 14. W.R. Raymond, «The First Governor of New nor, 24 May 1763;ibid.,37, Jacques Robin- Brunswick and the Aoadians of the River St. - Guiguenen, 24 M?y 1763. John,» TRSC? 3rd- Series VIII (1914) II,' 419-20. 2. Le Giros, «Charles Robin,» Ch IV, pt. I, Revue d'histoire de la Gaspilsie,1111,3 (juillet- 15. Ibid.,421.- septembre 1965), 152. 16 /bid., 422. 3.PAC: Charles Robin's Journal, 243. 17.N.B.flist;SoCietkollections,1,..110-113, 117. 4.N.S.,A74, 23,Lords of Trade-Wilmont, 15 May 1764;ibid.,73, Halifax-Wilmont, 18.Report of Edward Cavanagh, Maine represen- 5 June 1764. tative, in Abbe H.-R. Casgrain,Una polerinage t au pays d'(Quebec, 1888), 4424. 5. N.S., 81, 125,Francklinlhelburne,20 Feb. 1768;131, Belcher's opinion;135, Hills- 19.Raymond «First Governor,» 436-7, Haldi- boroukh-Francklin, 26 Feb. 1768. mand-Parr, 27 Nov. 1783. 434, Minutes of Council, 13 July 1785. 6.PAC: MG 23, F J.F.W. DesBarres Papers, 20.-Ibid., «Menudie Estate, 1768; TatamagoUche Estate, 1795,» Second series:Macdonald's report, 21.Ibid.,435. 41-5. 22.. ;Ibid.,'437, MercuCie-Holland i 24 Feb. 1785. 7.T.C. HalibUrton, SamSlick, the Clockmaker, 1785. 'First Series (1836). 23.ibid.{438, 'Mercure- Carleton, June

8. N.S., B13, 4, Council, 24 March 1764. 24.'Ibid441-6. fl 9.N.S., A63, 116, Memorial, Annapolis Twp., 25.Ibid.,448-9. 3 °De'c. 1759; Memorial, Liverpool, 11 Dec. 1759. :N.B. Museum: Hazen & White PaperstVo). 20, 83, No. 4, Bourg-Justices of the peace, 3 July 1781. For Bourg's career, see Abbe Arthur 10. PANS; Vol. 37, aGovernors of Nova Scotia- Board of Trade, 1760-72, No. 2, Belcher-. Melancon,Vie de, !Abbe Bourg, premier Lords of Trade, 12 Dec: 1760. protre seedier?, missionneirs'et Grand-Vicaire 0 pour l'Acedle et to Bele-des-Chaleurs,'1744- 1797 (Rimouski, 1921) N.S., A64, 60, Lawrence-Board of Trade, , 16 June 1760;ibid.,262, Belcher-Board of Trade, 12 Dec. 1760; A65, 189,Belcher- 27.Raymond, «Fi st vernor,» 450: Lords of Trade, 14 April 1761. 28.W.O.taymond (ed.,:TheWinslowPapers(St. John, 1901), 339, Dorchestercarleton, 3 Ian. ty(,' 12. A76, 56,Memorial of the Inhabitants of King'i C.9unty,23.March 1765. 1787,

13.N.S., Ap4 3 ,Memorial of the Inhabitants of Yar out Dec. 1775.

tr re 82 James P. Allen made his own unique-contribution to the field of Franco-American studies in T974, with the publicationpf the following article in the review Acadiensis. In it, he documents, as it has never been documented before,' the special attraction of the mantlfacturing industry, especially Textile manufacturing, for the French-Canadians in their population Indvements'igta and within the state of Mainl. Much of Allen's analysis .was made possible by a surprOngly reliable private enumeration of the Franco-Ameri- can population of Maine by Odile Laplante of Le Messager of Lelviston (reply in this cen , tury. .

LJ

110

A

v FRANCO-AMERICANS.INMAINE: A GEOGRAPHICALPERSPECTIVE I V by James P. Allen

6 During the last decade thepeopleof the er been distinctive. A second purpose of the United States and Canada haveshown a paper is to describe certain changes in culture growing awareness of and pride in their di- and social structure which haveoccurred aA verse ethnic backgrounds. In Maine this hr- .. Franco-Americans have experienced assimila- terest appropriately has focusedmost intent- tion to varying degrees in different ly on the Franco-Americans whO, places. In apart from this. regard, a variety of data fromMaine is the Nankees, constitute the most culturally useful as are'recent comparativesociological distinctive and nunrierically important ethnic studies based on national samples' OfFranco- group in the -state,I Yet it wouldbeswrong Americans. to assume that members- of this grouiare found roughout the state. They havin- Membership in any etlinirgroup is basic- d eed on numerous in some areas, but, at ally a function ofan individual's-sense- of theher extreme there are poitions of the identity with the group. Therefore;an Oh, is statwhere there are few if any. The largest group is most appropriately definedas t centres of French ethnic strengthare known group with a shared sense of -petiplehood.3 to local residents and scholars ina general Although such groups are.rusually limitedto and rather impreciseway while the ;Jess vias7 persons who share a common biOlogical and ii)1ecentres are usually ignoredHoiveyei% cultbral ancestry, ethnk intermarriageand knowledge of the changing locations of the attitude changes have Ineast thatsome Franco-American populatiou.wouldsent a logical descendants no longer feelan idgntity keessary firelude to understanding iheir'sig- with a particulaf ancestral ethnicgroup. nificance i &the state. -' Such individualsare not properly considered 4_ members of that group. The best definition The major purpose of thispaper is to of a Franco-American is 'thusan, American depict the geographical characteristicsof who Considered himselfor herself a'Franco- Maine's Franco-Americans duringthe twen- Ainericalt4td Who feelskasense of identity tieth century and to show whatchanges have with otheedescendants of the Canadiensand occurred in recent years,? A private1908 Acadiens. The, problemiith such,a defini- census and the most recent United States - tion is that thesenseof peoplehood is hard governs census are the basic sourcesre- to measure. .For this reason various surro- garding spatial. patterns and trends.The gates are often used. Most commonlysome historical development of 'Varioustypes of distinctive "cultural charaCteristic isidentified Franco-American settlement will, be'traced, `With most members of an ethnicgroup ant and statistical analyses will demonstratethe the people whoshare this characteristic aril: extent to which this'ethnic distributionhas considered-Member he group. Because

83 A' V 41

84 nearly ail Canadians and Acadiens =who mi- aspects of their ethnicbackground. In f cl, grated to the United States wereRonian this has often not been the&se. New Viig- Franco-Americans, especially, have Catholicand Fre &h speaking, religious land's identification and linguistic usage are poten- preserved their ethnicity over many more tial indicators. In general, the formeris the than two generations. Forthis reason, the better indicator, because Catholic immi- use of typical censusclassification's may re- grants to the U. S. havetended to keep their sult in a serious underestimationof _ethnic religion while typically abandoning thelan- numbers. Religious preferencemight Provide guage of the old country In two or three gen- -.a further culturalindicator, but since106 it erations. Franco-Americans, however, have has been the pQIicy of theBureau of the been more successful in preservingtheir Census to 'ask no questiohregarding such a2 French language through several generations privatematter as. religion. A seconddifficul-. than have most other ethnic groups.As a re- in'athe use of the piiblish&I U. S. Census , . oQeil not suit, a linguistic measure is probablyone 1asbeen the fact that the data are )iesented in terms of sufficiently snail areal satisfactoryindicator of relative Franco -' American strength in different places. units, This situation isexemplified byMaine, A mittedly, a few people who considerthem- a state whosegenerally large counties .en- selves as members of this were compass many smallant often contrastirig not raised as Catholics andprobably a much, towns. County-level measurements aresimp-__ t larger number did not speakFrench as chit; ly too gross to illuininate muchof the geo- dren. But there is no way ofdetermining how graphic variety of the state, .andexcept for people are represented in these untyp- Portland thprf has been until.recently no t, many detailed treat- ical, categories. More,9ver, measuresof lan- city large enough to receive , . li - guage and religion providethe only evidence ment. available_ regarding the size-anddistribut6n these of the France-American population.' However, it is possible to overcome - prolAns and to obtain reasonably gooddis- Social scientists wliq have studiedethni- -tributional information onFranco-Ameri- city in the United States have-frequen'tly cans, both at thebeginning of the twentieth used published volumesof the decennial century and in 1970. Forthe former, two publications of the latenineteenth century federal census as primary sources.Depending tl ,on the. year underinvestigation, measure- arehelpful,4 but .4Pecial 1908 census is ment of the size of an ethnic_population most 'useful., The unusualcircumstances!he- could usually be obtained fromdata on hind this census require somebrief explana- either 1) the mother tongue ofthe foreign It was planned by leaders ofthe Franc- - born population of states, countiesand Am an communitiesin order td demon- larger cities; or. 2) the country oforigin of strate t at they represented allethnic group numbers and, there- the foreigntioin and the

0 '' 5'

, 85 f

LeCoitts Permanent de la Cause Nationale motivation behind the survey would.aggest du Maine.This group commissioned °chile that Laplante was probably not reluctant to Laplante"to conduct ,a thorough survey of include those of French origin who wereno fr the Franco-American population in Maine. longei using the. language or practicing She In efforts Laplante traveled over 4000 faith. Although these matters do raise limes- miles within the state, seeking out Franco- .. tiong about the tots state numbers, it will5 '74 Ainericaris in even the smallest towns. His be assumed that variations in,the'acciiraCy of final count was one injehich he expressed counting and in the criteria for.-niembership.. greatConfidelice,in mite of numerous in the Franco-American coMMunity did not admitted, difficulties:" In 1908 And early vary significantly from place to -place. As s1909, .4aplantes findings were published wellf, One must remember 4nit- Laplante's and fortintately they .have been recentlyre- count was made by parish territories, which -printed.5 -Comparison with federalcensus in much of Maine extended over several 'figures. for 1910 indicates that hewas gen- towns and often inducted :more Jhan, one. erally accurate, with over-estimates likely Small FrancolAmerican settlement _together. only in areas having few Franco-Antericar.6 with scattered individuals and families. Thus, Becauset,, the survey was not restricted tore- it is not possible to,know the exact kcation cent immigrant generations and ,because it' and' extent of population clustering within) was presented in terms of Catholic parish -, these parishes. units, tho-{lata are more culturally valid and geographically illuminating than most U. S. CcintemPorary distributional dataare Census data:- klis results represent the hest availableita-t-lie United States. Census. of ethnic distribue nal data available from this, 1 930. This was differenyfrOm pitst .censuses period. inthatthe -question .concerning mo 1 .tongue was. not limited. in application to 5ir . , In Anterpreting Laplante's data, Certain foreign -born P.Opulation.All indigiduals in a "Probles must bi considered. First, Laplante- 15 per cent...random sample weVisked to was, of urse, interested in counting the identify theVianguagC:iised In their Mmes' Catholic po :dation of French background, when they were 'e0fldren.',7-or thiroijson and lie relied on parish priests foi much of the 1970 data on mother tongue are more "his information: But he -never defined the useful than those- from any previOus census: criteria by. which a perSon was to be consid- However, itis impOttant to recognite that ered a Trench Catholic. 'Although hewas *-the data do not indicate the langyagro*sed at able to include many Frimco-Ainericans who the time the census was token:Many people were outside the ethnie-centert and. some who' learned French or otherlanguagesas whii,were far from evenan Irish Catholic the' st langnage hatte since ledrned English Vb. Church, many Of thewere in theprocess an. s ay speak English tpgularly -as adults. 'of abandoning eitherlIreir ilanguage or their The itein is a good indicator, how- , Catholicism or,both. There was no.standard- ever, of French ethnic backgr tad and as .ized method for identifyinirwho wasFranco- such,. is a= good nisiii4 oft , American- and whowas not, as in cases of strength of French.hnicity in 'differenteint children of ethnically mixed marriages. Nor places. Thect thatnly sample of the . were there any expressed criteria for-Sleciding populatiohrs -asked thb-queStiontdoes not

who .shotild be counted as a, member of a. ,'affect the reliability of the ,res.ulq, etept . pirish,and who 'had beenso lax and unlitter perhaps in towns with fewei - estedln practicing his religion,asto be n4 hundred inhabitants.. Another imiiroveinek". ',,, loner considered a 'Catholic., Indeed 114 , 'in the 19/0 Census is the availabilifyof flats Cp

14, 86

for smaller areal units. The published volumeS the cumulative effect of four major phases,

of the Census provide somewhat greater de- - of settlement: 1) the expansion of early rural tail than in the past, and much more infor- settleinekit along the upper St. John River, matio4 is available in the Orin of coniupter 2) the settlement of formerly seasonal work- tapes. A print-out of 4e results Of the ers, Aspeeial(y in the Kennebec and Penobsco. mother tongue question for many of Mra River Valleys, 3) the concenttation of large towns is one empirical basis for research bn numbers of immigrants in cotton' textile the contemporary distribution of Front(); manufacturing towns, and 4) later concen- Americans.8 lrations of both immigrants and natives in certain pulp and paper manufacturing cen- Clearly the 1908.and 1970 data are not ters. Since flte4edevelopnients tail the foitd- strictly Comparable since they are based-on ditjons for the populatiOn changes to be in- different criteria. Yet each measures an im- vestigated,., they will be discussed briefly.

portant aspect of Franco-American ethnicity, . . aqd it is indeed possible to compare the two In the late eighteenthcettry French distributions in terms of relative changes.. Acadian pioneers began clearing . land for tween different places in .:Jhe state. Such homes and fields along the banks of the St. comparisons constitute the ptimary evidence John River, far upstream 4_rom the predonni- of the twentieth- century trends discussed in- handyBritisharea,...ar and . this paper. /- From a first landing at $t. David near the A present town of Madawaska, they soon)egan At this point it is appropriateloramine to expand along both banks, up and down the historical development of Franco-Ameri- the river. (Map O.?, Canadians from the St. can settlement in Maine. In general, the Lawrence Valley joined them, and by 1831 ethnic distribution at the beginning of the there were over 2,000 immigrants in the twentieth century can be seeinter §,of unner $t John Valley..1 ° The settlements, 1-a L. 1'v t..k P.'1'. L 6,- FRENCHRITTLEMENAXPANSION SOUTH RANK Um* ST. JOHN VALLEY

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known collectively tlfen as Madawaska,ex- If New Sweden in 1871was expanding to ten\ded from the mouth of the Fish River the north and east. Although the Swedes (Fort Kent) forty-five miles dOwnriver,be- pushed intos the town of Stockholm first, yond the parish ofSt. BruneauVan Buren). the French would soon, follow. Thug!a zone Therewere some English-speak g people it of hiterlaced was as created between either end of the Valley, but in thesenter Limestone and Hamlin and between.Caribou . theinhabitantsWere almost completely and Van amen. Also, to the west along the French, with roughly equal numbersof St. John River a smaller settlement of still Acadians and Canadiang. Ever sincethe different characterwas developing. Scots- Treaty of 'Paris in 1783' the .entirearea had Irishloggers and river- drivers from New 'I. been in dispute between the United States' Brunswick migrated to the Valley and lo- and Great .Britian. However, in 1842the cated west of the mouth of the St. Francis northern boundary of Mainewas firmly upriier from the French. In time fixed along the St. John and St. Francis riv- their descendants andnew arrivals formed ers, splitting Madawaska down its rivet:back- a small, somewhat society, isolated bone. People who had chosen lotson the both geographically and culturally.- A.narrow south bank became U. S. citizens while tholb, NN cultural transition zone. was being formed at on the north were confirmed as British sutler the town of St. Francjs: eastwardwas all al- jects. Resolution of the boundary disputeIIimogf exclusively PreithhCatholic area while brought increased migration anda resulting to the west was Allagash, whose inhabitants extension of the area of contiguous settle- spoke English and were most assuredly not meht. Some people moved up the Fish River -Catholic. along a newly completed road to the south. i , Also,. by the 18500s.log,ging trails penetrated Although in-migration to the Valley de- the broad hill country east' of Frenchville, clined in the last half of tin nineteenthcen 'and after 1860 this areaeceived its first tury, the population grew rapidly by natural farm families. Ulitmately these back settle- increase,. At the same time many individuals ments would be spread over the landsome left the area and sougjlt their fortune further ten miles south of the river. By 1.892 the set- south. Some worked at the huge sawmill tlenient encompassed Hamlin 'oil. theeast north of Ashland, a few moved to Caribou and St. Francis on the west, but the general and Fort Fairfield, and others joined mi- direction,of eXpansion was to the south) 1 grants from the Maritime Provinces seeking Wallagrask Eagle Lake, and Wintervillewere employment in the sawmills, tanneries, and then well populated. The major southward otherindustries of the Penobscot River thrust was along the main road from Van towns.' 2

Buren to Caribou, with a focus around theAP. parish at North Caribou, istablieshed in 1881. A similar southward drift was taking place A secondary, movement of French pushed from Canadian settlements closer to the St. south from Hamlin toward Limestone. Lawrence River. Beginning in the 1830s many Trench-Canadians from Beauce County In contrast to the wild forest land which were able to find' short-tertit work in south- surrounded most of the French settlements, ern Maine. In those early years most individ- these lands to the southeast lad been opened, uals rejoined their families in Quebec' when if not densely occupied, by the descendants the jobs Were finished, but ecpnomicoppr- of the Yankee-British pioneers of eastern tunities were so much better south of the Aroos ,took County. At the same time, the border that increasing numbers decided to Swedish farming colony begtftrin thetowtt move permanently to Maine." As early as AIN 88

Water- jobs, and French -Cana dians wererecruited ! 1835 thirty nullifies had gathered in vine," and by 1860 tthere were.more than" and eagerly accepted mill work. 500 Frenchtanadians in Biddeford and al- most as many in Waterville and in the towns \13y 1873, the cotton mill cities of Bidde- along the lower PenobscotRiver.' 5 Skow- ford and Lewiston were'receiving the largest hegan had over 200 French-Canadians,and number ofFrench-Canadians."In' 1860 there were sufficient opportunities in Augus- nearly 75 per cent of Biddeford's employed ta, Farmington, Fairfield andDexter for French-Canadians were working in the cot- each to have attracted several Frenchfani- tonmills.20 Although the first French-Cana- flies.' 6- After 1853, when the first railnilad dian hninigrant to 'Lewiston mayhave arrived .link between Q4ebec and Maine was com- as late as1860,2' the groWth of both indng pleted, transportation between Quebec and. try and the Fresh population was sorapid southern Maine's developing manufacturing after 1868 that Lewis' ton soonsurpassed cities Ivas relatively easy and cheap. This, Biddeford. By 1 $90 there were 9,250 French together with recruitment and the personal persons in Lew' ton comparedto Biddeford's 22 Mills were built in * contactnetworks established. earlier, made , -. e Lockwood it possible for future French-Canadianmigra- Waterville and the French communityof tion to be highly responsive to developing that town continued to expand.Other cot- job opportunities and income differentials-in ton mill centers' - Brunswick,Westbrook, and the various places.' 7, Augustahad fewer French, but only smallest mills in such places asHallowell, The largest employer of French-Canadian Kennebtink, Richmond and Yarmouth failed iminigrAtsmen,* women and childrenwas to becomes foci of-majorFranco-American .sthe exPIRding cotton textilemanufacturing communities..23 establishments. After a hesitant beginning in the early, nineteenth century, they grew rap- Woolen textile plants, more widelydis- idly after the'Civil War with theconsolidation persed and smaller than the cottonmills, of smaller mills and the availabilityof cotton tended to employ local residents.In towns fiber and BoSton capital tapped for millde- where both woolen mill employmentand ', velopment by,resourcefdl entrepreneurs." 8 French settlement occurred,thexelationship This was also a period of vigorousrailroad between the twowad uncertain. Skowhegan, expansion, with each line whichpushed Old Town and Madison allhad,French com- north helping totie more cities into': the munities prior to mill construction;'and Lis- -larger ' markets of southern NewEngland. bon, Lewiston and Old Town were Moredi- Moreover, southern cotton was easilyshipped verse industrially, with employmen't oppor- manufac- to .the port of ,Portland from there taken tunities not dependent on woolen by train' to the various mills. Prior tomid- turing. Perhaps only in Dexter andVassal- 'century most wor1cers in the mills wereYan- boro could the establishmentof Franco- kees, often- faun girls looking for more ex- American communities be associatedprimar- citement, and a better life in the city. But be- ily xith the woolenmills.24 However, the cause of the monotonousand often danger- importance of the textile industry' aswwhole to' the French- ous work -(Withlong %lams and low pay, in providing employment fact fewer* Americans accepted suchjobs, and in Caradianimmigrants is clear from the the 1850s much of the labor in .the mills was that 'in 11190 over 30. per centof Maine's being performed by Irish immigrants:With employed Canadian-born French malesand the post-Civil War expansion, .eventhese 84 per "cent of employedCanadian-born. recent immigrants were able, tofind better French females worked in suchmills.25

99 4' 1'

89 . ok. In the late nineteenth century apothei world;its emp oyees 'included Quecois, major indtistry was developing in the state. but these were later,med by 'about one When the paper industry switched in the late hundred Acadian fin lies.29 Some P.E.I. 1870s from rags to wood pulpas a source of Acadians settled neat,'te newmillin yar- paper fiber, the resource.potential of Maine's mouth,30and,others Oade their way to the - forests was obvious. Over the next few dec- Chisholm and Riley. 'Allis in the town of ades numgtious pulp andpaper mills were es- Jay.31 Millinocket's4ncomericans came tablished, commonly on the larger rivers mtiftly\ fromtheupper' St. n Valley and the Androscoggin, the Kennebec, and the the Maritimes, and the largest colony of New Penobscot. Tire industrybuilt w ole new Brunkwick and P.E.I. Acadiansdeveloped in towns on the fringes of the great fost areas Rumford after the International Paper Com- and rejuvenated older settlements'w ich had pany opened its sulfite mill and paper bag been chosen as sites for the .new mills. The plant in 1900.32 Similarly, in the lower rapid growth of the industry meant that Penobscot River towns some of the French a wood choppers were in great demand. Know- immigrants were from Quebec, but most,d ledge of job opportunities in the woods had come from the Maritime Provinces." been widely disseminated, and in 1871a rail= road connection between Bangor and New 'By1908, 'then, the Franco-American Brunswick was completed. By the end of the - population was concentrated in the new century a large proportion of the woodsmen manufacturing centers, and it is possible to were Canadian in origin.: Scots, English, Irish determine statistically the extent to which and Acadians from the Maritime Provinces French urban settlement wa0correlated with together with French-Canadians fromacross different types of manufaring. Laplante's the border to the west.26 data for 1908 and Maine state statisticson manufacturing employment by town in When the large pulp and pdper millswere 1911834were compared for all towns and built, a great variety of people sought work cities with over 2,900 inhabitants in 1910. at the plants. The average annualwage was Aroostook County was excluded because 4609 compare;! to $442 for woolen mill Frapco-Americansettlementtherewas workers, *390 for cotton mill workers, and known to be unrelated to manufacturing. $415 for Thmber and timber workers.27 The Thirty-seven places were included in the r7r. companies ,recruiteda few skilled paper analysis. makers, but most of the Yankees, Italian im- migrants, and French from Canada and Lew- . Results indicate that cotton textile mt- iston who were hired at the millswere anx- ployment was very highly correlated with ious for any job at .these higher wages. Also, ; the Franco-American population- fra..915). the presence of Acadian French inthe paper Both woolen and pulp and paper manufac- mill towns differentiated these placessome- turing employment ,showed positive but what from t* other French settlements in much lower correlations (r....141 and .137 southern Maine. Acadians from New Bruns- respectively). It is correct,. then, to associate wick, Prince Edward Island and'theupper the early twentieth century Franco-Ameri- St. John Valley migrated in handfuls to most cans with the cotton industry. This does not of the urban French centers in Maine, but mean, of course, that all Franeo-Americans the paper mill. towns received easily the or even a majority wore actually working in largest numbers" (Map 2). For example, in the industry. It shows only that this indus- 1880 the S.D. Warren Company in Westbrook trial employment was sufficient to provide was described as the largest paper mill in the a locationsl focus for the infant Franco-

10.0 a ,t1

. 90 .41. ' American communities, each-0f Which con ofFranco-A4erican settlement in these spe- . Moreover, total Jaine4: many individualSof varied occupa- cialized industrial !centers. , :Americans had a manufacturing employment was morehighly flank skills...11d Franco 40 irdistinctive geography at thistime js ftirther co elated-withthe total population (r=.808) indicated by the fact that correlition be- n withthe Franco-Americin population. .fotal-population.and tbe Franco- tween the analypdlby step:: American popUlation ofthese:placesas rel- The data were further determine the t_ -ativelAkiw 0-.391).dearly, FranIco-Ameri- wise multiple regression to can settlement was not areflection of the cumulative importance ot thedifferent man- the.Fian- general populationdistribution. tifacturing types in accounting for :co-American, 'distribution. The ;resultsindi- , Of the places in the aboveanalysis, two cate that half thevariittion.,ip the Franco:- by were cities with nearlytwice the cotton tex- Amoricah distribution could b explained Franco-A.nwrican pop- cottontextileemployment.(0.4942) tile emploYment and largest cot- ttlation of the next largestcehter: It is quite withoist even including the two .. Franco-AMerican centers. Fur- clearthatthecorrelatiOn was strongly:. ton mill and influenced by these two extreme cases(Lew- thermore,allthree variables together ac= Of the diStribut and iliildeford-Saco)in *hich the cor- count for.uover..70 per cent iston. Aroostook relation with cotton textileemployment was tion of Franco-Americaksoutut very 'high.Theref0ire, in order to better .un- 'County.. derstand-, the situation_ for moretypical ur- Franco-Ameri- ban places, a second analysis wasmade, this Other major features of can settlement inNIL,948 can bestbe seen in, tame-xcluding LewistOn and Biddeford- remaining thirty-five terms of countycomparisons (TaIlle2). Saco. Analysis of the the largest places showed that theFranco-American Aroostook County contained highly corrOated number of Franco-Americans,and the larg- population was still most Franco-Americans in the with cotton textile employment(r.u.703), est proportion of industry employ- total population Was alsofound there; Set- .but that pulp and paper concentrated in the correlated tlement was still highly ' ment was also strOngly' ValleY(Map 2). Be at the.01level). rural upper St. John statisticallysignificant ntury Woolen textile employment had amuch low- immigration in he latenineteenth not statistically signif: was. not large, it wasindeed a nat' e-born er correlajtioriIri..258, By 1910 icant at the...0.5 level). Correlationwi,th total population that occupied the area-. (r -.468) was only 13 per cent of theFrench in Aroostook ,manufacturing employment Tanada.35 Penob- \=/ -legs than that with either cotton or pulpand County had been born in scot County alsocontained a large number paper manufacturing,making clear the.fact t

TABLE a RESULTS OF MULTIPLigREGRESSION OF FRANCO-AMERICAN POPULATION ON EMPLOYMENTVARIABLES ." R2 Increase inR2 Employment Type R .4942 .4942 Cotton textile . .7714 .5951 .1009 Pulp and paper .7073 .1122 Woolen textile .8410 *Lewiston, Biddeford-Saco andAroostook County not included.

101 1 91 r 44*

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St FRANCO-AMERICANS. IN MAINE,1908 rR

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gir 4

92

-oFranco--Amer*ans; and,,because' -soMany nada. The presena of Franco Americans. -in Cutnberl4nd, Franklin, Ox/-.4,_ ,of k residents had *migrated from theU.S. stwh counties 'as descen- ford and Somerset, can beunderstood only 64.side of the St. John Valley or were ants or -very early frenchCanadian settlers, in' terms of particular towns.Becanie the '''the percentage of foreign born was excep- low numbers aild proportion of county-to- tionally low (26%) in that county too.40 tals obscure the localsignif&ance of these . French settlements, an examinatignof the . In the southern part of. the stateFranco- distribution by towns is more illuntmating. Americans wererelearly stew gent in Androl scoggih and York Counties, with Kennebec Tale 3 include; only parishes in which, County third in numbers. Here mostFranco- the Franco-American populationin 1908 concentaated in one town. .- Americanslived close to the:mill operatiotis was substantially of the types already discussed.With the ex- Data for smaller places indicate adispeesakof - ception.of ,Watentille and, to a lesser extent, Franco- Americans whichmale location in Biddeford, the French- population ofthese. terms of towns toouncertain. In those par- counties was relatively new to the state. ashes 'Where Franco-Americans wereknown Over half the French. in Androscogginand to be concentrated in onetolin, but with York Counties in 1910 had been bornin Ca- significant numbers in one adjoining town, '3. TABLE.2 FRANCO-AMERICANS IN MAINECOUNTIES: 1908, 1970 1908 1970 Per cent Franco Per cent French Fr. M. T. In American c---Fr.-Ams. in Mother Tongue Population Total,Pop. 66unty Catholics TOtal Pop. 39 14,842 25 35,940 ,r Androscoggin 27,442 29 22,881_. 31 Aroostook 6 7,715 7 11,286 Cumberland 1,559 ./ 7 Fianklin 2,351 12 22 "0 403 .1 HanCock .18,264 19 Kennebec 9,152 '15 211 1 Knox 112- 1 0 200 1 Lincoln ,22 8 3,341 9 3,612 Oxford 8,885 7 Penobscot 9,38Xt 12 2 845 5 Riscataquis 4 1,114 5 Sagaliahoc 723 4 4,358 12 4,475 Somerset 467 2 t Waldo 145- 5) 2 301 -1 500 Washington 26,226 24 York 15,143 22 141,489 .Total , 12 15, LAverage H (January. 1909). Souries: Laplante.«Les France-amdricains duMaine.»La revue franco-emoriraina. Bureau of the Census.Thirteenth Census of the U.S. 1910:Population. pp. 206-209. U.S. Number of In- pp. 814-816. U.S. Bureau of theCensus.1970 Census of Population.Mate: habitants. Table 10: General Social andEconomic Characteristics. Table119.

1.1 L

93 TABLE 3 I FRANCO-AMERICAS IN SELECTEDANS:1908, 1970 _ 1908 1976-

Franco - .French Per cent American other Tongue Elench Town or Parish Cathb,lics s. >_- ulation ,M.T. Lewiston *7- 11,180 43, : a. - 25,037. 60 Biddeford (incl. Saco). .10,641 62* .15,549t; 61 Waterville (incl. Winslow) 5;862 51*) 8;338 30 Van 'Buren , 3,800 .97 3,844 . 94 Brunswick (incl. Topsham) 3,308 $O 2.114 3,1'52. 15 Old Town (incl. Bradley') -3,3b0 15,999807 20 Sanford (incl. Springvale) 2,968 38 Westbrook 36 2,487 17 4 Auburn 116 2,9,11 19 6,938 29 Fort Kent v° 2,850 95. 3,929 86 Ru'jriford (incl. Mexico) 2,745 2,665 21 Augusta 2,487 '19 *if 6,419 29 Eagle Lake 2;4.00 99 943 95I Caribou (incl. N. Car.) 2,242 .4 43 % 2,470 24 Frenchville ,...1 1,950 '99 1,441 97 Skowhegan 1,806 '34 925 12 Madawaska 11600 95 4,800*, 86t Jay (incl. Liv. Falls) 1,525 51* 1,505 18 Bangor 1,058 4 1,861 6 Millinocket (incl. E. Mil.) 1,039 31* 1,369 13 Dexter 855 24 364 10 St. Francis -805 95 876 79 Portlapd (incl. S. Poit.) 760 1 3,653 4 Bath 674 7 271 3 Presque Isle 641 12 876 14 Brewer 624 11 47g 5 I Orono 599 17 768 8 Lisbon 567 14 1,135 17 *See text for explanation of probable slight overestimate represented by these figures. t Estimate. * For Biddeford alone the 1970 French mother tongue population was 12,268. Sources: Laplante's census,'published in issues ofL#essager(Lewiston) and reprinted (See. note 4). U.S. Bureau IA the Census.Thirteenth Census of the. U.S. 1910.-Population. II. pp. 801-805, U.S. Bureau of the Census.1970 Census of Populatiori:Maine:Number of Inhabitants. Table I: General, Social and Economic Characteristics. Table81: 102: Fourth Count of CompUter Tapes. Table 23 for towns with fewer than 10,000 inhabitants.

104 I

4 94 , the second center is indicatedI ;;,,being in- largest Franco%AnieriCan center at this time chided as part of the parish to , In such` but the prOportiO of FrenCh in this second- cases the' percentage figure for themajor large, t cityofthe state was lower than one town in I908'-is- somewhat higher thanIt mighhave expected from Itswidespread reputation its the French city.LeWiston had .c., should be, as this figure does not take into account the total poi:Math% in the adjoining large numbers of bdth Yankees and Irish, so ..town. The case of Biddeford and Sa&i, for that even by 1908 the French were not in a which additional information on French lo- majority, But it had been growing faster cations is alablg, illustrates the situation. than Biddeford, as was indic'ated by the \ Because there was noFrenchparish in Saco, change in manufacturing employment fr n 1904 to 1909. While Biddeford grew by on k., even as late as 1908, t ie more than 1,000 4-. . Franco-Americans in Saco36 were included 288 persons insuch jots, there was An by Laplante with those in Biddeford to increase of 1,540 manufacring workeh in make the. total:of 10,641. BiddefOrd would Lewiston4Auburn byt elatterdate.39 then appear to be 662 per cent Franto-Ameri- - Waterville was still the third Franco-Ameri-, can .city, and new industry had appearedin . can. But if the 1,000 in taco aresubtracted tfrom Biddefbrd's total, the revised total of the area. The Hollingsworth anti Whitney, 9,650 Franco-Americans, 57 per cent of the pulp,and paper planLwas constructed across city's people, is more accurate. Still, Bidde- the Kennebec, River in Winslow, and a new ford was the leading city in the state in soda pulp plant at-:Fairfield also provided terms. of proportion of French in the total - jobs for theFrench community. But more popu tion. During this periodthe city was immigrants Were heading down the river to expe icing also an influx of European im- Auguata where cotton mill employment had migra is of varied nationalities. Atthe same by 1910 grown to ten times its size in time old Yankee- families had been moving 1845..40 Also, the town of Jay experienced a 11' across. the river to Saco to avoid contact major influx of people when the Interna- with the «new and uncertainpeoples.»37 onal Paper Company. developed plants on Saco was Considered a serene and prosperous e -Androscoggin Aiver.Few people had tradit6nal .community, epitomized by'. its been living just north of the town of Liver- old colonial homes and elm- shaded streets. more Falls when the mills were built. Conse- As Biddeford becanib -increasingly foreign quently, in the Chisholm area.especially and amid Catholic, Saco became a suburban refuge in the town of Jay as a whole theFranco- for the Yankees. "7 Americaa community-represented a large. proportion of the inhabitants. In Old 'town, also, measurement was complicated by the location of parishioners In the upper St. John Valley the building in neighboring towns. Over two decades ear- of the Bangor and Aroostook Railroad and Her; one-fifth of the French members of the the development of the potato as a specialty parishin Old Town had been livingin crop permitted much closercommercial ties Bradley and Milfordtowns.38 If the relative with the growing urban markets to the south. location of parishioners had not . changed, For farmers the potato represented a gamble then in 1908 probably only abOut 39 per for possible large cash gains, and for young cent crf Old Town's inhabitants were Franco- people and entire families there were good - f Americans. SiMilarly, some of the people jobs for a feW weeks in late summer picking counted by Laplante for St. John's parish in potatoes. Unfortunately, the prosperity of Brunswick actually lived across the river in bum0er harvests too seldom compensated Topsham. Lewiston ;hayhave been the for lean years; the Valley remained poor. I A /

fr 95

C2 bumbering.still prilded seasonal employ- felt that their language _was inseparable from ment for local then, and4Onle Frco-Ameri- their religion, that the French-language was a 'cans were able to purchase pusines such as necessary bulwark 'for CatholicisM,. As long sawmills; March factories and st res,',. which as person continued to use French rather had been started originally by Yankee' entre- than 'English he would remain a Catholic. preneurs.41 And althoughFranco-American But qui perd sa langue perd sa fol. The lawyers and doctors were begiving tore- priest?: and other leaders .who came to New place most, non-French professionals, there, England were verymuch aware of the danger were altogether not enough pod jobs to go of exposure to thealien influences.

, around.Even though some Franco-Ameri- ,or ,,,,cans were leaving the Valley,the high rate of The establisitinent of a Catholic elemen- natural increase plus the departure ofsome tary school was. bfttn the first concern of English speakers meant that the populace the pastor in a growing Franco-Ani* lean wasbecomingevermoredominantly community. in 1908 there were over 00 French.42 ,Moreover, thetotal population pupils in parochial schools in Maine, ,nd was growl ni rapidly. The number of people two-thirdsofthese wereinStench in the regiolk, frqm Allagash to Hamlin and schools.44 Usually the teachers weeenuns ti Withto WinteAfille and Stockholm, in- from either France or COada. Although in _creased from less than 9,000 in 1880 toover some schools there were classes in English, 21,000 in 1910. The new Franco-American most teaching was devoted to French-lan- settlements of Guerette and Sinclair on the guage subjects, including religion and French lakes vutheast of Frenchville were devel- Canadian history.45 Except the major oped in the 1890's while Eagle Lake and. ifraqco-American centers, the attemVv to Stocklliplm tripled their numbers betwe, preserve theweft of Fret; in eVeryday .1906 mid 19J0. The culturk andgeograp "speech failed, In parishes the prits cal Ceparation between the Franco-American spoke no French, and the abqition. of settlements in northorif4 4.aine1 and the rest glish language skills was obvio s15,_ 41n- of the stateproduced mostdistinctive able, if not necessaryi where FA co-Ameri- cultural region inall )fievr 'England, one cans were a local minorityAambering w few which appeared at this time 41 little danger ktundyed or less. Even in i57 larger places of being overwhelmed byithe English- speak- many Franco-Americanslostinterest "in mg Protestant and secular dominance of the ethnio matters; the 1920's_ represented the rest of the state and the country. last decade of widespread ethnic support for the use of the French language in all possible Many french Canadians arrived in New affairs of the community." By 1930 the

England in ,the years after 1908. Except for smaller schools had evolved into general "11 the peiriod of the net southward Cat4olic schools with French language 'study no*" continued until 1930, when the de- occupyinga minor position in the curricu- pressed U.S. economy and new immigration lum. Larger schools still emphasized the restrictions effectively ended the Ion period language, but no longer were the sisters of large-scale French Canadian immigratioir preaching love 'of-Canada and its history.47.

to New England.43 The development ofI In these schools a bilingual generation of growing French populli2ns in rural andur- Americans was being prodycedt In fact, until - ban places within the culalrally alien state of the 1950's- the,, state of Maine never really 'Maine posed an understandable threat to the enforced the requirement that inglish be the ,' integrity of the transplanted French culture. basic lahguage of instruction in all schools" In the nineteenth century French-Canadians although, until 1069, the. state officially 96

prohibited the teaching of subjects other there wis a rough correlation ,withthe size stium a foreignlanguage in a language other of Franco-American communities (Table 4). than English.49 All the larger communities supported such schools, although Old Town had a much 1 Enrollments in Franco-AmeriCan Catho- lower enrollment than_miht have been ex- lic schools in a tyjical yeir duringthe first pected from the number of people in the half of the century givean/indication of, area.. Bangor and Portlandhad large enroll- those pikes wiere the French-language was ..ments in parochial 'schools too, but.these, receiving support from theschools.Al- being Irish, provided no support for French. though the establishment and success of Millinocket and Dexter were, thelargest such scliols was dependent tb sonte extent Franco-American centers will nit anyCali- on the abilitiesof thej1ndividual pastor, olikoolowls at all.

TABLE 4 In general the French who migrated to Maine remained more closely tied to their FliANCO AMERICAN PARISH SCHOOL ENROL MENT: 1910 language and traditions than those, in other New England states. They also had less for- OW Pupils Town Pupils mal education. Considering only Canadian- ewiston 2928"ySkowhegan 417 born French eleven years of age and'older in 405 tiiddeford 2543 Jay* 0 1930, the percentage illiterate was higher in Sanford* .1298 Old Town 385 Maine than in any, other New England state. Waterville 981 Mexico*. Brunswick* 4075- Fairfield* J53 Maine's position was the same with respect Augusta t 99- Orono* 247 to the illiteracy rates of the secondenera- Rumford 600 South Berwick*158 tion Canadian French.50 Also, the Canadian- Auburn 5504 Jackman* 140 born French in Maine Were highest in the Westbrook 440 percentage unable to speak English, highest *Indicates pupils in a parish IV officially in median family size, and lowest'in the per- designated by the Diocese as a French.parish centage who,had become U.S.citizens.5 Al- but in which the Franco-American popula- 'though such characteristics were partly a tion was clearly dominant. In such parishes function of problems affecting all of Maine, French was typically studied as a foreign lan- guage rather than as the language of instruc- they do suggest that French culture was be- tion. ing Anglicized least in Maine. Source:Official Catholic Directory.1930 (New York. 1930). 0The size of Maine's F randoAtnerican Note: In addition, in theuppgSt. John Vali population can also be measured relative to ley thewere eight public schools. New England States, and; tecent which operating essentially as the otIla Frelicti paroChial schools. See Francis changes:n be-shown by comparabledata Brissard, «The Origin of Certain Public on mother tongue for1940 and 1970. In Schools in the St. John' Valley of ,1940, Maine had the second largest number Aroostook County, Maine.» (Unpub- ol peoplehose;pother tongue iewrettch lished M.A. thesis. Univ4rsity of Ottawa. Maine contaiMd a lar- 1967).pp. vi. vii. Discussions of these (Table 5).,Moreover, schools and the problemkinvyved ger number of. third -, andfouTh- generation with their operation can be found in French speakers tl3an any other New En- Ernst C. Helmreich.Religion and the _glandsstate,52 but the major explanation for WA Schools: An Historical Approach this was the unusually early development ol. (Brunswick. 1960). pp. 22.27, and in the unin44 St. John Valley. Since 1940 the KlOss.Les droits linguistiques(See note rc- 49) pp. 50-53. percentage of foreign born among those of or. .4 .. 4

. ...., _. .*. 97

. 4 t. 4 / French mother tongue has dropped'in allthe contrastsbetween thestates. ,There are states, an indication of the ge1ierai reduktion perhaps some differences betIveen thestates in immigilition from French Canada. Tlpe in the extent of French language retention' V differences between the 1940 and the 19/0' This would appear to bea -functiK of they .4 mother tongue Figures thUs reflect internalk,size-of local. FranCo-AnteriCancommunities, , migration within Ne.W, Eligland, natural in'- -the extent of French languageuse in schools, crease, and differences from place toplace in and the amount and recency of immigration' language maintenance. -, from French Canada. But the characteristics .4* -'' .seenin Maine that differentiate French Itis. important to note that in all the communities in terms of the potential for Newt Englandkotates the last few decades,. ,language retention are, for the most part, have seen a growth in the number of people .- eliminated by aggregation at the state level. wIlti learned French as their first languagein 'Also, there is no indication that rates Of the home. Thisisstrg evidence that tiattfralincrease among Franco-Ametican French Atlingity was mu h.more resistantto _differ from one state to another. C change than many people had expected. The quently, the growth pate differences ween NI,.,

greatest absolute gains in Franco-American states are primarily the result s ogralph ice I population as measured by French mother shifts of the Franco-Ai an population: , tongue werewereit ade inConnecticut. an ssa- chusetts, wit Connecticut showing by far The data indicate that Franco- Americans, the largest percentage increase. Thiswas also compared tothe total population, have the only state in which the French popula- shown a greater net migrationout of Maine, tion grelv more rapidlythanthetotal New Hampshire, and Vermont anda corre- population. Changes in. the Aff of the spondingly greater tendency to move to French population do _mirror shifts in the Connecticut. The large 'net migratidn to that total population and seem to accentuate state makes it now roughly equal rine

, TABLE 5 ill FRENCH MOTHER TONGUE POPULATION, NEW ENGLAND STAVES:1940, 1970 French French Pier. cent "Pet cent Mother Tong& Mother Tongue Increase Inziase States ,Population - Population Fr. M.T. To op. 1940 1970 1940-70 1940-70 Massachusetts 281;960 367,194 30 Maine 138,260 141,489* 2 New Hampshire 100,580 112,559 12 50 Rhode Island 85,260 101,270 19 33 Connecticut 59,900 142,118 137 77 Vermont 38,580 c,193 \9 24 *In 1970 Maine recorded 256 people whowere born, in France and 796 who were born in the U.S. but had at least on parent born lit France. This indicates the insignificant role of thatcountry as a source of

French-speaking people in.the state . Sources: U.S. Bureau of the Census.1940 Census:Population. «Nativity and Parentage of the White Popu- 4ation.» Table 2. Data based on a 5 per cent sample of the entire population,not restricted as has usually been the case{ to the population of foreign birthor parentage. U.S.1970 Census of Population. U.S.Sum- thary, General Social and gconomic Tables 146, 147. Data basedon a I'S per cent sample of the entire population.

108 e' 4 ,98 .11

_in the size of its Franco-American popula- tion and compared to data based on Catholic tion. Maine,-on tbe9other hand, showed the parish membership, the fact of placeto place -lowest percentage increase of both Franco- differences. in linguistic assimilation 'mkt be kept in mind, and an analysis +ifgeographic ,o. , ilmericatv and total population, suggesting a every significantout-migration, especially of variations in this aspect ofcultfre. change Franco-Americans. In fact, iliiebt migration will be presented later in this paper.Howev: from the upper S. John%trey to Connec- er, the key processbehind the 1970 distribu- ticut has ,been well known for decarjles.With tion has still been migration, notassimilation. the'buficfrup of U.S. forces prior to the coun- Th bus, major changes that have occurredbe- try's entry into World War II, the newly de tween 1908 and 1970 inthe numbers and* vefoped aircraft factories and other defense proportions of Franco-Ameiicans as indi- plants in southern New England needed la- cated by the available data are primarilythe bor. Workers from all over Maine, and espe- result of population shifts.' cially from the Valley, came to industrial evi- centers like Hartfotd and:New Britain.The ..Several significant developments are Migratioottci such places in central Connecti- dent. First, the Franco: Americanpopulation cut has Continued throughthe -1960's,53 of the southern industrial areas111;s grown stimulated by the greater lob opportunities the most. Androscoggin County'sFrench in Connecticut and *the personal con ty0- population grew by over 20,000 between the. tablished, through previous Migrants. 1908 and 1970 (Table 2). This was twice ' 101 increase experienced in any other county, Within Maine itself certain grth trends and it made that county the presentobvious York and migration flbws have oc .The.size focus of Franco-American ethnicity. of the 1970 Franco-AmeriOn QliC psop- mid Kennebec Counties have grownsutistan% ulation may 'be estimated apola'ticin tially alSteeach increasing itsfaratico-Ameri: from 1908 data. In 1908 the 01", 67 Franco- cannutm by, roughly 10,000. Thesei.. AtZierican Catholics included by Laplanie counties with their greater economichealth constituted 74 per cent ofthe state's total have gOierally been attractive to residentsof Catholic population of123,547.54 Wit is as- poorer areas. A secondtrend has beeicthe sumed that the French proportion within dispepal of some Franco-Americans', it the Catholic population has remainedthe. areas in which they havehistorically been same,55 'then in 1970 there were approxi- few in number. Now a majority oftownS in mately 200,000 Catholics of French,back- the state live some 'people-Wtiose mother ground in thestate.56 Interestingly, it ap- Congne was. French. Counties long the coast pears that 70 per cent of this groupdid take :- Hancock, Lincoln, an Waldo -have.. be- . speak French , astkeir mother tongue, a shown the largest percentage increases remarktly high peAcentage for 1970 consid- cause their 1908 populations were sosmall; still ering the dpowerfAl pressures for linguistic but in these counties Franco-Americims assimilation. In gelation to the state constitute lesS than S per cent of the popula- 4: . population, 154per cent of thethe Feople in tion in even the largesttowns.57 1970 spoke clench as their mothtr tongue and the Catholic populationofFrench In Aroostoiiktounty the earlier pattern heritage** makes up at least r cent has changed but slightly, Thesouthward of the population of Maine. e rift begun in the last century has continued the lake resorts of Guerette and Sinclair, When the mother tongue data by tviwn and other people have by-passedthe inter- Ash- are used as anindicator of the ethnic popula- vening woods to settle in Portage take;

* t 4

4

J

1

BEST CRY AVAIIBLE

FRENCH MOTHER TONGUE,1970

ti

I

Us41111A. les. Owl St 1.1,14.0

46. 110 100

Settlement south of Ail'othelr trend has been the development land and Stockholm. centers. Wins- these towns, however, is stilldistinctly non- of some new Franco-American Franco- French (Map 3); And to the west,the town -low has proved so attractive, to Americans, generally former Waterville resi- of Allagash in 1970 recorded not one person dents, that the French mothertongue popu- spokenFrench as a mother tongue. J4 who had 39 per With such little in-migration to the county's lation bf .nearly, 2,900 represents over of the cultural cent of the town's people.The most prO- rural areas, the stability has been the boundary. between 'French and non -French nounced change, however; movement of Franco-Americansinto Port- areas is not surprising. tr land, the largest city in the state(Table 3). Historically. this city) has been acommercial Th ispersal of Franco-Americansfrom and diversified manufacturingcenter with the rlier, concentration in theinduStrial Nevertheless,by rs has been mostevident in suburban fewFranco-Americans. ce numbered over expansion. Auburn andsSaco werethe first 1970 the French population than West- suburiTs, and soon OldOrchard 2700, making it sliAlijiy larger of the of which have became a popular suburban resortfor Bidde- brook and Brunswiek,' both similar develop- ford residents and FrenchCanadian visitors had a large out-migration.% parishes created in ment in PenobscotCounty has meant that alike. Within Lewiston, Town in the families who Bangor has now surpassed Old the 1920's serve many Catholic French as their moved to the south and east partsof the city number of people who spoke parishes in le petit Ca- mother tongue.. Considering the strong pres- from the older French in these cities, nada. Brunswick Franco-Americanshad, by sures for linguistic assimilation .'Yankee the growth of the Frenchmother tongue 1046, already bought many old major geo- city.58In the small, population indeed represents a homes outside the In addi- growing 'towns outside thecities in the graphical shift of Franco-Americans. inAuburn, Augusta southern part of the state\typically between tion, Francoitmericans than doUbled since in 1970 spoke and Sanford have more 4 and 8 percent of the people in Winslow French as their first language.No longer are 1908. And if Franco-Americans in the Waterville total,then Franco-Americans so concentrated in theold' are not inclufled MorefFranco-Americans now live each of these' three citieshas substantially mill towns. than does the formerly in Livermore Falls than inthe town of Jay, more FrenCh,peeple where. the toriginal settlement wasiodated. third largest c'ehter, Waterville. Bradley has a higher percentageof Franco- settlement of The citiesN:ofBiddefoid and Lewiston Americans than does its parent important urban, shows an unexpect- have been clearly the most Old Town, and Bingham of French ethni- edly high proportion ofFranco-Americans, centers for the preservation absolute numbers city regardlessOf the method of measure- though in both cases the only one large 'city in New comparison of the percentage ment. In 1930 are small. If a n, NewHampshire) had a of a county's Franco-Americanpopulation England ( Cage of,Canadian-bbrnFrench which lived within themajor urban centers higher peice opulation than',Lewiston and of that count ''s madefor.1908 and'1970, it in itsItotaf' Biddeford.5However, a comparison ofthe is clear thatsubstantially lower percentage two suggestswhat has happened4 to 'make of Franco-Americans areliving -in the older Lewiston and Aubuin 'come tobyershadow centers of Waterville(including Winslow), Biddeford and Saco. In1908 Lewiston\ and Rumford (including Mexico);Lewiston, Bid- Auburn ,contained rs per cent moreFrench deford (includingSaco); Brunswick, West- than BiddefOrd and Saco,althougA Franco- brook, and Old Town. S

101

Americans in Biddeford constituted a greater electronics and shoe factories, for instance, proportion of the city's peasle "(Table 3). have employed Amy people who formerly Yet Lewiston's French Culture lhas continued worked-, in the ,textile mills and\could be to be replenished by immigration from Cana- readily trained in other assembly 'tine tasks. da, especially during the 192.0), whereas Moreover, the willingness ofixorkers to com- Biddeford has received fewer -iii migrants, mute long distances haseasepotential labor This is evident from the fact that in 1960 shortages'!" The deve*pinent of the Ports- Lewiston recorded more than twice as many mouth -Naval Shipyard, at jCittery dcreated foreign-born French as Biddeford:6° Also jobs for several thousand, civilian workers: important has been the fact that the largest and when the dates Cotton mill in Biddeford and oldest French parish Lewiston has closed in 1959; an estimated 800. persons long been under the supervision of Domini- found jobs at the shipyard and commuted can Fathers from Canada while Biddeford's each day from Biddeford 65.The automobile parishes have had no comparable link with has thus permitted employees to reside in French Canada." los a result, in 1970r total the community of their choicehile taking meMberShipInLewiston and Auburn's jobs elsewhere,, and residential' patterns of French parishes was-almosttwice that of the past are thus less. subject to change. Biddeford-Saco's, and-Lewiston and Auburn ( together had more thah, twice as many peo- in orderto examine general changes in ple who listed French as their mother tongue the distribution of Franco-Americans since (Table 3). 19081 a correlation analysis was performed using several 1970 population and manufac- Nevertheless, in spite of these develop- turing' variables.66 As in the earlier analysis, ,____ ments, the 1970 pattern of Franco-Ameri-Ameri- Aroostook County was not included because, cans shows a great similarity in features to of its special characteristics. Data are avail: the 1908 distribution. This is due partly to able-for 53 towns and cities, including all the lack of geographic mobility of some fam- places in the 1908 analysis and all but three ilies Rut much more to the fact that mobile of the other Maine towns having 1970 popu- -Franco-Americans tend to move either out lations of 4,000 or more.

.of the state or to the major centers where others live and find good employment: Eth- The geographical stability of the Franco- nic geographical patterns can thus be pre- American distribution during the twentieth served regardless of mobility rates.62 In century is indicated by the fact that correla- Maine the older residential pattern could stilt tion with the 1908 distribution was extreme- bepreservedas economic opportunities ly high (r.'.913), much higher thamthe corre- changed after World War II. With the decline, lation withihe total popi\lation of the state .of the cotton textile \industry, might be (r...582). However, the degree of correlation thought tha many people would leave the with the total population has increased since old cotton tn,s. But in many cases other 1908 (r..391 in 1908), a demonstration of the industries ha appeared. When the large fact that Franco-Americans have been mov- Goodall-Sanrd cotton mills closed in 1954, ing mewhat out of their earlier more dis- most people who were laid off. remained in tinive settlement pattern and are becoming Sanford, and most, of those who left. re- ore like the total population in distribu- turnedto 'Sanford when the town later on. brought in new indintries.63 One reason why* Maine has been able to attract new C tton textile mills are now found in on- dustriesis its/labor availability. The new ly a few of their former locations in Maine, f k

102 sA r

and,even pulp and paperindustry/employ- cent town, the French Mother tongue figures ment is no longer correlated with Franco- for that town were included in the total for '46Americans (r.043). This figure might have themajor town.Inothercasesparish been somettat higher if Franco-Americans boundaries conform to town boundaries or, residing in towns adjacent to mill towns had in the case of Dexter, 84;percent of the par- been included, as would be appropriate to ishioners live in Dexter town.67 Ifthe 1970 ..the less concentrated residential patterns of French mother tongue figures are compared today, Replacement of many textiles mills to the 1970 totals of Catholics of French by a wide variety of manufacturing establish- background, the result i4 a,rotigh indication ments not dependent on riverside locations of the extent of language maintenance in dif- and internal migration within the state have ferept Franco-American centers. The higher meant' that Franco-Americans are slightly 4. the index,the greater the percentage of the less correlated with total manufacturing em- local French Catholics who spoke French as ployment than they were in 1908 (r-.716, as' their mother tongue. Conversely, a high de- opposed to r...808 in 1908, with Biddeford- gree of assimilation to English overthe last Saco and Lewiston included): Moreover, this few decides is indicated by a low index. All is still less than the correlation between the percentage: figures .:are somewhat overesti- total population and manufacturing employ- mated due to the fact that not all people ment in 1970 (p..771), indicating that nei- whose mother tongue was French are Catho- ther the past nor the present Franco-Ameri- lies. Also, in the many cases of inter -ethnic can distribution should be thought of as tied marriage, pastors in the largeRanco:Ameri- to total manufacturing in any special way. can parishes probably counted as'Franco- Americans those people whose background Cultural changes among Franco-Ameri- they did not know. cans are much harder to measurethan geo- The index shows that the French language graphical changes. However, it is possible to has been retained as the mother tonguemost'' make some statements, about French lan- completely in Lewiston, the largest urlian , guage use, pojitical preferences, income lev- French center, and in Frenchville andFort' els, religious behaviour and social structure. `Kent, St. John Valley towns. In Biddeford and, Auburn, French languagemaintenance Regarding the first of these, there is evi- has also been relatively high. As the size of the (Gee of striking place to place differences local Frahco-Ameiican community and its in linguisticassimilation xhen mother proportion in the total town, population de- Catholic tonguedataare eompare4 to crease, the need for English speakingskills in- Chnrch data. Records of theDiocese of Port- creases and French language maintenancesuf- land show for 1965 and 1966 the number of fers. Thus, French. has been retained least in Catholics of different ethnic backgrounds in small communities `like Dexter, In the still I certain parishes for which such figures were - smaller towns of-JackMan and MooseInver supplied by pastors. These figuies are direct- language maintenance has been highliecause ly comparable to the 1908 data since the most people are ofFrench,backgiound and 1966 same measure was used. The 1965 and the nearest larger towns lie across the border ., adfusted`on figures were averaged and then in French-speaking Quebec. the basis of the major town's 1960-1970 population trend, so as to provide an esti- In the 1950's, maintenance of French mate of the French Catholic population in continued to be dependent to a great extent 1970 (Table 6). Where a substantial portion on its use in schools.Thsose families with the of the parish population resides in an adja- greatestexperience. inFrench. parochial 103,

schools have been the ones most likelyto homes. Only 13 per cent of the parentssur- speak French in their honies.68 In 19513 the veyed had children whose only languagewas. Diocesan Superintendent of Schools stated English.71, However, majorchanges occurred that in 53 of 93 parotid& schoolsin Maine, inthe1960's. The practical erosion of French was.taught as a language,was the lan- French language was accelerated everywhere, guage used for (logy religious instruction, probably most effectively by the influence and was frequently spoken and writtenapart of television, although the value of bilingual- from these formal occasions.69 The value of ism was being stressed innew, ethnically French as a second languagewas being ,em- self-conscious educational programs, espe- phasized by the teachers, who encouraged its cially Inthe early 1970's. Even in the upper use in school assemblies and in conversation St. John Valley, where wellover 90 per cent outside school. Interestingly, in 1956 the of the 1970 residents had spoken Frenchas public schools of Sanford begana program their mother tongue,the actual use of of instruction, in- French to all students from Freitch dropped sharply. Outside the home tbe fourth grade thraugh the twelfth grade.7° the young people speak English though the No. other public schools in the stateother older people are understandablymop som- than the schools in the St. John Valleyof- . fortable with. French. A combination of fered this training. French and English is spoken in most homes "'N (Table 7), and in only 44 out of 271 sample In a 1960 survey sampling Franco-Amer- households surveyed in 1966wasFrench the icans in Brunswick and Lewistonover three- only language used.72 The cultural homoge- quarters of the responderits statedthat neity of the Valley and the presence of French. was spoken' most of tie time in their French language radio and television statiode

, TABLE 6 -, FRENCH LANGUAGE MAINTENANCE 114 SELECTED TOWNS French French Index of Catholics, Mother Tongue French Language Towhs 1970* 1970 Maintenancet ' Lewiston 25,282 25,037 99 Frencliville 1,461, 1,441 99 Fort Kent 4,225 3;929 93 Biddeford (incl. Saco) r 18,768 15,599 83 Auburn 8,838 6,938 79 Jackman (incl. Mooge R.) 824 599 73 Brunswick (incl. Topsham) 4,454 3,152 71 Caribou (incl. N. Car.) 3,759 2,470 66 Jay (incl. Liv. Falls) 2,354 1,505 64 Rumford (incl. Mexico) 4,465 2,664 56 Old Town (incl. Bradley and Milford) 4,223 2,196 52 Dexter 1,277 364 29, *Calculated by multiplying the percentageincrease or decrease in the major town's pulation from 1960 to 1970 by .4 and adjusting the 1965-1966 average to show this change. j) t Index represents the per cent di French Catholics in 1970who rewrted their mother tongue as French.. Sources: Annual Rerforts, §elected parishes. Archives ofthe Chancery .Office. Diocese of 'Portland. U.S. 1970 Census of Population (See note 8). k N I

104 ti

on the Canadian side of the St. John River When the socio- economic levels of 4econd- nt for its persistence in Valley com- generation French Canadian, Irish, Italian, mun ies relative to all other places in the and Polish immigrants were compared na- stat except Lewiston (Tattle 6). tionwide in 1950, the French clearly showed the least increase in education, income, and The significaice of the geographical di- occupational status from levels -attained br vide between the French and non-French thefirstgeneration.74 Most immigrants' areas of Aroostook County (Map 3) is es children iiMproved substantially their statue evident in-political rearences: The vot- 'position in American society, yet the French ing pattern in recent presidential elections demonstrated 'little 'change. Another study and certain referenda shows a consistent dis- based on the interviewing and personality tinction between the Democratic andliberal testing of 954 subjectsifrom 62 towns, most -' French towns and the Republican, strongly lyiuConnecticut,found people, of French conservative towns like New Sweden just to and Italian background were significantly the south. The rural and small town areas of lower in achievement, motivation and voca- Aroostook County west of Caribou and tional aspiration than , Greeks, Protes- Presque Isle and south to Houlton are some tants, and Negroes.' Social class differences of the most conservative towns in the state. accounted for only part of the variation.7 5 * Moreover, the cultural differences expressed One observer noted- inthe early 196p 's, invotingbehavioralsodistinguish, the «Franco-Amerians still read very little aid, French-American urban centers from places too often, have "what has aptly been termed like Portland, South Portland, Gorham, Far- a low achievement syndrome; they are, quite mington, and Bangor, where Franco-Ameri- happy if they live comfortably.» 76 ki?6,1 cans are proportionately weak." In Maine, -Nationwide sampling of 2,701 Catholics; in- the proportion of Franco-Aniericans in ,a cluding 16b Franco-Americans, supported town's population, whether rural or urban, is this view, as Franco-Americans showed a low often the best single predictor of town-by- movement into higher education and a low

town variations in voting preferences. - occupational mobility between generations compared to mdst other Catholics." In addition to language and politics, cer- would atpear that some values characteristic tain other attitudes and behavior distin- of nineteenth-Century French Canadian cul- guished Franco-Americans in the 1956's, but ture were influential at that time. there are indications that Many of these have since come closer to the American .norm. However, during the 1960's there have

TABLE 7 LANGUAGE REGULARLY SPOKEN IN THHOME S1EST END, UPPER ST. JOHN VALLEY, 1966 I A Pe nt Per Cent French- Per cent, .Town French: English Combination English St. John 27 51 22 St. Francis 21 1..r\ 61 18 Fort Kent 64 30 6 Eagle Lake 41 - 51 8 Source: See note 73. a 105

apparently been some changes. In a well de- can culture that most large-scale surveys of signed1972nationalsampling of over this type are concerned with questions of 47,000 homes in all fifty states, respondents spend 'and economic achieveinent. Some were asked to identify their ethnic origin or equally significant comparisons might be descent and answer questions. regarding in- made fietween groups in .terms of consumer, come, education and family size.716 With this behavior, life styles, values, personality, reli- research a better indication',of the of gious behavior, or interest and,skillin arf,.- America's ethnic populations in terms of music,'

116 v 106 4

loseitsextremelytight hold." In the difficulties in measurethent, their varied geo- 1950'S the, old ethnic caorganizations found it graphic expression must be c,onsidered in almost impossible teecruit new members any cultural assessment. The experience of from either the elite or the young, for these growing up as a Franco-American in Maine people had little -heed for formalibrganiza- or elsewhere in New England differs very tions or for such ethnically restricted social much as a function of the town one lives in. groups.83 But becausemany of Maine's ur- banFranco-Americans, remainedinthe In summary of these geographical and working class,itis not surprising that in' cultural findings,itis clear that Franco- 1960, 58 per cent of Francd-Americans in- American settlement in Maine in the early terviewedinLewistonandBrunswick twentieth century was .the result of several «claimed that most of their friends were processes: 1) contiguous expansion of rural Franco-Americans.»8 4 settlement east and west along the St. John River, followed by movement along several During the 1950's and 1960's social as- .routes to the south; 2) exploration of eco, similation _generallyincreased,though..in nomic opportunities by seasonal and, eater, terms of inter-religious marriages in Maine, perthanent immigrants from Quebec; creat trench Catholicswere intermarrying with ing the first French urban nuclei in Water- non-Catholics less than were Catholics of , vile and the Old Town area; 3) permanent Irish background .8 5 For the state as a whole, settlement _of large numbers of French Cana-

Catholic "sanctioned mixed marriages ac- .dian immigrants in the cotton mill towns of counted for .a quarter of the total Catholic southern Maine; and 4)later migration-from v marriages in 1965. Intermarriage was lowest wit ,iin Maine and from both Quebec a (3%) in the parishes of he upper St. John° Maritime Provinces, to the pulp and paper Valley, where, of course, nearly everybne mill towns. Geographically, the distributiop r9 was Catholic. However, the rates were al- was very4distinctive in its high correlation to most as low (7%) in the largest French &bap the cotton tex, and, to a lesser extent, the parishes, where contact with non-Catholics pulp and paper industries. At tlp same time, was relatively minima). Religious -interma French Catholicism, together _with the use riage rates generally increased as theisize an 9\ the French language, encouraged so strongly.

proportion of the local-Franco-American, 10the home and parochial school, made for population decreased. Rates of intermarriage a cbrrespondingly great cultural and social were highest in parishes withoutparochial distinctiVenessonthepartof Franco- schools and in towns with Tess than 5,000 Americans. Immigration from Canada was people and a predominantly non:French sh ly reduced in the,second quarter of this Catholic population.!together, these fig- centuly, but a new out-miiration to Connec- ures point to tremendodifferences in the p, ticut and population shifts within 31/Idine be- religious life of Franco- niericanat Tics came ;important.'- t , - _ depending on where they live: . . The .tajor-41,iltributionalchangesin Of. course,- the significance of Franco- the during tile twentieth centuri have American' cult4eandsocietychanges bee1), a wide scattering of Franco- Ameri- through tithe and 'varies from individual to cans in small towns; especiallyin the south- individual. But every indication Supports the ern portions of the 'tate ; 2) the dispersal out no4ion that its geographic variations the d_ if- of earlier concentrations, near various mills ferences from place to placeare some of to suburban, towns; and 3) the development the most important and that,.in spite 1ff of P6rtland and.Bangor as important Franco- IP

6 107

American -centers. Altogether, ;these trends this effect. In 1970 three quarters, of the have made the residential patterns of Fran- state's Catholics and atleast orie-fifth of co-Americans in the state' more like..9iose of Maine'sentirepopulation .,.wereFranco- the general population. Yet, perliapir'ine- American Catholics. what surprising is the extent to whicthe 1970 geography mirrors thaVof sixty years MostFranco-Americansretainsome before, although today it is no longer corre- sense of identification with their ethnicheri- -Iated with special aspects of the economy. tage, and in the larger centers,a new pride is often in evidence. Nearly five and one-half During the twentieth century the prorces- million people in the United States are of ses of cultural and social assimilation have French origin'. They constitute a major ele- eroded some of the distincliveness df the ment in the diversity of cultUres which is so Franco- Aniricans, even in the large Ftench striking in this country. Franco-Americans centers. Culturally, the greatest change .has are now at,ffie Ameriain, norm in terms of probably ben the 'decline of French lan- socio- economic status, although below-aver- guage use, especially in smaller towns but in age levels of income for Maine's population s. -the. 4960's even in the large .ethnic centers. as a',Whole together with a lelifey of rela- Until The Jate 140's most 6roag people., tivelylowFranco-Aiperitanassimilation were uninterested in their linguistic heritage, ipay b, reflectedlin a gfightly 'lower position Sbut the rtival of e fide pride which has for that state. In addition; the fact that enveloped the entire ountry has produceda Franco- Americans it aipe fire still distinc- new interest in kir ing Frenclkamong so tivein.theirdistribution and thatthe of Maine's Fra -Anyerisah§. Gonttaryo strength of theit ethnic culture varies so the opinions expressed in,the late nineteenth much fro* place to, place underscores the century, linguisti6*.imilation has Apparent- significance of a geographic perspective on ly n weakened( 'lies )to, CathblicismNal- this, .the most important ethnic minority in Monkethnic intermarrikige may be havMg the state. --m

c

IR

414

ft. 6

Notes

these difficulties, comparisons are useful. For ex- 1 The term«Franco-American)in its broadest sense refers to Americans of FrenchCanadian amplk Laplante reported 15,143 Franco-Ameri- or Acadian. heritage. In this paperthe label cans in York County, somewhat more than the1 «French» is roughly synonymous but, includes U.S. Censps figure of 13,683 French Cana ians; .also recent immigrants who may still think of but in Androscoggin County Laplante'total themselves as Canadians. In contrast, Maine has (14,842) was smaller than the governent's long been dominate(' by people of English and (15,132). For the cities Laplante's figures were Protestant heritage, constituting a very loosely usually slightly higher, bu,t fillative position of defined ethnic group often labeled as «Yan- both cities and couhties`was almosi always the Thirteenth kee». same. U.S. Bureau of the Census, Census of the U.S. 1910: Population,II, pp. 814- 2. Portions of this paper are bast(' on material 816, 818. For further cornparativ etails, see from the author's doctoral dissertation: ACatito- Allen, «Catholics in Maine,>> pp. it 67, 172. lies in Maine: A Social Geography.» (Unpub- lished Ph.D. dissertation, ,Syracuse University, 7. The question was worded, «What language, oth- this,person's 1970). er than English, was spoken in home when he wasachild?» The procedures are explained in U.S. pureauof the Census, 3.The clearest and most valuableexplanariogt the ethnicity. and the various types of assimila- 1970-Census of Population,General Social and tion whiclMthnic groups in the U.S. have ex- Economic Characteristics, Appendix B,.pp. 7, perienced is found in Milton M. Gordon,Assim- 34. ilation in American Life(New York, 1964)., .S. Bureau of the Census,1970 Census of Pop- Les Canadlens-francais de la ulation,Fourth Count tapes, Tabulati 19.2,11,23, 4. Edouard Hamon, for Maine. N2uvelle-Angleterre(Quebec, 1891); A. Bour- -«Mother Tongue and Nativity,» ata were supplemented by published da- bonniere,Le guide franca's des Etats-Unis T (Lowell, Mass., 1891). ta for c ies and towns with over 10,000 in- habitants available from the1970 Census of 5. The results first appeared in issues ofLe Messa- Population: Maine,General Social and Eco- nomic CharaCteristics, Tables 102,h9, ger,thenewspaper published in Lewiston, MairTe, to champion the Franco-Americap cause; kCounty totals were also reported inLa revue 9. The author wishes to thank LawrenceMiyaki of iranco-armiricaine,II (January, 1909), pp. 206- the CSUN. Geography Department's Cartogra- 209, and III (October, 1909),pp; 398-403. The phy Lab for the Preparation of maps accompa- data have been reprinted recently in Ralph D. nying this article. Vicero's, «Le recensernent d'Oduie4aplante,» k «RepOrt,» Recherches' Sociograptques, XII(4ptembre- 10. Edward Kavanagh and John Deane, decembre, 1971), pp. 3/3-377. inCorrespondence and Documents Relative to the North_ Eastern Boundary, Vol.:;j (1828, 1829, 1831), pp. 367-442. The t5lume is loca- 6, The U.S. Census in 1910 recorded the numbels but of foreign born and foreign stock (second gen- ted in the Maine State Library, Augusta, t eration) French Canadians incounties and lar- this handwritten description has been published in W.O. Raymond, «State of the Madawaska ter cities. TIA census included pople regard- Collec- less of 4ligion, was taken-- N't-Tiro years later than and Aroostook Settlements in 1831,» Laplante's survey, but excluded the grand-chil- tions of the New Brunswick Historical Society, dren of immigrants. Comparison isappropriate III, No. 9 (1914), pp. 344-384. in areas where nearly all French werefirst- or of 11. Thomas Albert,Histoll du Madawaska(Que- second - generation immigrants. In the . case 437. excluded bec; 1920), pp. 191, 192, 233, 287, and the city measures, the ,U,S. Census the set- members of city parishes who happened to re- More. ligetails of the spatial expansion,of side outside the limits of the city. In spiteof tlimeM by this time are evident froth a private le

109

religious census. The numbers of'Catholicsre- 20. Vicero, «Immikation of French Canadians,» ported for each town Can be takenas anindica- p. 171. tion of the extent of French settlement in that town. Census resuitc were published in theBi- 21.Album souvenir du The anniversairede la par- ble Society of MaieQuarterly,I (March, 1893), oisse Saint-Pierre et $aint-Paul de Lewiston, and in the Bible Society of Maine,Second Sta- Maine, 1871:1946,(Lewiston, 1946), p. 8. Lou- ir tistical Report(Portland, 1901), both available is Mothon, Notes on the history ofSts. Peter at the Maine Historical Society Library, Port- and Paul,L'Annie dominicaine,(1893), as col- land. lected and edited by Charlotte Michaud for the LewiTton Journal. 4 12.Bangor Daily Commercial, July 2, 1872, p. 3; April 10, 1886, p. 1; lune 4, 1873,p. 3; and 22. Ha mon,Les Canadiens-francais,p. 402. August 15, 1874, p, I. 23. Maine, Secretiry of State,Statistics of Indus- 13. lames P. Allen, «Migration Fields of French Ca- tries and Finances of Maine for 1888, Second nadian' Immigrants to Southern Maine,» Geo- Repat,pp. 161-165. graphicalReview,LXII (July, 1972), pp. 370, 371 provides more detail on this early migra- 24. /bid. See also Desjardins, «French Canadians,» tion. p. 4.

14. Edwin C. Whittemore, ed.,the Centennial His- 25. U.S.,Census Office,Eleventh Census of the U.S., tory of Waterville(Waterville, 1902), p. 248. 1890: Population,II, pp. 564-565.

, 15. alph D. Vicero, personal communication. 26.Daily Eastern Argus(Portland), Jan. 20, 1903, ese figures are based on revised counts from p. 10. t e manuscripts of the U.S. Census. See Ralph D. Vicero, «Immigration of French Canadians 27. U.S., Bureau of the Census,Thirteenth Census to New England, 1841-1900: A Geographical of the U.S., 1910: 'Manufactures,IX, pp,. 453- Analysis,»(UnpublishedPh.D.dissertation, 454.k University of Wisconsin, 1968). 28. Desjardins, «FTeieleh Canadians,»p. 8. 16. Vicero, personal communication. See alsoHo- norius Provost, «Un chapitre d'histoire religi- 29. Msgr. Philip E. Desjardins, formerpastor of St. euse dans le Maine,»La revue de l'Universiti Hyacinth, Westbrook, interview, January, 1968. Laval,II (June, 1948), pp. 857, 858; Francis B. Butler,A History of Farmington(Farmington, 30. Carmita Jones, «Acadia in Maine,»Records of 1885), p, 169; Philip E. Desjardins, «French Ca- the American Catholic Historical Society of nadians, Central And Southern Maine,»Church Philadelphia,XXXVI (1925), p. 361. Wor/d,(Portland), June 1, 1951,p. 4. 31. 't Rev: Julius Boucher, former pastor of St. RtApor 17. R.K. Vedder and L.E. Galloway, «Settlement Chisholm, interview, February, 1968. Patterns of Canadian Emigrants to the United States, 1850.1960,»Canadian Journatof Eco- ZJILL: sjardins, interview; Msgr. Felix Martin,pastor nomics,III (August, 1970), pp. 476-486. or Ste. Croix,Lewiston, interview, February, 1968;Church World(Portland), July 1, 1955, .18. Robert G. Leblanc,Location of Manufacturing P. 9. in Nineteenth Century New England in the Nineteenth Century,Geography Ptiblications at 33. Analisis Of a sample of 128 naturalizationrec- Dartmouth, No. 7 (Hanover, N.H., 1969),esp. ords shong place of birth of French -named pp. 86.96 and 108-122. immigrants from Canada to the Old Town -Ban- gor area in the period 1880-1910 showed 30 19. «Report of Rev. P.E. Gendreau, Special Agent, per cent Omni the Province kof Quebec and 55 of his Visit to French Canadians in the U.S., 0.4. per cent from the Maritimes, in addition to 15 The Minister of Agriculture,»Sessional Papers per cent from the New Brunswick section of (Canada), No. 9 (1874), p. 67.' the upper St. John Valley. U.S. Bureau of Im-

4. 120 1 1.0

migration and Naturalaation, «Record of Dec- 49. Heinz Kloss,Les droits linguistiques des Fran- laration of Intention,» Vols. I, II, Ill, and VI, co-Ameritains aux Etats-Unis(Quebec, 19 0), Penobscot County Courthouse, Bangor: p. 52.

34. Maine, Bureau of Industrial and Labor Statistics, 50. Leon on E.TruesdellThe Canadian Born in the Twenty-fourth- Annual Report, 1910(Augusta, United States(New Haven, 1943), pp. 18.9, 190. 1910). 51.Ibid.,pp.1,17, 199, 248. 35. This figure .arid subsequent ones are based on foreign-born French Canadians In 1910 as a per- 52. U.S., Bureau of the Census,Sixteenth Census of centage of tilt 1908 total. U.S.,Thirteenth Can- the U.S., 1940:Population, «Nativity and Par- s -3 Moth- SOS of the U.S., 1910:Population, II, pp. 814- entage of the Total White Population by 816. er Tongue,» Table 2,

36. William MacDonald, «The French Canadians in 53. U.S.,1970 Census of Population,Subject Re- Economic Areas, New England,»Quarterly Journal of Economics, s ports: Migration Between State XII (April, 1898), P. 254. 86.

37. Roy P. Fairfield,Sands, Spindles and Steeples 54. P.J. Kennedy,Official Catholic Directory, 11909 (Portland, 1956), p. 217. (New York, 1909). thie present pro- 38.Le Messager(Lewiston), Sept. 15, 1881. 55 There is no good evidence on portion of French within the Catholic popula- 39. U.S.,Thirteenth Census of the U.S., 1910:Man- tion, butsomkonfirmation of the relative sta ufactures, IX,'p. 455. bility of the prilartioA is found in a 1949 esti- mate of 77 per dent by a Frenchethnic organi- 40. Maine, Bureau of Industrial and Labor Statistics, zation. See Comite d'Orientation franco-ameri- Twenty-fourth Annual Report; 1910,p. 15. caine,'Notre Vie franco-americaine(Boston, 1949), p. 21. 41. Edward Wiggin,History of Aroostook,Vol. I (Presque Isle, 1922), p. 185. 56. In 1970 there were 267,88 Catholics inMaine according to the Diocese of 'Portland.Felicia 1971 Catholic Almanac(Paterson, 42.Ibid. A. Foy, ed., 1971),p. 512.

43. Yolande Lavoie,L'dmigration des Canadiens ts, aux Etats-Unis avant 1930(Montreal, 1972),* 57, See note 8 for sources. pp. 13, 22. 58. William N. Locke, «The Flibrich Colony at 44. J.L.K. Laflamme, et al, «French Catholics in Brunswick, Maine,»'Les Archives de Folklore, the United States,The Catholic Encyclopedia (1940, p. 106. (1909), Vol. IX, p. 275. 59. Truesdell,The Canadian, p.53: 45. Nerve B. Lemaire, «Franco-American Efforts on Behalf o_ f the French Language in New En- 60. U.S., Bureau of the Census,1960 Census of gland,»inLanguage Loyalty in the United Population: Maine,Table 80, p. 120. States,Joshua A. Fishman, ed. (The Hague, 1966), p. 258. 61. Vincent Tatarstuk, ed.,The Cathigic Directory of the Diocese of Portland,1967-1968 (Port- 46.Ibid.p.262. land, 1967), pp. 81, 83. V of the 47:Ibid.,p. 263. 62, The incredibly high residential mobility Americanpopulation, throughput the nine- teenth and twentieth Onturiesjs being don- 48. Rev. Charlek .Murphy, Supertntendent of Schools of the Diocese of Portland, interview, strated by research on population turnover cit- September, 1967. persistence rates by decades in a variety of

1 ies and towns. This research, involving thetrac- fnd, Economic Consequences of the ing of 4dividuals rather than Dickey- measures of net Linggp School Hydro-electric PowerDevelop -. migration and aggregate populatiCinchangenug- - (tient on the Upper St. John Valley, Maine- gests no major differences in geographic mobili- Phase I, Preconstruction, ty by size of place or ethnic Misc. Report 123 of group, when socio-- the Agricultural Experiment $tation, economic status is controlled. The University persistence of Maine (Orono, 1968),p. 22. of ethnic residential patterns, bOthwithin cities and between towns, as in Maine,must febriefore 73.. Allen, «Catholies in Maine,» be accounted for by the existence pp. 252-261, 285- of distinctive- 299. David Walker, «The PresidentialPolitics of ethnic migration streams, linking together in a Franco-Americans,»Canadian Journal of Eat- circulation system ethnic communities in many nomics and Political Science, XXVIII(August, places. See Stephan Thernstrom,The Other 190),--pp. 353-363., Bostonians(Cambridge,' Mass., I973),,esp. pp. 220-232, for a synthesis of these researchmeth- 74. Leon F. Bouvier, «La stratification ods and findings. soclale du S groupe ethnique canadikefrancais aux Etats: Unii,»Recherches Solgraphiques;y,No. 3 63,?W.S. Devino, etal, A Study of Textile Mill Clos- 11964); pp. 375-378:'Bouvier's data camefrom ingsin. Selected New England Communities the U.S. Census in,1950. (Orono, 1966), p. 29. 75. Bernard C. Rosen, «Race,'Ethnicity, and the Armour Research Foundationi Planning Study Achievement Syndrome.»American Sociolog- for the Economic Growth of \'4. State of Maine, ical Review,XXIV (Feb. 1959),pp. 57-60). -Vol.11(1960), pp..12, 15.- 76. Herve B. Lemaire,The Franco-Americans of Devino,Textile Mill Closings, p. 14. New England,» bP.S., Department ofHealth, Education and Welfare,ALanguage Resources '66. Data on manufacturing employmentby town- Project (mimeo, 1963), p. 63. were Trom the Maine Department of Economic I geVCICinent, Maine Buyers' Guide andDirec- 77. HarOld J. Abramson,Ethnic Diversity in Catho- toryPT)f Maine Manufacturers,19701971 (Au- lic America(New York, 1973), pk42-45: gusta, 1970). Population data were frOm the 1970 Census of Population. 78. U,S. Bureau. of the Cen'sus,CurrentPopthation Reports, 67. Personal Series b.20, No. 249, «Characteristics . communications from Rev. Gaston of the Population by Ethnic Origin,March Auger (Dexter) and other, pastorsconcerning 1972 and 1971,v. pp. 19-25. the distribution of parishioners within,their par- ish territories, January, 1968. 79. Abramson,Ethnic Diversity,pp. 117-119. 68. Peter H. Rossi and Alice S. Rossi,«Background 80.Ibid.,p. 90. and Consequences of Parochial SchoolEduca- tion,»Harvard Educational Review,XXVII 81.Ibid.,pp. 91-95, 160-164. (Summer, 1957), p.\187. ? 1 .. 82. Bqsie- B..-,,Wessell,An Ethnic Survey 69. Rev. Armand E. Cyr, qUoted in Kenneth Wo C. Car- Ikrcket)TidtrirsarriV.,(ChiaagO;*,ff is penter,.«The Franco-Americans in Maine,» , (Un- thorough !survey wad basedon quioimairesion published Honors thesis, BowdoinCollege, completed by 4,978 public school 1958), p. 26. in a French center ,Sirtlilar to the largerones in. Maine. ' '70. Devino,Textile Mill Closings,p. 17. 1 ! 83. Romeo Boisvert, quoted in Carpenter, 71. David B. Walker, The Politics and Ethnocentrism: Franco-Americant, N p. 43. The Case of the Franco Americans(Brunswick,' 1961), p, 17. 84, Walker,Poi/tics and Ethnocentrism,p.17. 72. Louis A. Ploch and Nelson LeRay,Social 85. Allen, ((eatholies in Wine,»pp. 334-337,

1 -22 t,

by 11.2 Istie no. 23 of the NewEngland Quarterly of 1950 carried a brilliant summary in New England Iris Saunders Podea of 'tlie conditionsof life in the French' communities in the Quebec In the,nineteinth century aswerhCas a discussion of the prevalent situation q the States., region which theFranco-Ameticans had left behind them in emigrating of work, of child la The goodland the bedmostly thelytd-.-with regard to co nditions goverpmental.re- bor, of housing,ofrhealth and orclothing are extracted from numerous rele4nt Frond/ and English Ian- ports tts AmericanandCanadian, as well as from the vow %attire, By the turnof the century, living conditionshad Immeasurably im- proved forthe Franco - Americans.

J

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O 4 QUEBEC. TO< LITTLE CANADA>>: THE COMING OF THEFRENCH CANADIANS TO NEW ENGLAND IN THENINETEENTH CENTURY

by Iris Saunders Podea

Most American minoritiescame to the the influx of southern andeastern EuroPean linked States from the east,the south, or at the end of the nineteenth century changed the west. Only. the French-Canadians mi- the -older image of lythe Chinese of theEast- grated from the north. They emigratedfrom ern states. In the -1880s and '90s j1reW._. Quebec-,-in7the. -t8,40s becauSe Of depres:Ted Englarid.eri s(arted to describeFrench-Cana-', cOriditionS in the ahipiraildiitgand lumber hi= dians ai".indstrious, frugal, -and quickto dustries and because of difficultyin obtairi- learn; the Italians, Greeks, and Syrians had, 4ng land, most of OA was-in the handsof replaced, them on the lowerrungs of society. the speculators. Like most other minorities Despite partial assimilation and acceptan ('e, the French- Canadians sought- greater econ- the. French-Canadians clUtg t#%, their:own omic opportunities. They-settled n,r4Ilyin language and customs. Thetreftipl to drop New England, although somemoved to their own ways prevented he iroupfrom Illinois, Wisconsin, Michigan, and NewYork achieving social equality with Yankee- New and found employment as agricultural la- Englanders. A borers, lumbermen, textileoperators, and brickyard workers. New England Yankees In the following selection Iris Saunders dubbed them lythe Chinese of theEastern Podea describes the early experiences of States,» an indication, as Marcus Hansen hat French-Canadints in New England. written, that New Englanders consideredthe Canadians ignorant,poor, and degraded; an unwelcome influx that would lower New Englanders have longteenaccus- wages and raise the proportion of criminals; tomedtohearingthe French language and an element that showedno disposition spoken in the streets and shops of Lewiston, to become «American.» Many natives also Manchester? Woonsocket, and othermanu- thought that thenewcomers really were facturing towns. This phenomenonmay have loyal to another country,or, since they Were led to a conjecture whether the (struggle for Catholic, ntled_by the priesthoitd. Forthese a continent, still' continues, and the pres- worried New Englanders theFrench-Canadi- ence of the French Canadians in New Eng: ans constituted a dangerous class In thecom- rand is but a phase of Quebec's expansion in munity. North Anierica, The Canadian' Frenchin- vaders who voured into New E nd in the By 1900 New England had about. last three or four decades of the ineteOth 275,000 French-Cardiansd . thereafter im- century, however, slid not come as,warriors. migration& declined as economic 'conditions They were simply seeking theirdaily breid, in Canada improved. Diminished entry and and thek peaceful penetration has provedTar

113 114. more successful than'the earlier French ef- mittees appointed by the Legislative Assem- forts at military conquest. Leaving Quebec's bly in 1849 and 1857 tb investigate the ex-. hnpoverished farms, they entered the ex- tent and causes of emigration from Quebec panding American Industrial life at an opppr- confirmed the backward state of agricultural tune moment and were quicklytransfornied affairs.3 Many French-Canadian Youths were into an urban people. A few, of course, re- landless, while crown lands remained too dear mained farmers, especially in Vermont and and requirements for settlement too difficult. New Hampshire, but they constitute a rural Little land was available for colonization, minority.Thisessaywill'be concerned with and even when it was available, inadequate the ancestors of today's Franco-Americans, roads and bridges made it difficult of access the French-Canadians who migrated to New and deprived it of markets for its produce. England mill towns prior to 1900. The committees'pleas for better roads,, bridges, and other reforms such as home- This migration southward from their steads and the guarantee of wood rights native province Quebec was induced by at went almost unheeded, except by,coloniza- variety of reasOns: geOgraPhical: proximity, tionstfcieties, many of whichWerein-- colonial struggles, and seasonalopportunitigs. effective. Lumber camps and farms, canals angirOlv- roads, quarries and brickyards, river and lake Quebec agriculture confirm& to decline. steamers: all were clamoringfor manpower While the Dtninion Governmenl was making in the growing Republic and Quebechad every. effort induce European immigrants more than an amplesupply. Po'itical unrest to settle in the Canadian West;French-Cana- in Canada before Confederation alsocontnib- - dians continued to leave their farms forthe uted to the migration, but those who came United States, for the West, or for, thecities. as refugees after the1837 Rebellion or as Thehabitantswho remained 'behind still malcontents folio:ming the union of Upper pursued their old methods ofsail depletion and Lower Canada in 1840 were relatively and, in addition, the oldinheritance, system few. Higher wages in the United States were still prevailed. Farms, already small? *ere re- always a magnet, but more important than peatedly subdivided among the many children occupational attractions across the frontier of French Canada's large families, reducing of political forces at home was the economic them to strips too narrow to produce an distress whichbectame increasingly intense in adequate living. It is' no-. wonder that the rural Qiiebec throughout a large part of the Seventh Census of.Canada statedlhat it «was nineteenth century. not in quest of a higher standardof living but to avoid a lower* thitthe French-Cana- No real undlerstandinof the French- dian was impelled to migrati.44 Tpi people Canadian migration intoew England can of Quebec, rather than risk the shrinkingof be gained without -some f ea of whatthe an alreadyprecariousexikence, preferfed to French-Canadian left behinQuebec agri- leave behind the land of their ancestors. It is culture presented a dismalutlook, and in- hard to believe that -a people so gregarious dustry was undeveloped. Ihis journey and loyal to their province as the French- through the province in 1819, BenjaminSil- canadians would have chosen Venture liman had commented on theastern! farm- into a formerly hostile NewEnglandlor the ing techniques then employe and this sake of uncertain financial gain, had it not criticism was still valid half a 'c ntury later. been for these disheartening prospects at It ivasIthe prevailing prejUdice t at land im- home. provement did notpa.Y.2 The ecial com-

A 115

In view of the predicament in which increasing emigration from the province, but French-Canadian,youth found itself, the Civil it Was widespread. It becamea subject of War in the United Stateswas a welcome op- legislativeinvesetatiolf, ecclesiastical Con portunity to many young men. The induce- cern, and pro0agandistic literature. Discred- ment of bounties, for army recruitswas ir- iting motives were imputed to the departing resistible, and it is estimated thatapprox- inhabitants in an effort to stay the tidemis- imately 40,000 French-Canadians servedin._ conduct, extravagance, love of luxury, ad- the Union armies, a number of whomun- venture, and so onbtit emigrationiontinued doubtedly were already resident in the United to gain in volume until about 1896,a date States.5 Thewar also coincided withitnd ac- which marked sevtral significant trends. A celerated annprecedented industrial devel- period of prosperity in Canada followed close e opment in New England. Laborwas at a on the heels of its return in the United premium, and improved technology .....States,.._and-the-advent -of--the-first-French= possible to employ unskilled workers toan Canadiad Prime Minister enhanced Quebec's increasing extent, a fact whicli vastly broad- prestige. In this last decade of the dentist), -.ene4'1!le oPP901111ittOS.. f9t.-WOM04,:-701111dreii;.:1A Cith French United and ,iimnigranfs.. With this crying need, it States increased byover 90,000 but in the . was not surprising that wide-awake mill succeeding ten years they decreased by more owners in New England should tap Quebec's .than 9,000.6 French-Canadians' wereappar- overflowing supply, especially when it layso ently beginning to find a More adequate out- much nearer than Europe.. let for their talents at home.

New England manufacturers gave French- In the meantime, what of the thousands Canadian workers a ready welcome. Even be- of French- speaking workers absorbed in the fore the war they had discovered the adv,an- gigantic maw of the New England mills? By tages of importing French-Canadian labot3* no means the first immigrants to invade the quick accessibility, lowwages, industrious northeastern states, they followed the Irish anduncomplaining employees. Factories who had long since achieved the Icsecond adopted the practice,,of sending recruiting colonization) of New England. In many _50 agents to Quebec and entire families and New England to*ns they were the first parishes were transported to New England. sizable group of non-English speaking people Many are the accounts of desolation in and by 1900 they numberedmore than half Quebec's deserted villages. Railroadswere a million in New England alone? Americans also instrumental in promoting the migration, looked down upon habitants arrivingon first, by facilitating means of travel, and New England station platfornp in rustic-garb, secondly, by stimulating this French-speaking followed by broods of children. These large traffic through agents and interPreafs, The families without financial,;rerrves . were ob- most)effective recruiting agent of al!, how- ligated to seek worka -0 nee, and usually ever, was the émigré- himielf. His Jetters friends from their native, illage guided them home spread the fievre des Etatatnisamong to both jobs and shelter. Mostly farmers, they relatives and friends, and when he visited his had -no experience in the industrial world. native village dressed in city clothes, weiring The feiv who were ikilled in various trades the inevitable gold watch and chain, heper- were handicapped by language and tempor- sonified success in the United States. arily had to join the rank and file in the mills. No more than mere mentioncan be made A heie of the growingnalarm feltin Canada at The cotton and textile industry, offered e 1"

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the greatest opportunity f?r unskilled labor Haines recommended the use of textbooks and absorbed a large portion of theseFrench- such as those employed in New .Brunswick Canadians, whose descendants havebecome where both English and French instruction i(a permanentfactor in the labor supply of was given. Shefill that American children in the cotton mills) of NewEngland.° The the public schools' could profit by learning a French-Canadians made themselves felt in ,little French, this industry in the 1870s, when there were . over seven thousandCanadian-born engaged 0 The charge has often been-made that in it in New England. Within thirtyyears this French-Canadians, with their large families; number soared to nearly60,000.99 French- had more child operatives in the millsthan Canadian operatives in cotton rose from 20% any other group ofworkers. Child labdr, to nearly 37% of the totalnumber in Massa- nevertheless, was prevalent in the textile mills --chusetts -between 1890 -and-1900, -and , in long before the. coming vf.ths french-cana-, Maine and New Hampshire they exceeded dians.15 They simply followa a long-estab- 60%.10 In .1888 over- 3',000 French-speaking lished custom when they sent their children -women were employed in- ilie 0-otten Mills of to work, one further reinforcedby. necessity. Lewiston, Biddeford, Saco, and-Waterville, Actually a study of cotton mill workersmade out of a total of approximatelyfive and a in 1905 indicated that the French-Canadian half thousandfemale,employees.I 1 Although children contributed onlyone-third of the fewer French-Canadian women worker,s than income in the familieS covered,while Irish those of any other nationality had ever been childrenin,the same survey contributed 45% employed for wages before coming to the ,of the family income.16 United States, 12 over 40% of 'those in Mas- sachusetts over tee years' of age,were em- More justifiable was the accusation that ployed in 1885.13 the French-Canadians evaded the schoollaws, sometimes falsifying'the ages of their child- Bureau of Labor . In 188* the Maine Bureau of Industrial ren. The MassachuSetts and Labor Statistics 4pointed FloraHaines Statistics went so far as to statein itsreport as special agent to surveyconditions for of 1881that when the French-Canadian women textile workersin that state.14 After. parents were finallyocornered? by the more sordid accountsof textile 'Mills, its is school officers and *there is no other escape, refreshing to come upon herdescribtion 'Of a often they scrabble together whatfew things clean and cheerful spinning room with open they have, and move away to someother windows, of the mill girls with neatwhite place where they are unknown,and where linen collargorid whisk brooms tobrrish lint they hope by a repetition of the samedeceits from their frocks. She 'reported ,defective to escape the'schoolsentirely, and keep the eyes as a commonailment among the French children at work right On in themills417 and the use of Vbacco by French-Canadian Although much evidence to the contrary was WomeYtooksnuff'and signs were presented by Indignant French-Canadiansin children. the' posted ini'renchan Englishrequesting those Massachusetts at a special hearing before using tobacco not lib4( spit on thefloor.), Bureau in 1881 in an effort todiiprove this Most French-CrinVian girls lived athome in and other equally derogatorystatements of that very very 'Etrowdedqu4ters, but those who lived the Report, there can be little doubt in boarding houses enjoyed a g96dregatation young French-Canadianchildren, were com- in t community. In view fif theFrench- monly employed and thatexisting child labor Canafildretention of their 'language in The laws were violated. At thin timeCommit- United States, it is worthy of note that.Miss stoner Wright, head of the Massachusetts I e . le 11

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Bureau of Statistics of Labor, while admitting were parents and manufacturers hostile; the that the remarks were not true for Massachu- whim, authorities themselves did not want setts, indicated that they were applicable to the schools flooded with the undisciplined French-Canadians in Connecticut and New children of the working class.22 Sometimes York.' 8 Tlkiswas confirmed, by the Con- at the beginning of a semester, childrenwere necticut Bureau of Labor Statistics in its all turned out of the mills, but withina few annual report for the year 1885: weeks most of them were back. Although Massachusetts led in child labor legislation, Another element which affects child statistics 1.41891 showed a higher proportion labor is that of race. The native American almost always wants to educate its child- of French-Canadian children at work in the ren. The 'Irishman feels this wadi even cotton industry in that state than elsewhere more strongly, and will make great sacri- in New England.23 RhoAe Island likewise fices fiyt the sake of his family. On the found fault with the French-Canadianson other band, the- French Canadian, ina. the score ofilliteracy and child labor.24 Evi- great many instances regards his children dence from a number ofsources, therefore, as a means of adding to the earning ca- obliges one 0_ c9Pchble that the..French- pacity 'of thi family, arid, in making ar- Canadisns were conspicuous 'offenders,even rangements for work, he urges, and even where violations of school and minimum-age insists upon the employment of the fam- laws were common. ily as a whole, dbwn to the very young- est children who can 'be of any possible As newcomers, they had little choice but service. to accept the lowest wages. With their large It is in places like Baltic, with a large French-Canadian population, that these families they were able to get alongon less than the native American workers usedto a evils have been felt in their severest form. if There was a time when the Baltic Mills higherl,andard of living. This and the fact employed a laige number` of children that they were frequently introduced into under ten years of age. The worst of Nov England industryas strike-breakers did ? these abuses seem to have been done not endear them_to their co-workers. At West - away with in that place; but there are Rutland, Vermont, when theywere imported many mills, especially among the' less into "the marble quarries duringa turn-out of important ones, where it has been im- Irish quarrymen in186p, bloodshed re- ible to stop or even to detect themP sulted.25 In FallRiver during a strike in An verseer in Southbridge reported in 1872' 1879, employers had to build special houises thshe used totell.. -the French-Canadians in the mill-yards for French-Canadian.xlcnob- that- he law did not permit employment of stick» spinners, for fear strikerswould per- children under ten years, sand the next day suade them to leave town.26 -Many' similar they were all ten.}.20 Reports of factory instances of strike- braking occurred. Thanks accidents of the 1860s and '70s included to this unfortunate role: which immigrants French-Canadian children under ten. Felix in the United States, have often been,called - Gatineau, in his 'history of the Franco-Amer- upon to play, they won,the enmity of oigag- icans of Southbridge, observed the tendency ized labor. Nor did they wish to joinin of these first French-Canadians to send child- strikes and unions. Experience hodtaught ren from seven to eight years old to work in- them, they ,claimed, that Mir they didpar- stead of to schoo1.2' ticipate in 'strikes they lost their jobs whili others went back ;to work without telling pot is certain that the school lawswere them." The Knightsof Labor (condemned ly ced in New England. Not only in Quebec by Cardinal Taschereau)were not

. ,4 118 t very successful inrecruiting French-Canadian professional levels, distinction was reserved members and tried to influence state legisla- fot the few and the majority had toendure their low tion -againstthem.28 French-Canadian influ- the hardships that accompanied ence was held partly responsiblefor the fail- wage scale. It wasthe poverty and dirt of their t Little CanadasA in thenineteenth cen- ) ure of NewEngland cotton mill operatives. reputation to build a strongerorganization;29 but rather tury that gained for them a sorry than do without wages during strikes they' when they first came to NewEngland. preferred a low income regularly. Nearly every manufacturing townwhere On the other hand, there were evidences they settled had itsFrench-Canadian quarter. «French- of a dawning litbor consciousness amongthem The usual picture of these squalid before the end of the century. A fewjoined evilles» dispels at once the Quebecallegation' the Knights of St. Crispin and eventhe- that the emigres departed for loveof luxury. Knights of Labor. At the time Chinese were Most of them began life in the UnitedStates introduced into the Sampson shoe factory at in tenenNents and were locallyreferred to as tCalucks.» Sanitation and cleanlines's were .t North Adams, in. 1870, severalFrench -Cana- dians participated in the protest againstthe at a minimum_ anthe high death rate in Chinese.30 In 1879 sixty French-Canadians some or the,«Little Canadan was to be ex- at to Douglas Axe Companyin Massachu- pected in these overcrowdedand ,unwhtiles- River and Holyoke were settstruck for a 1094.1 wageincrease.31 some lodgings. Fall and William Unions, which atfirst had been indif&rent notorious for their <

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This, alas, did not alwaysprove true. than his confrere in Quebec. The Massachu- setts Bureau of Statistics of Labor compared French-Canadians,as well as Irish, were a French-Canadian family and boardinghouse problem to the health authorities. Theywere diets 'in Holyoke, Lawrence, Lowell, Montre- frightened by compulsory vaccinationand al, Riviere du Loup, and Quebec and found did not understand why wakeswere prohib- both nutritive value and quantity Insider- ited during a period of epidemicdisease. The ably in favor of Massachusetts.42 Lowell Health Department madean earnest effort to reach its «Little canada.)*School Clothing also showed improvement. The children there were'generally vaccinatedfree French-Canadians were quick to adopt, the of charge and parental oppositionwas attrib- American mode and sometimessacrificed utett,more to the necessity of caringfor the food or home comforts for fashion. 43 Sewing child's sore arm thanto prejudice against machines were not unknown in homes of vaccination.39Detailed child-care instruc- French-Ca tvdian workers and seemed to have tions were printed in French and Englishand a benefice dk influence on the aspect of the a medical inspector was sentintothe distikt whole hourbcpid,4.4 french-CanacliaitS,.were with two boys actingas interpreters. Disease reputedly *ell dressed, but there were rela- waswidespread among French-Canadian tively. few silks and satins. Necessity it times children and infant mortality high, muchof drove economy to the extreme of avoiding it. diie to improper feeding andignorance. walking to save shoe leatheror wearing out- The Health Department deplotedthe laztuess grown garments when there were no younger and indifference of parents who failedto children to inherit them!" send for the ward physician when their chikirenwere ill. People who could afford a Toward n of the ce tury, the funeral better than they could preventive «Little C: nadas* were-being abandoned to measures 'were hard to get along with,wrote other im %rants. The co"ng of the street one health officer despairingly." railway wan important actor in enabling workers to qt the tements,46 and in These humble and insalubrious beginnings towns such as Wor er and Marlboro where were the common immigrant lot. Therewas, textiles were not the predominant industry, happily, a brighter side for the French-Cana- French-Canadian home ownership madepro- 1 .dians. The impression is all.toocommon that' gress. Investment in real estate w_ as regarded the farmer liVes an idyllic and healthful life, as an indication of stability and ah excellent but evidence often reveals the sim?le lifeasa way to train the French-Canadians in econo- synonym for mere subsistence. In moving to my through the habit of saving to pay off the mill towns of fiew England, the French- mortgages.47 Theproperty requirement for Canadians enjoyed better foodthanin, voting by naturalized citizens in Rhode . Quebec and many wrote home that theyate Island was an added' stimulus thereto the meat every day.The proud housekeepero> purchase of real estate, butt general progress wrote Archambault in his novel, Mill Village, toward home ownership was slow." In view was the one who would place five pounds of the French-Canadian reputation for thrift, of fried pork chops anda half peck of boiled this pace is disappointing. potatoes' before an invited guest.?>4 I Sucit-a housekeeper was luckier than most, bat the Frugality was a Quebec trait whichon French-Canadian laboringman in MassaChu- occasion excited the jealousy'or envy of setts consumed about five pounds of food .others. The first savings of French-Canadians per day in 1886, a pound and a halfmore usually went to the church, and their fine,

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410

c, 1,1:04 120 I recold for financing church properties is in simply to multiply daily wages bythe num- to de- contrast to their slower privateadvancement, ber of persons working per family an without regard to age, at the same time demonstratingtheir willing- duct the cost ofliving, steadiness of employment. ness to sacrifice fortheir faith. The amazing' occupation, or Ferdi- feature about their religious, educationaland ' Furthermore, both Father Hamon and philanthropic institutions. is that theywere - nandGagnon4, father of Franco -Americans' paid 'for by small contributions,mostly from journalism, repeatedly exhorted their com- spending the working class, with very fewlarge dons- patriots to economy instead o carriage rent, circuses,1 tions1:49Saving was encouraged by the money on picnics, clergy, and toward the end of the century and trips to Canada. special savings institutions forTrench-Cana-. dians began to appear in NewEngland. Holy- The close ofthe nineteenth century settled people oke's second cooperatilie bank wasfounded found the French-Canadians a fignch-Can4lian workers in New England nunibering overhalf a mil- in 1889 to enable experienced in to buy homes on amdnthly installment plan, i lion. By this time-they were financial industry and, where statisticsdistinguished it ..was._ the first FraocOAPIrTican they-had institution , in the =UnitedStateS,50-- Wow. the oldei repent§ from the 'new, had to proved themselves able ,to competewith socket's Inst tution for Savings sbon It must not employ Freh-speaking clerks to take care other workers'itr New England. and Mani be forgotten that the steadyinflux of new of French-Canadian accounts, had to pass Pothier, later Governor ofRhode. Island, arrivals fro'm Quebec, who yet 1900 the first through their period of orientation,held served in that capacity. In the group. In- caissefiopulaire, a form of creditunion, was back the general average of of French -Cana- founded in Quebec, and this movement soon stances were even known French-Canadians at, spread to the United States.Another Quebec dians replacing other 3 It required time to learn' to habit which promoted savings wasthe family lower wages.5 turned over their demand thesame,working and living stan- system, whereby children in the United earnings to their 'parents. dards as native-born citizens States, but unbekno.wn tothemselves, the the French-Canadian thrift, nevertheless,has French-Canadians were conforming to Early emigres usual immigrant, pattern, starting atthe low- probably been overestimated. it in the second had little iconfidence in banks orinvestments, est 1 vel and surmounting Meanwhile. their their mistrust justified bysuch experiences. andthird nerations. New England Investmeig United-Stat orn descendants weregrowing as' the fraudulent equipped for broader Company and the loss of savings'deposits in up bilingual, bus better bank failures. The averageannual sutilus participationin American life. amongFrench-Canadian families inMassa- $10.59, and they Their economic situationgradually im- chusetts in 1875 was only complete preoc- saved .less than any otherethnic group in the proved, freeing them from time." Although saving doubt- cupation with earning a livelihood,and they state 'at that problem of their less increased with improvementin occupa- turned their attention to the Father Hamon in own ethnic survival.It became almost the tion, .the estimati,--made by mutual 1890 that a French-Canadianworker with a, breith of life to the newly forming Franco-American family of four childrenshould have, about benefit societies and the 'deduction of major press. UnlikeEuropean immigrants, French- $80 a month left after bond with the expense's 2 seems high.-One of the great mis- Canadians did not 'sever the adjoined New takes in estimating ability to savehas been land of theirArth, for Quebec

131 121

England, and visits, newspapers, and educa- Indeed, theirs was a splendid record in earing tion iu the province were easily accessible. for their 'own. It was too soon to foretell the Their dual loyalty, so openly avowed, puzzled extent of change from their traditional ways Americans and often became suspect when until more Franco-Americans hadexper- reinforced by aloofness from public schools, ienced a generation of life in the United non-Frenchchurches,andorganizations. States. The old melting-pot theory has been Thus, friction 'in the new environmentwas somewhat discredited in recent years, but not confird to labor competition. economic forces have remained it persistent assimilator. The twentieth century ushered Within the limits -of the century the ingreat change for 4French-Canadians in French-Canadian migration into NewEYgland Quebec, now become most his* indus- was still in b state of flux. It :had, however, trialifed province of Canada, and it may give transplantedalmostinitsentiretythe the Franco - Americans a chance to guide their French-Canadian parish, with separate French Canadian cousins along the path of ethnic churches, schools, and. homes for the needy. tenacity in an industrial world.

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Notes

1. Benjamin Silliman,Remarks made On e,Short 11.2nd Annual Report of the Bureau of Industrial Tour between Hartford and Quebec, in the and Labor Statistics Wir the State of Maine Autumn of 1:'(New Haven, 1824), 293. (Augusta, 1889), 131.

2.P. Q. Sessional Pepe,187475, VIII, Dog" 12.Report of the Immigration Commission,X, 72. -01 No.' 4, «Rapport .ganer u commissaire de l'agriculture et des travaux bliss de la Pro- 13.20th Annual Report of the Bureau of Statistics (Boston, 1889), 577. vince de,Quebec pour Pannee ssant le 30 of Labor juin 1874,)) 7 14.2nd Annual Report of the Bureau ofIndustrial 3. Rapportidu comite special de l'assemblee leg- and Labor 'Statistics for the State of Maine, islative, inomme pour s'enquirir des causes et passim. de l'imtiortance de l'emigratkm qui *Neu togs les ans du Bas-Canada very lesEtats-Unis 15.Samuel Slater liad employed children from (Nfontria41S49);O:iirrk. ,-RiffijiOtt dd. White stegen-listwelve years of age ated then-adopted special nothine. pour causes.de the pra-cflee of hiring whole families. remigration du Canada aux Etats-Unis d'A- merique ou ailleurs(, 1957),passim. 16.Report of the Immigraticin Commission,X, 114, Table 64. Census 41IP 4. Dominion Bureau of Statistics,Seventh of Canada, 1931(Ottawa, 1936), 110. 17. 12th Annual Report of the Bureau ofStatistics of Labor(Boston, 1881), 469-470. 5. JohBartlet Brebner,North Atlantic Triangle (N Haven, 1945), 161.62;Catholic Ency- 18. 13th Annual Report, Bureau of Statistics of clopedia(New York, 1913), VI, 27 2. 'Other .Labor,(Boston, 1882), 27. estimates vary from 300,000. 19. 1st Annual Report, Bureau of Labor Statistics 6.Leon E. Truesdell,The Canadian Born in the of the State of Connecticut(Hartford, 1885), United States(New Haven, 1943), 77, Table 48-49. 30. The author. is Chief Demographer of the Bureau of Census, Washington, and figures in 20.3rd Annual Report, Bureau of Statistics of this book are from the U.S. Census. Labor (Boston, 1872), 379.

7. Truesdell,The Canadian Born in the United 21.Felix Gatineau,Histoire des'Franco-Americains States.FrenchCanadian stock in the New de Southbridge, Mass.(Framingham, 1919), England states numbered 51887, according 46; 4 to the U.S. Census of 1900. 22;Forest C. Ensign,Compulsory School Atten- 8.Melvin T. Copeland,The Cottonarlufacturing dance and 'Child Labor(Iowa City, 1921), Industry of the United (Cambridge, 62-63, 96-97. 1912), 120. 23.7th Annual Report, Commissioner of Labor, 9.Copeland,The Cotton Manufacturing Indus - 1891,(Washington, 1892),II,1588-1590, try... ,118-121. . Table XX.

10.Report of the Immigration Commission, Im- 24.5th An *sport, Commissioff-te Industrial migrants in Industries(Washington, 1911), Statistic! Rhode IslandlProvidence,1892), x, 33, Table 17, and 36,Table 19. 44-52. 123 C 25.George 1-1. Perkins,The Marble Industry of 40.Annual Report of the Board of Health..., Vermont» inReport of the State Geologist on 1888(Lowell, 1889), 3741. the Mineral Industries and Geology of Ver- mont, 1931-1932 (Burlington, 1933), 292. 41.A. A.Archambault,MillVillage(Boston,, 1943), 126. 26.George E. McNeill, editor,The Labor Move- ment: The Problem of Today(Boston, 1887), 42.17th Annual. Report, Bureau of Statistics 230. of Labor(Boston, 1886), 311-312. 27.E. Hamon, Les Canadiens-francais de la Nou- 43.William Kirk,A Modern City(Chicago, 1909), velle Angleterre(Quebec, 1891), 45-47. 114-115. 28. E. Hamon,Les Canadiens-francais ,45. 44.6th Annual Report, Bureau of Statistics of Labor (Boston, 1875), 313. 29.William Z. Ripley, «Race Factors in Labor Unions,».Atlantic Monthly, XCIII (March, 45.Camille Lesiard,Canuc. k(Lewiston, 1936), 1904), 302. 19, 33.

30, 414 Ftaport.of the Bureau .0f. Statistics. of Labor, 46. _Deportof the Immigration Commission; X-,-- 187071 (Boston, 1871), 1.06. 342. 31. 11th Annual Report, Bureau of Statistics of 47.Hamon,Les Canadiens-francais de la Nouvelle Labor (Boston, 1880), 51. Angleterre,18-19.

32.29th Annual Report, Bureau of Statistics of 48.French-Canadians have not come up to the Uabor(Boston, 1899), 620; McNeill, editor, general average or that of the foreign torn in The Labor Movement, 230. - the U.S. for home ownership and medianren- s tal, a situation which prevailed down to the 33.30th ,Annual Report, Bureau of Statistics of census of 1940.,, Labor(Boston, 1900), 163, 209. fi 49.Abb6 D. M. A. Magnan,Histoire, de la race 34. 13th Annual Report, Bureau of Statistics of franceise aux Etats-Unis(Pis, 1912), 283- Labor(Boston, 1882), 25-26. 284. 35. Report of tie Immigration ConilYTTssion, X, 50.Constance M. Green,Holyoke, Massachusetts, 177, 289. A Case History of the Industrial Revolution in

America(New Haven, 19 '39),,p171 -172. 36.. William Bayard Hale, «Impotence of Churches in a Manufacturing Town,»Forum(November, 51.6th Annual Report, gu)eau of Statistics of 1894), 298-300. Labor(Boston, 1875), 377. 37. Annual Report of the Board of Health of the 52.Hamon,Les Canadiens-francais de la Nouvelle CityofLowell, 1882(Lowell, 1883), 18. Angleterre,16-17. 38. 4th Annual Deport, Sures(' of Statisticsof 53.Ferdinand Gaghon, Sa Vie et ses oeuvres Labor (BOstotb 1870,378-379. (Worcester, 1886), 76. 39.Annual Report of the Board of Health of the City of Lowell, 1880I(Lowell, 1881), 5-6.

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126 Testimony' to the living conditions in New England Francocommunities is offered in William N: 1.o-eke's-sketch of the French colony at Brunswick,Maine, published in the first issue of Les Archives du Folklore,MontreK1946. 4Uthored by a professor of Freh, this study combines a social-science empirical tradition with thehumanistic tra- dit of value orientation. Struggle against handicaps is the theme. Success isthe per- ceived outcome. Local data such as naturalizatibn records, parish membershipand mar- riage records, voter registration rolls and tax rolls have never beenmoreeffectively used In the study of a comncunity of Franco -Americefts.

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THE FRENCH COLONY AT BRUNSWICK,MAINE: A HISTORICAL SKETCH..

William N. Locke

4-y

11A There are-said to beiin the United,States speaking population of Brunswick which is so 1 e million and a half people of French- of interest here, thepresence of a generous dian origin. Some of these aredescended water-power supply at Brunswick is ofcap- m early frontiersmen, like those of the ital importance. As the demand forcotton ld settlements in Missouri,'others have fabric grew, the mill was increased in size. In immigrated more recently, 'as forexample 1857 the company had 235 :looms with those in and near the industrialcities of'New 9,000 spindles; it employed 175 people, In 'England. Many of these cities havea mixed 1867 large additions had ben made to The population includinggroups of various na- buildings, and the mill had/26,000 spOdles. tionalities,, but in themore northerly of The company owned 75 tenementsan nkan- them one often findsa 4mpler..situation ufactured its own gas, which it also supplied with an older, nearlypure Anglo-Saxon to the town'. In 1877 the mill had 35,000 group, and a newer group of first ond, spindles, empkiyed 550 hands and owneda and already third generation Fren people Thundred. tenements in which, its employees, of CfMadian origin. A tow%inthe latter lived, with a store where they traded.z category is Brunswick, Maine.ere olie can see in miniature the picture 'of how the This expansion took place just before' French from the Northcame toe*, Eng- and duringthe Chi War. The local people, land communities; how theystrued against 'plusa Cerfain number- of Irish immigrants, economic, racial; and linguisticandicaps; who had come .to 'Brunswick when the rail- how they succeeded n win quality in road was built, were the first to work in the one field after another: po tical, etonomie mill. llut with the rapid grovith itwas nec- social. crsary to import labor; so ,as was the grow- ing, custom in New England; agentswere sent to Canada tosecruit laborers under con- EARLY PERIL D 4.1441, tract. The abuses of ,tthis systemare well known. The importadon of contract labor Brunswick, Maine, isn the seacoast, was forbidden in 1885, but the French of thirty miles north of Portland. Its historyis Canada continued to come where they knew like that of many another..Mainecoastal money was to be earned. In Canada the town, rich in traditions 'of Indian battlesand amount of good land for farming was limited seafaring lore. Bowdoin Collegewas founded and the market, for farm products,poor. there in 1794, andone of the earliest cotton mills in the state was built at the falls of the The first men from French Canadato, Androscoggin river. Since it is theFrench- come and ,settle. in Brunswick came between "). 127 137 118

1850 and 1860, judging from the immigra- illation of Brunswick began to grow, there tion dates given in naturalization recolds, was a demand for apriest and then for a but the big movement began after 1865 and church. The first Catholic services held in continued until 1900.3 Unfortunately, there Brunswick were in 1821, according to the are no records except those ofnaturaliza- Telegraph in 1878, and a tions to show when influxes of, Canadians took 'place. There is one stray item in the ...society of believers in the doctrines Of the Church of Rome was begun in Brunswick Telegraphfor March 28, 1875, this Town about 1860 or a short time «Quite a lot of French Canadians came here previously. Services were at first pa- last week to work in the Cabor mill,) but formed by the priest stationed at Bath,. thi4 is,as far as I am able to ascertain, the Thesociety,however/ graduallyin-' only time the local newspaper mentioned creased in numbers and in 1866 pkir- the arrival of workers. For one thing, no one *chased emir present (1878) church expected these people from across the bor- building. ..OA Father Powe'rsws soon '4 der to become a permanent part of the com- after -sea to them. The society" is now, Y munity. One matt, criticising the mill owners, numerically by far ,the largest in the is quoted as follows in. theTelegraphfor town. About five sixths of th congrega- September 20, 1870: / tionvre Fench-Canadians. They number abglit eight hundred. The present priest, They afford no real assistance to a place Father Noiseux, is a French-Canadian. in theNay in which ttit business is con- r*---\ ducted. Th,e money for the cotton and A school for teaching English to the mantsfrtured goods is all turned in French-spokifig- Canadians wA.:started be- Boston the trade is mostly through one fore 1872 by-David H. Dennison. This initi- ,channel, and the operative population ati was. takenov& by the'Catholic Church .4 is never permanent, especially the French in 86 when a schoolvitas ,started, for Canadians who all look to a permanent French, hildren, though the aim of the latter Home in Canada. was to give .them aCatholic and a Frerh -----) educationllt appears that the Cabet:Coin-. ... .From lime to time in the local news: party, operators of themill, had italr paper,there appeared items fram which we some sortf school for childrenher cat, see that the French population 'was sponse todige,opening of the Church school rowing more numerous. In 1873 a summary irs very greto.ina1887, there werebpplybxi- s printed, ofr reyort by Charles. Hill on nukely 200 children enrolled. . rch attendance. He. gave 3,066 as the to- ,- talumber.altending church in town; 477 of . thewere French Fatholics; 131,Irish Cath- CONSOLIDATION. PE olics.

An increasta- f sevetalhundredwas not From 1880 On, the Fren h-Canadians te- inconsiderable a town of the size, of gan to be accepted air a more orless perma- Brun'swick, It had had a population of 4,687 nent addition tothe town. They were grow- ,fa in 1870, of which 4,148 were native born; ing rapidly innumbers. TheTelegraphin 539 were foreign born and in 1882 accord- December 1887 said ,that there were 320 ing to theTelegraph thetotal population families in the French section, whereas there was 5,384. had. been bit160 in 1882. Also these Cana- dians had begun to seethat there were defi-, Naturally, as soon as the Catholic pop- nite economic and pelitical advantages to

1 3 8 -.1

129

.or Immigration and Naturalization By Five-Year Periods6

Period Immigration Naturalization

1850-55 1

1856-60 1

1/%1-65 1 1866-70 35 1871-75 50 1876-80 70 18 1881-85 64 36 1886-90 `. 77 57 189 li-95 74 33 1896-1900 44 108 (all in 1900) 1901-05 36 50. 1906-10 30 33 (all in 1960 1911-15 7 4 1916-20 14 126 4 1921-25 18 21 1926-30 8 8 1931-35 24 1936-39 17 Totals 530 535

. -becoming citizens. The loplpaper of Au- when they become eligible. It was also gust 23, 1884, records the f5llowing: decided that all possible means of in- -4 formation should be resorted to to gain A meeting, of French-Canadianswas political information. held in the Court Room, Town- Hall, Monday evening, Joseph Dufrense being The table above shows the immigration and elected temporary chairman, and Louis naturalization by five-year periods. fir Trudeau, Secretary. Henry Ragot ad- dressed the meetipg in 'Frenchupon During the '80s there was serious trouble topits in which the people were inter- with disease among the French population. ested, the result of which was the for- The tenements and boarding houses owned mation of a 'permanent organization. I PreSidentNoel Vandal], lecretary Louis by to Cabot Company were crowded" and Trudeau, Exavier Payment (Paiement), unhygienic as more and more French workers Ermenigle (Hermenegilde) Coulombe, came into the town. The townspeople, led Telesphore La Point (LaPointe), Joseph by Editor Tenney of the Telegraph,rose up Machaud (Michaud), Frank Maturin in indignation agaivit the millowners, as the (Mathurin), Jos.Dionne, and Henry following editorial of May, 1866 shows: Ragot.5 The subject ofnaturalization was discussed,' the question being: shall What we have stated as to the conditions the French take out naturalizationpa- of affairs at the factory boarding houses pers or remain foreigners? It was Unani- on the east side of idaln-St. near the mously decided to naturalize, and 53 cove, is enough to cause a pestilence and were found to brieady for naturaliza- we were not surprised on Saturday last . tion,others will become naturalized when Father Gorman informed us that a

139 130

good deal of sickness prevails among the DEATHS (Continued) French-Canadians wcksking in the facto- Year French Irish ries. He said that since the 1st ofJanu- ary he had buried morechildren than he 1890 58 3 had baptized and surely this Is a sad 1891 66 2 state of affairs. ,Rev. Gormanattributes 1892 60 the present sickness to the Said neglect 1893. 86 5 1 of sanitary conditions in and 4bout the 1894 78 4 houses which the Canadian people oc- 1895 66 6 cupy. It is somebody'sbusiness to see that the sewers, cesspools, and privies However, not all was black, in the life of if sickness are cleaned out and then, the newcomers. TheTelegraphtells of church continues, a look must be taken at the and interior of the dwellings; it is of no use fairs, «levees,» plays, operettas, picnics, affairs! «A to look further after the causesof dis- even dances. Marriages were gay with ease thanat the banks of the cove French wedding on Monday morning reeking with filth. twelve teams transporting 'the bride and groom throughout the streets,all patties ap- Throughou( the summer and fall of 1886, parently enjoying themselves to the fullest cold, the theTelegrapheditorialized, against the ne- extent, though the air was keenly glect of the Cabot Company,which «evi- thermometer being only a few degrees above dently cares more for the figureof its divi-- zero.» In 1883 the goodeditor thought dend than for the comfort, or evenhealth, gayety was going too far: of its employees.* AFrench-Canadian, Des- peaux, was made anembermber of the Town Has a crisis arrived with racing on Ilte Board of Health at this ime, and1886 was a -streets?On Monday morning, as fre- French quently happens, there was a French turning point in the death rate of the wedding, a part of the fun always being compiled population. The following table, a ride after the ceremony is over.Three from the records of St. John's Parish, shows sleighs driven abreast as rapidly as livery the deaths from 1877 to1895, 1877 Oyeing horses can travel were going down Fed- the first year for which the Brunswickparish eral Street in high glee when William has records. , Mountford was knocked down. We humbly suggest that as we have so many DEATHS churches in ithe villageand religious sentimentisso strong, that asrnll Irish Year French chapel 4hOuld be erected at Mere Brook 1/177 7 adjoining the new race court. 1878 13 1879 4 In most cases the first French-Canadians 1880 19 to come to thelJnited States werethe young 1881 4 men. When they hadbecome established, 1882 46 48 4 they sent for their sisters and brothers and 1883 in Brunswick had both 1884 38 k3 soon the community slowly, and 188$ 28 4 sexes. The marriage rate rose 1886 81 2 there Were some marriages betweenFretich 1887 72 Catholics and non:Catholics as is shown in 1888 41 3 the following table, compiled from the mar- 889 42. 2 riage registers o St. John's Church.

140 dur 1

W 131

4 t MARRIAGES / ie

Ytiir FOich French-Irish Irish Mixed Other

10 2 4 10 1 3

9 1 1 8"--- ,--) 1 1881 15 . 1

1 82 18 1 48 21 3 3

1884 18 1

1885 4 1

1886 15 1 1 1887 27 I 1888 27 .ite 1889 19 1 , 1890 17 .. 4 1891 21 1 t 1892 29 .!1 2

1893 24, . likli I 1894 17 1

1895 25 _ 1

1896 28 1 1897 22 1898 14 2 1899 26

1900 17 1 3

1901 35 1

1902 ( 28 1 1 _ 1903 V 21 I 1904 26 1905 27 2 1 1906 17 1 2 1907 17 1 ,2' 1908 16 1909 19 2

191Q 28 1 1 1911 18 2 2

1912 30 2 1 3 1913 23 2 k = 2 1914 26 4 2 1915 21 C 2 _-i. 1916 22 r . 44. . 1917 36 1. 9 3

1918 21 1 % 1 1919 35 4 1920 45- 1 3 1

141 132

MARRIAGES (Continued)

Year French French-Irish Irish Mixed Ober 3 19214 33 1922 31 2 1 3 1923 v 36 2 1924 31 3 2 1925 2 1926 44-27 3 1 1927 28 7 1 1928 28 9 1 1929 24 6 3 1930 44 2 4 6- 3 1-931 29 1932 19 1 1 2 1933 16 1 6 4 1934 28 1 6 3 1935 28 3 4 1936 36 4 10 1 3 1937 23 1 3 1938 24

Judging from ,theTelegraph,the French he does not expect undue consideration. beginning. If Docility is one of his most markedtraits. people were liked from the or ambitious. «for- He is not over-energetic there was any resentment against the His main concern is to make aliving In eigners, it did not creep into the paper. for himself and his family, and,if that fault 1872 Editor Tenny wrote We have no seems to have beenattained, he is little to find on general groundswith the French- troubled by restlesseagerness,, to be Canadians employed in the cottonmill; they doing something higher thanthat in arequiet,orderly, and industrious.*In which, he is at prept engaged.Above 1885, ,«The French-Canadians areputting up all he is reluctant, as comparedwith the several dwelling houses, one largestructure Irish, to join labor unions, and isloath on lands recentlypurchased in the north- to strike. western part of the village,and the way they put. togetherwooden building is something Again, in the same, article, hewrites, «Very of a marvel.» The French:Canadiandoctor,, few of the French now returnto Canada to Dr. Pare, was so well likedthat at his death. stay, or even look forwardto such a possibil- in 1887, the mill was closed aday in tribute ity and the amount of money nowsent out to him. ProfessorMcDonald of Bowdoin of the country, whileconsiderable, is very College wrote anarticle,8The French -Cana- small in comparison withformer figures.» dians In New England,in which he said the He ives the figure of2,500 as a fairly reli- following of theFrench-Canadian: ablestimate ofthe*rench population of B nswick in 1897. He is quick to learn, active anddeft in his movements. He is contentedwith his the men who work, and, usually, with hp wages;and In the early years only

142 133

were naturalized (some 250 by 1900) could A fairer comparison of the relative im- vote, but as the first generation of American- portance of French ownings is obtained by born grew up, they added to the number. subtractingfrom(1 4 ) theamount of The following table is from the Brunswick S 1,665,227, which is the value of non-resi- voting lists.It- will indicate theincreasing.. dent property. This gives S 2,809,019,prop- part the French were able to play intown erty of residents other than French, which is politics, though it should be mentionedthat 3.02 times (13), People of French extraction there never was a «French bloc» in Bruns- therefore owned 1/3 as much propertyas wickthe French-Canadians, like their Eti- non-French residents dile ripen!'cousins, are too individualistic. ,t The economic progress of thesenewcom- _PERIOD OF EQUALITY ers to Brunswick has been amazingly rapid. There follows a table compiled from therec- Not only in tile town proper but in the ords of the Assessors.1° Theaccuracy of ally surrounding country-side, the Frech people individual figure is debatable because it is of- have bought homes, farms, and business ten next to impossible to determine which.(property. On many roads leading out of names are those of French eeople, The cus- Brunswick,every other name on the mail tom of giving «mill names»' 1 to the newly boxes is a French one. Of the Selectmen in arrived workers resulted in the adoption by 1940 one was English, one Irish, andone many of an English equivalent. Rousseau French. The local magistrate named Rous- ti sometimes became Broolts, for example; so seau died last year, and numerous less impor- it was necessary a hundred times to make in- tant offices are held by people-of Frenchex- quiries of the local : «Was traction. On Maine Street and in the stores, Blanch White French or Yankee? Was Wil- it is common to hear French spoken. Along liam Ruest, french? Was the Joe McCarthy half the street, the end nearer the mill, that used to live on Water Street Irishor French is more common than English; while French?» However, thesecases were solved in the stores nearer the College, Englishpre- and the .table represents a reliable, overall dominates. picture of property ownership in Brunswick.

REGISTERED VOTERS PROPERTY VALUATION Year French Other Total Year French Other Total 1869 4 876 880 $ 425 1870 9. 886 895 180 $1,600,233 S1,600,658 1870 40 1,833,5891,834,039 1875 27 917 944 1875 None1" 2,090,180 2,090,180 1880 .104 976 1,080 0. 1880 1,025 1',978,85;1,979,877 1881 152 1,025 1,177 1881 4,250 3,322,7933;326,043 1885 212 1,028 1,240 885 16,10,0 ,389,660 3,405,760 1890 369 937 1,306 1890 47,125 3,371,1113,418,236 1895 450 950 1,400 1895 95,805 2,349,6412,455,446 1900 ,475 1,121 1,596 1900 114,340 3,422,05.13,536,391 1905 596 1,026 1,622 1905 146;878 3,372,6833,519,561 1910 272 1,353 1,625 1910 195,931 3,588,3013,784,232 1939 1,050 1,437 2,487 1939 928,755134,474,246145,403,091

143 s.t_ 134

, In Brunswick today there is taking place slightly from year to year. a partial fusion .between the two races. In High School, prizes go-sometimes to children The parish of St. John's Church includes of French, sometimes to children of English the Catholic residentof Topsham, across extraction. At dances it would heimpossible the river, and what is true of the Church is to say whose ancestors came from Canada true of most of the life of the Town. Tops- and whose were old native, stock. There is ham has a separate post office, is in a differ- .nothing in dress or even in features, in many ent county, but it forms a social and com- cases, to distinguish the two races. There is, ivercial unit with Brunswick. Together the however, one point on which they diverge. two towns had in 1940 a population of In general, the French are Catholic, the Yan- 10,992.16 This figure, compared with the kees, Protestant. And with Catholicism in size of the Parish of St. John, 4,568, shows Brunswick goes very closely the use of the -that the people of French origin represent French language. The PatOchial SChoof has about two fifths of the foie' group classes, conducted in French; sermons in the French church are in French at certain hours; and in the homes the inajority of mothers' ORIGINS and fathers of French origin talk French to their children. One of themns(important factors In the study of/o people who have migrated is the This is so true that we can accept the fig- regions tomwhich they have come, impor- ures of the size of St. John's parish as the tant fron the point of view of their customs,.. size of the population of French origin. Of their folklore, and partiCularly important in course, an exception muse made for a cer- , respect to theirlanguage'''. The Origin of tarn number of Irish and other Catholics, but the French of Brunswick can be traced most of these were formed into 1 new parish.' through only two types of4cords. around 1930; so itis not too wide of the mark to consider Father Dauphin's report on 31.CoMplele marriage records pf St. John's the parish of St. John for January 19 115 A Parish 19+984 8-1938. as'a summary of the present popillat on of 2.The Naturalization records since_1850 French prigin. The French who are lin-Unger of the Sagadahoc County Court at Bath; Catholics and the'convert. will approxirerA the Cumberland Comnty Court at Port- ly cancel each °tiler. land; the U.S. Circuit Court at" Portland, pia and the U.S. District'Court at Portland, The total membership shows a gain of Maine. These courts are those where Brunswick men could be naturalized. . 458 sive 1930 when there were 4,110 in

. the Oarisli;,before that it had varied only ,1 .rotalinOrShipof John's Parish: 4,5r -1',3221 Women 1,476 Men . : 896 Boys (under 21) 874 Girls (under 18) Families: 1,183 i Deaths 47 Marriages 54 frit/. Baptisms: 95 t 3Llao.ys,329 'girls atte 'the parochial school, taught by brsulinesisters.

-4 tt

44 135

The'place of birth,or of baptism, given he called them The Chinese of the East.» in therecords makes it possible', after elitn- Never perhaps was such a chargemore trium- Mating duplicates, to locate the origin of. phantly 'refuted than by the French of 1,122 immigrantsas shown on the following Brunswick, the very town where MacDonald page: wrote. Starting with a feN, men from the North who came with nothingmore than The marriagerecords ofSt.John's their hands and their brains to help them Church show that, as would be expected, make a living, the colonygrew, in spite of many. Brunswick residents of French extrac- linguistic barriers, until today it is abouttwo tion were born in other New Englandtowns fifths of the total population of Brunswick and cities, their ancestors having previously. and Topsham. AssuMing that this proportion moved there from Canadaor, possibly, is accurate for each of the towns individually, France. For the sake of comparison withthe and itis close to being sosthen the French statistics on Canadian and foreign origins, two fifths of Brunswick today owns proper- there follows data for people born in the ty assessed at approximately one million dol- New England states and the few fromout- larsa figure which is all themore impressive side New Englandr,grouped under «Others.» when one realizes that this isone quarter of the valuation of the resident-owned property The'French at Brunswickcan be said, in of the town. general, to have come from along the south bank of the St. Lawrence River from Mont- The French-Canadian group has its on real to beyond Riviere du Loup and particu- in Canada along the south bank of the . larly from the region withina fifty-mile radi- St. Lawrence and .participlarly in andnear us of L'Islet; for out of a total of 914 from the county of L'Islet. Of the 914 people of Canada, 508 came from the four contiguous Canadian birth whose originscan be traced, counties of L'Islet, Montmagny, Kamouras- 508 (55%) came from the L'Islet region. ka,andTemiscouata,the others being With the others from everycorner of the widely scattered. Province of Quebec, itis evident that the group from near L'Islet forms the hard core of the Brunswils, French colony. However, CONCLUSION the work was shed by all, and the position of equality held today by the French inthe The worst slanderever levelled against old Yankee town of Brunswick standsas a the Fren of New England was a simile by. tribute to the adaptability, the toil,and the Prof.acDonald of Bowdoin (op. cit.) when fertility of the French Canadiansas a race.

g* IStatey of Birth Number States of Birth Number Maine (except 13runswick4 Rhode Island 6 17 (nd Topsham) .133, Connecticut -r 7 NeW Hampshire 16' Others 6 Vermont 6 Massachusetts 27 Total 201

4 1\45

C . 136

ORIGINS BY COUNTIES AND COUNTRIES OFBRUNSWICK PEOPLE COUNTIES IN PROVINCE COUNTIES IN PROVINCE NUMBER OF QUEBEC NUMBER QUEBEC 4 O Lotbini Argenteuil 0 39 Maskino Arthabaska 17 1 Megantic Bagot 0 Beauce 28 Missisquoi 0 Montcaln 0 Beauharnols 58 3 Montmagny Bellechasse 52 Berthier 0 Montmorency Montreal (Island of) 6 Bonaventure 5 0 Napierville Brome 6 0 Nicolet Chambly 2 Champlain 0 Pontiac Charlevoix (See Saguenay, Portneuf Quebec (County) 2 former name of county) 0 8 Richelieu Chateauguay 3 Chicoutimi (includes modern Richmond 11 Lac St. Jean Co.) 36 Riouski 1 Compton 6 Rouville 2 Saguenay (modern charlevois Dorchester 7 Drummond 2 approximateK1 0 Shefford 35 Essex 5 Farnham O Sherbrooke Soulanges 0 Frontenac (See Compton 4 4nd Beauce) !anstead St. Hyacinthe 7 Gasp 2 4 Hemmingford 0 St. John St. Maurice 10 Hull 1 47 Huntingdon 0 Temiscouata 3 Terrebonne lberville 0 0 Two. Mountains Joliette 0 Kamouraska 133 Vaudreuil Vercheres 3 Labelle 1 Wolfe 14 Lac St. Jean (See Chicoutimi) 0 Laprairie 5 Yamaska 3 County unknown, Province L'Assomption 13 Laval O of Quebec 11 County unknown, probably Province of Quebec 51 L'Islet19 270 OTHER PROVINCES OTHER COUNTRIES 1 New Brunswick 11 Newfoundland 3 Nova,Scotia 5 Ontario 14 France Prince Edward island 1 «Canada» 10 Belgium Total from Canada 914 Total 7 137

t.s Notes

1. SeeSurvival of French...in Missouriby Ward 11. The foremen, at tirst Yankees and Irishmen, Dorrance.U. of Missouri' Studies, Vol. 10, No. having to write a name for tach man on the pay 2, April 1, 1935. rob would sometimes simply choosea name for a new man whose name they could not spell. 2.History of Brunswick,George k/Wheeler, So a Levesque might be told «You, Levi, under- p. 566. stand?»

3. §ee the table on Page 12. The figures in this column represent onlyper- sonal property; evidently the. assessors did not 4. Ninth Census Vol. 1, 1872, Government Print- consider this worth assessing in 1875. ing Office, Washington, D.C. 13. Of this, $792,031 is real property; $136,724 is 5. The spelling of these names shows that the edi- personal. tor went by his ear alone as a guide. In paren- theses I 'have put. the spelling used by people 14. $4,474,246. with these names. Another example ofa «phon- etic» spelling of French names is ina December 15. Printed in theBrunswick Record,January 2, issue of theTelegraphfOr 1873: «A French boy 1941. named Benway while skating on the tindroscog- gin river here was drowned on Tueiday.» The 16. Brunswick, 8,658, Topsham, 2,334, according name was, of course, Benoit. to 1940 census figures issued by the U.S. Bu- reau of theCensusPopulation of the State of 6. Based on Court records 'described under 2on MaineLFinal figures 1940, Series P-2, No. 31. p. 17. - 17. While the Question of the language spoken by 7. To this number must be added 4 people who the people of Brunswick is outside the scope of immigrated first to another town, though resi- this paper, it can be 'stated, on the basis of fur- dents of Brunswick when naturalized; therere- ther material to be published shortly by the au- mains a discrepancy of 1, caused by the fact thor, that the French of Brunswick conserves that for 2 persons a naturalization butno immi) remarkably well the heritage brought from Ca- gration date is given, whereas for 1 person.there nada, showing no sign wha never of break-I is an immigration but no naturalization date. _down or disintegration such acertain ill-in- formed writers have assumed would be the case 8.Quarterly Journal of Economicsfor April 1898. in view of the constant-close contact with En-. glish. 9. Apparently an error but one which is iinpossi- ble to rectify because of the state of the Town 18. 1908 being the date when the place of baptism records. AA of the bride and groom was first recorded.

10. Unfortunately much of the informationon as- 19. Also one non-French, non-Catholic born at sessments for the last twenty years is on loose L'Islet., cards more or less scattered, making it impossi- ble to get any fully satisfactory figures. ,1L

147

4 138 A study of a Franco-American community olrseveral lienerationsis found in George F. Theriault's article published In theUniversity ofTOnto 1969monograph Canadian Dualism: Studies of French-English Relations.Thtkiault focussel on Nashua, New HaMpShire as a case study. The social andinstitutional framework witipin which (la survivance, was achieved are examined. The authordescribes a whole host of institu- tions: schools, convents, hospitals and orphanages,cemeteries, newspapers and volun- tary associations of all kinds. The commonheritage of the Roman Catholic faith,the French language, the wave-like pattern of immigration andthe proximity to the mother- country are seen as the basic elementsof the effective cultural and structural pluralism of the Franco-Americans. This pluralism did adapt tothe unfolding economic differen- tiation within the French community, theincreasing generational remoteness from the Canadian experience and the draft, along with theincreasing rates of intermarriage. Twenty years ago Professor Th6riault said:The central institutional structure of 'la Franco-Americanie' even. in comparatively large cer?ters such asNashua is ;bowing in- creasing signs of weakening., But, he added, ( waysof life, deeply cherished institutions, religion and language, are too centrally In the grain 'of apeople to change rapidly..o His judgement has stood the test of alvost a generation.

148 THE FRANCO-AMkRICANSOF NEW ENGLAND

by George F. Thiriault

Outside the Province,of Quebec the a culture embodying in so many respects largest concentration of people ofFrench- values antithetical to its own? Canadian origin in the New World isfound in New England. It is impressively large Recent studies' by Canadian scholars in concentration, the best ates placing-its many fields have reported highly interesting numbers somewhere between 900thousand variations in the answers the Canadianscene and one million. The Franco-Americans of is producing, and will produceincreasingly New .England thus constitutemore than one in the years ahead, to this truly in six of the French-Canadian stock fundamental on this question.- While the dissimilaritiesbetween continent. On the basis of numbersalone, the American and Canadian settingsprevent therefore, they are of considerable impor- the drawing of precise analogues, thesimilar- tance in any study of 'rench- Canadiansoci- ities are so numerous and in certain ety and its culture. basic so- ciological respects so crucial that theFranco- AintiFan experience has considerablevalue They are of far greater interest andim- for co`mparative purposes. portance, however, when their collective experience in the United States isviewed in In the pages that follow I shall outlineas the perspective of their response and adapta- fully as a short chapter permits themore im- tion, over a period of timeextending back portant historical,ecological, and institu- nearly a century, to the many-faceted chal- tional features of Franco-American lifein lenges of life and living inan industrial civil- New England. In doing so Khali concentrate ization. In the current period ofdynamic rather more upon what is implicitthe first growth, industrialization, andurbanization than in the second word in the pression in Canada few questions havemore far- «Franco-Americando sinceour imary in- reaching import for the future ofboth terest lies in what has happenedin the United English-speaking and French-speaking Cana- States to the French-Canadian heritageof dians than this: What happens inthe course the Franco-American. of time to the traditionalFrench-Canadian way of life, its values, institutions, andcus- It is well for us to have in mindat the toms, when it is transplanted from the iso- outset that the central motif of theFranco- lated rural, parochial, village setting to which American experiment has beenthat Rf com- it is indigenous to the dynamism of a highly bining elements drawn from the pastand the industrialized urban millet), and isexposed present, from different societies andtheir year in and year out for several generations cultures, from widely disparatetraditions, to the ceaseless pressures and influencesof ideals, and philosophies intoa viable whole.

139 149 140

It his been, in short, anJim'sattempt 11 put into practice and to carry forward a Itoparticular kind of cultural pluralism. Con- Evidence of , la Franco-A mericanie in temporary leaders of la survivance inNew New England is unobtrusive butcatches the England recognize this clearly. A manifesto eye of the interestedobserver. It is most in adopted upon the occasion of the celebra- evidence in the older textile centres, large tion of the Centennial of the founding of and small, that were by far the most com- the first Franco-American parish described mon goal of emigratingFrench-Canadians in Franco-American life in these words: the nineteenth century. From 1865onward, except in periods of economicstagnation, Upon the spiritual plane, the Franco- «the mills» beckoned with jobs,in good Americans are Roman Catholics; upon times w hundreds and thousands of jobs, the temporal plane, they are American that prov ed the immigrant with an eco- citizens;finally they are by tradition, nomic foot old in the new land. language; and spirit French; the whole being co-ordinated and combined in such a manner as to produce a way of Today, nearly fordigenerations later, life without a parallel in this country.2 these cities offerabundanttestimony to the vitality and achievement of thishardy habi- For a minority group living within a tant stock. From MainStreet to the neigh-. larger society dedicated to endsdifferent bourhood grocery, stores bear such names as from its own to embark on and to hold to Gagnon, Lucier, Avard, Ouellette,Thibo- such a cterse is at best a precarious enter- dean. The shingles of lawyers anddoctors prise. Its members find themselvesoriented display such names.as Morin,Perreault, Me- at one and the same time to severaldifferent ard. Signs and newspaperachirtisements cultural worlds. They are subject to both in- puicize such business enterprises as La- ternal tensions and. the pull .of conflic croix, coal dealer; Marcotte,milkman; Le- interests in their relations withthe peoples Febvre, radio and television service.In 1955 and institutions of the largerenvironment asin1880, of course, Franco-American that people living in a more centrallyinte- names are common onthe employment rolls grated society are spared. From asociolog- of textile, shoe, and paperindustries. They ical point of view it is not the failureof such are also found todayin large numbers in in- undertakings that is surprising but rather the dustries that are relative newcomers toNew extent and duration of theirsuccessful life, England, 'plastics,,electrical appliances, and On the American scene, whichhas seen in other divers ' Indiistries. Within these the past century and a half thetesting of the firms their names arc Mind all the wayfrom experiments in survival of soniany minority unskilled and loilmskilled jobs to manage- groups, only the SpanishAmericans of the ment positions,all otiih their representa- Southwest have approached the degreeof a.. tion at the manageitt level is still smaller success of theFranco-Americans of New thin their numbers and long residencein the They England. community would:§eeril to call for. 4are, in short, aprCiriainent enough element. in To discover the extent of andthe more these New Englandindustrial centres, along- important reasons for the measure of success side the Irish, who precededthem by a gen- they have achieved is the task towhich we eration, and the Poles, Lithuanians,Greeks, Euro- now address ourselves. Italians, and oll*r south and central pean peoples who cameinto these cities in the 1890's and the early years ofthis century. 150 d

141.

, Evidencesthatthe Franco-Americans England scene, taken for -granted by both constitute a sub-comunity within the lar- theyFranco-Amertans :and their fellow citi- ger community are also found. Nearly all zens. Behind this publit'facade liesttlie much these cities have areas within them that both less readily ;observable, less easily measurable, Franco- Americans and other residentsgener- massive but elusive reality of the Franco- ally .regdrd as French. In the nineteenthcen- American way of life. Questions .about it tury these were often spoken of as p'tits abound; answers, Fu.m answers, are hard to (5 Canadas, Frenchville, andso on. More often, come by. How far has assimilation into the among the Franco-Americanshemselves, main stream of American life gone? How these areas were and are known d spoken many defections from the faith have the of by their parish names, St. Louis de. Gon- three generations of life in the predominantly zague,Enfant Jesus,St. Francois-Xavier. Protestant, "secularly oriented United States While the churches, invariably large, with tall brought about? How has the goal of bilin- spires topped by the Roman 'tatholiccross, gualism fared; what, has happened to «la could not in these cities have the undisputed belle langue franfaise?» Just what ,is theex- prominence against the skyline of their ante- tent of interaction, co-operation, and mutu- cedents in the villages of Quebec, they have ality of action and interests with Prench been none the less the nerve-centres of Canada? Franco-American life. Clustered around the church are the presbytere,the parochial. Thesequestiggs,and many others that schoolsusually separate. schools for boys spring to mind about the Franco- Americans, and girls -the nuns' convent, the brothers' are not easily. answered. Lit us first identify home. In the larger communities, parish- and place 14 Franco-Americanie precisely. In .. bnilt and operated hospitals and orphanages 'speaking of it in the old textile centres we are not uncommon. have only identified it with-the type-of cities with which the Franco-Americans are most These are the most prominent, but not commonly, associated; Where perhaps the ex- the only; institutionalfeatures of the Franco- periment in survival has been most success- American sub-community. On the principal ful, but which collectively cannot even come streets of these Franco-American areas men's close -to accounting for the-whereabouts and clubs are prominent;, with suCh-juimesas cultural life of "the estimated 900 thousand Les Racquetteurs, Club Montcalm, Club to one million Americans of French-Cana- Gagnon. IA the larger eIntresNa French-lan- dian stock. guaie newspaper suchas L'Acilon, Le Tra* wiilleur, I/Impartialappears weekly. Insur- Me need first to grasp the distribution of >Ance and mutual aid societies,as well as poli- this population in the whole of New England,, tical Organization at the ward level,are or- to sketch in the broad outlines of their re- ' ganized along ethnic lines. Each year in some gional ecology. We are handicapped by the of the larger :centres symbolic recognition is fact that the United States censuscovers accorded la Frimco-Ameticanie by special only the first two generations, whereas the observances, parades, masses, and so forth, third and 'fourth generations are vitally im- on June 24, which is Ayla fete de St. Jean- portant for our purposes. Precise statistics Baptiste.» are not available, but reasonablyaccurate es- iimates can be made. For our purposes it Such are some of the dutward e'ences will only be important to delineate the most of la Franco-Americanie. They are,as we general demographic characteristics of la have noted, unobtrusive features of the New Franco-A mericanie.

151 * 142

TABLE I ti

FRANCO-AMERICAN PARISHES IN NEW ENGLAND, 1949*

Fr.-Am. - 1 Total nat '1 Fr.-Am. Total %. A t: Diocese R.C. parishest.-- mixed* Mixed § Fr.-Am.-. Boston, Mass. 351 30 __. 24 54 15.3 Burlington, Vt 81 6 25 16 47 59.0 Fill River, Mass 96 19 4 2 25 . 26.0 Hartford, Conn 321 7 16 12 ,35 10.9 Manchester, N.H. 93 20 19 "30" . 69 74.1 POitland, Me 132 37 29 25 '91 68.9 (P rovidence , R 1 -130 18 10 8 , 36 ?7.6,. Springfield, Mass. 212 41 4 25 70 33.0

Total 1,416 178 107 ' 142 427 30.1 ... -, , *Ct mite d'Orientationfranco-am6ricaine,Notre Vie franco-americaine» from "a Memfritpresentinfathe principal statistics, concerning laFranco-Americaniein NeW England (Boston, 1949), p. 21. ti "N. tA iparish in which the priest(s) is Franco-American, and such duties as preaching, confession, and the prayers in which the congregation participates are conductedin French. . *A parish in which the clergy and the majority of the parishioners areFranco-American, lifit where the priest is required to preach in bgth French and English, for thebenefit of those parishioners who are not Franco-American. §A parish in which the Franco-Americans constitutA an appreciable proportionof the parisioners, but are not in the majority, in which the clergy is rarelyFranco-American, and in which services may or may not be oouLlyfed in French as well as inEnglish.

The Franco-Americans are by no means, The rural-urban distribution of Frfinco- evenly-distributed in New England; this fact American stock within these states attests to is of crucial importance in understanding la the essentially urban character of la Franco- survivance. They are found appreciable Americanle. In Massachusetts the percentage numbers in predominantly rural states such of Franco-American stock of urban resideae a me and Vermont, and theyhave a con- is 91; in Rhode Island it is even higher,.94/ sideble'representation in such rural and In New Hampshire- it is;77; Connecticut,r68; «small towns 'occupations as togging, paper Maine, 63; and Vermont, 18: A reasonable milling, and dairy and potato farming, but generalization frorn thesefiguires3 and other. they are essentially and primarily an urban dad' would appear to be that fOttr.'oOt of-five group. Massachusetts, heavilyindustrialized Franco-Americans live in an urban environ- ,and urban, _has more than twice as many rhent. :Pranco-Americans as Maine, which ranks second among the New England states in the Perhaps the most accurate index, from a number of fkanco-Americans in its popula- sociological point of view, of the scope and tion: There follow in descending order New character of la Franco-A mericanle is provided . Hampshire, in third place, then RhodeIsland, by the numbers and location of parishes that Connecticut, and Vermont. have appreciable numbers of franco-AMeri- cans 9sn their varigh rolls.Table I presents ;

01.

A):

+de 143

conciselythe distribution of the Franco inthe 5,000 to 10,000 range: including Americans' in the parochial structure of the Auburn, Maine, Burlington, Vermont, and Roman Catholic Church in New England, West Warwick, Rhode Island, as representa- and at the same time suggests clearly the tive of such comnstunities. Communities with degree of concentration of the Fraillio-Amer- Franco-American groills of from 1,000 to lean population. 5,000 are very numerous.4

These data reveal that the Franco-Ameri- cans constitute practically the entire body of III communicants in 178 parishes, andare in the majority in 107 other parishes. In at The precise specification of the condi- least 285 Roman Catholic parishe§ in New tions, necessary for the survival of a minority England, therefore, very sizable ecological society and its culture within a larger, donii- 'groupingsof Franco-Americans exist.It mint society is a difficult task. It.is.perhies seems reasonable to assume further that in , especially difficult when the larger societyris an appreciable percentage of the mixed par- the United States, huge, amorphous, dynam- ishes, numbering in all 142, Franco-Ameri- ic; characterized by tension, conflict, and can groupings of sole size are also found. ambivalence at numerous points; at once tol- 4,rould appear reasonable to estimate that erant and intolerant of multiplicity; exerting 2/5 if the Catholic parishes in New England pressures for conformity while simulthneous- have Tranco-American populations of 1,000 ly creating conditions that permit diversity. or more. These parishes may (pike properly be regarded as the nerve-centres of the The interaction of like-minded persons Franco-American experiment in survival. in some numbers is the fundamental require- ment of all societies. A minority society is Another view of these concentrations of no exception to' this basic sociological dic- population may be obtained from thecom- tum. This basic condition wa's met in the FC paritive numbers of France-Americans in case ofla Franco-Amtcricanie.The existence the cities of Ntw England. Exact statistics of relatively compact sub-communities of are nqt available, but close approximations Franco-Americans in the inchistrial cities and may be made that ar adequate fot the pur- towns of New England, organized in parishes pose of outlining the scope ofla Franco- that in their churches, schools, and associa- Americanie.The largest urban concentra- tions gave explicit expression to .the central tionsof Franc&-Americansrangefrom values of their culture; the Roman Catholic 30,000 to40,000 persons. Woonsocket, ,faith, and the Frenchanguage, provided the Rhode- Island, Fall River, Masiachusetts, and sine qua nonof social interaction and regular, Manchester, New Hampshire, are in this cate- 'formal, institutionalized cultural expression.. gory. Rahging from 20,000 to 30,000 are a such communities as New Bedford, Lowell, Other factors tended toOkilitafe and k and Worcester, in Massachusetts, and Lewis- hance interaction-and culture-building act ton, in Maine. A considerable number of ties, notably the timing ofimmigratiffli into communities fall in the 10,000 to 20,000 these sub-communities and the socio-ew- range; representative of these are Biddeford, nomic homogeneity of the Franco-American 'Maine; Fitchburg, 'Haverhill, and Lawrence, "(Oblation during *the early decades of their Massachusetts; Nashua, iltw Hampshire; and deiekipnient. Franco-American immigration Pawtucket and Central rills, Rhode Island. into the United States has been a markedly A larger number of communities ate foid. wave-like phenomenon. Prior to the Civil

O

P 0 3

144

War, people of Frenc -Canadian origin in The combined effect. of the simultaneous New England were few, till fewer canie with arrival of large numbers and socio-economic the intention of becom r remaining as, homogeneity was to quickly bring intoexis- permanent residents; Illa ere migratory tence comiect neighbourhoods ofFranco- seasonal workers. In the late 1860's the Americans in the cold-water flat and tene- boom in the cotton mills led to the first ment districts clustered aroundthe huge tex- large-scale influx. In Nashua, New Hamp- tile mills and shoe factories in dozensof shire, a community the writer has studied New England industrial citiescid towns. intensively, the Franco-American population jumped from fewer than 200 in 1869 to over The proximity of the mother country 2,000 in 1872. The severe depression of the was and is an importantfactor influencing seventies, beginning in 1873, brought an the lives and cultural destinies ofFranco- abrupt end to immigration. The upswing of Americans that, of all the immigrant groups business in 1879 and the booM Of the early in the United States, they share only with eighties brought another wave of Franco- the of the southwest. nostalgicthe Polishimmigrant .Americans intothe community, swelling However their total number to nearly 5,000. Immi- might feel about his'ildhood in a peasant gration was again heavy in the early 1890's. village, he had made and knew that hehad After 1895 immigration tended to be more made an irrevocable commitment incoming continuous, but on a smaller scale,less to a new and vastly differentland. He had marked by heavy swells, except for the turned his face on the past, made a clean and boom years of the1020's. Return migration definitive break with it; he and his children to Canada has been small. Only in the severe looked to the future and a new life. and long depression of the 1930's, and then only for two or three years, did the numbers Not so the Franco-American. If he did leaving the United States for Canada exceed not lily the United States hecould return to the numbers entering. In the past twenty Canada. He could look forward tovisiting years, comparatively fewFrench-Canadians the home country. He couldmaintain his have come to New England; and few have ties with relatives and friends bycon-espoit- returned to Canada. dencef From time to time many of them joined him. There, was much correspondence The wave-like pattern of migration, in back and forth across the border, and a the riter's opinion, had much to do with surprising amount of visiting back and forth the 4Liccessful establishment and mainte- even in the early yearswhen° economic re- nance of la Franco-Antericaniein New Eng- sobrces were slender indeed. Canada as a land. The simultaneous arrival in NewEng- source of leadership was veryimportant. land's cities of large numbers of like-minded Priests, nuns, brothers came to lead the way French-Canadians, sharing a strong tradition, in the reconstruction in New Englandof the similar status as poor, unskilled, uneducated parish, with its church, its schools, perhaps wage workers, and similarproblems of find- even its orphanagesand hospitalsthe parish ing jobs, homes for large families, and learn- that was the essential cornerstoneof Franco- ing how to get along as French-speaking American society Vd" the matrixwithin Catholics in a dominantly English-speaking which Franco -Am scan culture couldbe Protestant environment created, then sves- nurturedandsustained.Soondoctors, sary conditions for the promptestalMt- joiirlists, other professional men, trained ment of a minority sub-society. in Canada, 'could follow and helpplay an

li important partin rounding out a viable

154 145

structure of associational,fraternal,and No time was lost in establishing a parish community life. It is worthy of note that, of their own. The Irish, Who' preceded the onceestablished,these Franco-American French-Canadians by fifteen years or so, es- sub-communities recruitedsome of their re- tablished the first Roman Catholic church in ligious and lay leaders from Franco- Ameri- Nashua in the 1850'sthe Church of the Im- canyouth of both sexes whowere sent to maculate Conception. The earlyFrench- Canada for their higher education. Canadian settlers attended that church. In 1871 a separate parish, St. Louis de Gon- zague, was created. In November of that IV year, Rev. J. B. H. V. Milette came from Ca- nada to begin a long and extraordinary sue- The social and institutional framework cessful pastorate, and in 1873 a large new, within which la survivance was achieved is of church was dedicated. such importance that the manner and the order of its creation are worthy of note. For The period that followed, through the this purpose its development ina representa- remainder of the nineteenth and the early tive community may perhaps best suggest years of the twentieth century, was'one that the general pattern. Nashua, New Hamp- can only be described as of remarkable vital- shire,' is one of the largercentres of Franco- ity and vigorous leadership. Writing of the American settlement. Today some 17,000 parallel growth of Franco-American parishes of its total population of 34,000,or 50 per throughout New England during this period, cent, are of French-Canadian origin. This Mason Wade spoke of the movement as «an particular communityistherefore in the extraordinary effort, which is matched by middle range of Franco-American centres, no other ethnic group in the United States,» considerably smaller than the largest, which and its leaders as «extraordinary men.»6 We runs up to 40,000, considerably larger than can do no more than outline the dimensions the many cities and towns whose Franco- of this achievement, in one community, and Ainerican populations run from 1,000 to note certain' considerations that heighten its 10,000. Nashua, by virtue of the size of its stature. Franco-American population, must bere- garded as one in which the necessarycon- Father Milette's parishioners were, al- * ditions for the creation and maintenance of most without. exception, newly arrived day the social framework for la survivanteewere labourers, without special skills. The great unusuallyfavourable. How survival' was majority worked at wages averaging a dollar achieved, and the time-table that was fol- a day in the huge textile mills of the Nashua lowed, are therefore especially interesting. Manufacturing Company.Theirfamilies were large. They spoke little English and French-Canadians were a little later in they. had had but a few years of poor school- beginning their 'migration to Nashua than ing in inadequate country and village schools. they were in coming to some other New In the space of a geperation these people England centreg. ln 1865 thelocal directory were to invest over% million dollars, at nine- listed only thirty-one slefinitely or probably teenth-century values, in the property Father French-Canadian names. That number in- Milette led them_in building. ,.creased slowly until 1869, then, reflecting the first huge wave of migration, mounted In 1875, two years after the church was steeply frorli 1870 to 1873, to approximate- - dedicated, the parish acquired a presbifrre, ly 2,200. and in 1879 a cemetery was purchased. The

155. 146 parish grew rapidly: by1883 its census In the traditional rural French-Canadian showed 3,368 souls and 604 families. In that society the parish had been? iipffeci, the year, the, church being almost paidfor, the community, the all-embracing m ix within first convent was built, the Soeurs de Sainte which farm, family, social relations had each Croix came from Canada, and the first paro- had their appointed places. So nowin the chial school was opened. New England textile centre, pail passe with the wave-like influx of French-Canadians, In1885 the parish was divided and this social matrix was reconstituted. Nashua's second Franco-American parish, St. Francois-Xavier, came into being with 663 Tall spires of Gothic churches rose in the communicants on its rolls. The division did densely peopled tenement districts clustered not slow down the growth of St. Louis de around the textile' mills. In their shadows Gonzague, however. In 1887 the church was parochial schools were built, as quickly as improved. Two years later the boyS' school possible, and, however great the strain on was. built.In 1891 a, new presbytere was the parish's resources, the presbytere, a cou- constructed. Inthe same year the boys' pent for the nuns and a home forthe brothers school was en'arged and the Freres du Sacre- who came from Canada to teach French as Coeur came from Canada to take charge. well as English to the young and to see to it The older parish had by 1890 regained the that the three R's were learned within a sys- numbers of parishioners it had lost with the tem of basic values in which religion had the establishment of the new pariih. In the early central place. It is worthy of note that the 1.1490's it grew rapidly; the parish census in Franco-Americans were much more assiduous 1893 reported 5,621 souls. In 1895 the resi- in the building and staffing of bilingual paro- dence of the brothers was built. In 1896 the chial schools than were other immigrant Ro- -church wasAirged. In 1897 a large new man Catholic groups. InNashua, as has al- school of t y-one classrooms was built. ready been noted, the Irish preceded the In 1906 a new boys' school was built. From Franco-Americans by aboutjifteen years. In 1901 to 1903 an orphanage with accomoda- the middle 1850's their numbers in the com- tions for 200 children was constructed, and munity were already 2,000 and they built the Soeurs de Charite came from Montreal theirfirstchurch,but twenty-five years to manage it. In 1907 Father Milette crowned passed before they built a parockial school. his work by building one of the largest Ibis- In the larger Franco - American parisltes.vigor- pitals itn the state, with 118 beds, which was ous leadership could cap thisbasic parish also placed in the charge of the Soeurs de structure with a hospital and an orphanage, Charite. as Father Milette did at St.Louis de Gon- zague in Nashua. In 1909 St. Louis de Gonzapie was again divided and Nashua's third Franco-American With the establishment of the parish, the. parish, Enfant Jesus, was established. Devel- building and staffing of churches and paro- opments similar to those traced above for chial schools, the cornerstone of la .survl. the original parish, with the exception of Vance was laid. The basic goalof retaining, hospital and orphanage, occurred in both of the identity of the Franco-Amerifans as a the new parishes. In 1910, Nashua's Franco- group was visualized by theirleaders as ail- American population hid increased to at tainable through the three crucially impor- least 8,555, or 33 per cent of the commun- tant institutions of the church, theschool, ity's total population of 26,00. and the home. The long experience of the French-Canadians as a minority group dis-

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posed them to believe that if these three Parochial associations, charitablesocieties, institutions, closely integratedone with the societies supportingreligiousmissions in other, could be formed into havens of refuge foreignlands,findreligiousassociations impenetrable by outside influences, where servingpurely social functions formen, the Catholic faith, the Frenchlanguage, and women, 'and children were formed. Non- French-Canadian culture were cherished and parochial but church-sponsoredmutual. aid nurtured, they could thrive,even in the societies, burial societies, insurance midst of -an alien and mildly societies, hostile milieu. athletic and fraternal societieswere formed. Such large Franco-American sub-communi- It is well to note how ina community ties attracted lay professionalmen frp, like Nashua (and therewere many other Canada, especially doctors and cities and towns in which journalists. In the pattern was Nashua a French-languagenewspaper, L'Im- duplicated), circumstances favoured ina partial,stillin existence,was launched Nin more general way the attainment of this goal. 1898. As we have seen, by 1910 thecommunity as a whole was one-third Franco-American.The . TheFranco-AmericanexperinItntin implicationsare far-reaching. When such survival in New Englandrev many conti- an appreciable percentage ofa community's nuities in values, attitudes, hist!ions, and population speaks French, workandbusi- community ecological patterns from ness feel the impact. 870to It becomes «good thepresentday.Nevertheless,certain business» for a Main Street storeor bank to characteristics and tendencies clearlydiffer- have clerks and tellers who can als-o speak it. entiate the earlier from the laterperiods. The French will be heard spoken by workmen on assignment of specific dates to thesepgriods construction jobs,infactories, anywhere is necessarily arbit6ry, but ifthe caution where.men are associated)n work. is borne in mind that thedatesused below are intended only as generally suggestive,their Sections of the community,particularly use has a certain convenience. in the thickly settledtenement districts hard 41. by the mills and factories, became after The period reviewed in theforegoing 1871-2 almost exclusively French-speaking pages, extending from1870 to 1910,was neighbourhoods. Thus theordinary social clearly one of most vigotousgrowth and interaction of everyday life inplay groups, institutional developMent. Itincluded the neighbourly relations, sports, and friendship late years of the nineteenthcentury when lent effective support to themajor institu- thirtyyearsof economic depressionin tional church, school, and home,in perpetu- Canada- spurted the wave-likemovements of ating Freixch-Canadian culture.The fact that population into New, England, which, by in the formative years, from 1870 to1901), contrast to Canada, alternately experienced the Franco-American populationwas un- boom years of prosperity andsharp reces- differentiated in economic andsocial status sions. In theliitinco-Americimsub-commu- 'was a potent factor in shapinga homogene- nities in New Eliglandthesewere the years in ous ethnic sub-community. which the traditional paRsheswere con-. structed ikthe.Neiv Englandenvironment. This solid community base fora Franco- This task was advanced withgreat vigor by a American way oflifelikewise provided number of outstanding priests,of whom opportunities for furth6r institutionalelabo- Father Milette.,in Nashua.was an illustrious ratiolboand development. Voluntaryassocia- example. These were year/in which boththe' tions of diverse kinds quicklydeveloped. clergy end their parishioners stoodfirmly

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. thgir claim for the de- The pronlInentrole of thefirstI'genera- united and adamant in the tra- parishes.Inthe tion immigrant continued in so far as velopmentof national activities were con- centres ofrelativelylarge ditupings of ditionalinstitutional 1 hierarchyofthe cerned, but new fetures made their *pear- Franco-Americans -the generation Roman Catholic Church made no attemptto ance.Incredsingly thenew tats, with no personal oppose the desir softhe - ,Franco- Americans born in the United experience of',tench Canada, made itself for «their own» church4 and.schools in felt. This lieeration was naturallyand truly which_ the French language enjoyed a status hoine, at equal to that of English, Of for «their own»rbilingual, having learned French at duffel), and in the parochialschools, f4tn» priests. Mends and cliques, bnd,inathletic and other In secular life this period inFranco- social activities; and. havinglearned English's omnipresent, ambient American society was characterizedby the fromthevaried, who was\-finfluence of,iffe in an"American community. dominant role of the immigrant, Semi- learning English aS a second languagebut was Economic differentiation appeared. Economically skilled and highly skilled workers'developed. much more at home in French. sales, and la Franco-America.nie during 'these yearswas,/ White-collar 'jobsinclerical, 'undifferentiated/It was a society- of wage secretarial work came tcp---t'filled by the of immigrants. An workers, largelyunailled and poorly educa- sons and daughters 4liN.ural parishes of the prov- emergent middle classcomposed largely of ted. Fresh from storekeepers, ce of Quebec, these newAmericans were small business entrepreneurs, conditions bakers, milkmen, realestate men, politician's, pied to adapt themtelves to into existence. A in New England as they foundthem, particu- and office-holders came sprinkling of profehal men,doctors, and larly as regards work, but they were so nu-s., _ Kimpactly together that lawyers appelired. merous and lived so I of making basic there could be no question differ- cultural choices. T..ey wereFrench, deeply Ecologically, this socio-econpmic the ethos entiation expressed itself in the emergence, Catholic, profoundly attached to densely pop- that was their heritage. usually on the periphery of the ulated tenement districts,of lower middle- of leleriod that followed, roughly identi- class and middle-class residential areas, architectural fea- fied as the years from 1910 to1930, was dif- which the most prominent first. Immi- tures in that period werethe two- or four- ferent in many respeets from the single and gration from Canada was on asharply reduced family apartment building and the scale eept for a few boom' yearsin the duplex family' type of home in asomewhat twenties, but was fairly continuous,and re- less congested neighbourhood. turnees to Canada were feW.The natural rate 1920, Nashua's This was the period of thecoming of age of increase was high. By their Franco-American population hadrisen to politically of the Franco-Americans, and prominent role 10,420 or 36.7 per Cent of the totalpopula- assumption of an increasingly Local political by.1930 it had reached in local and state politics. tion of 28,379, and expression, cent of the total popula- leadership developed and found 12,683, or 40.3 per and later in sub-csimm'unities and first in naturalization campaigns, tion of 31,463. The of politi- their institutions continued toexpand. Vol- the organization and consolidation f. cal action. Typically, localpolitics became a untaryassociationsdeveloped- and grew subject of lively interest, especiallyfor rising, stronger. ambitious young men whoseinterestsit

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fe, served; and identification with their ethnic some indications of the,factors at work can group played a n ost pronlInent role in this be presented here. Two method4vere used developmenti to arrive at a close estimate of the percen- tage made up by people of Franco-Amesican Religious leadership tended to change in background. A complete tally was nxide of character. Parishes grew in numbers ofcom- the ethnic identification of the voters on the municants, andbecameinstitutionally community'scItecklists, arid an hideprenilent stronger, but the dynamism of the earlibr ,tally was made by. using a zoning map and years was replaced by a spirit that seemed to city directory and identifying the residents stand principally for consolidation and on an evenly distributed sample of streets in maintenance of close identififoation with the each zone. These two checks independently group. Struggles within the Church and in the -arrived at a percentage just short of 50 for press reflected a strong insistence upon the the proportion. of the total population that rights of Franco-Americans to run theirown was Francomerican in origin: It is inter affairs in their vvn «national» parishes.-Vig- esting to conipare thiS percentage w-itlt,4bat our, assertiveness, and some independence arrived at in :anothartiocal study maele ih were manifest. The tendency away from the 1936 which foAnd that.the Franco-American,, earlier dynamism, however, is perhaps best ethnic stock constituted 45.5 per centiof the e?iceritsed symbolically in the fact that tile total population. cuk who replaced the founders in large ur- ban Pranco-American parishes were priests Both in total numbers -approximately, approaching the end of their career, who,as 17,000-and in percentage of the commu rewards for.long service in smaller parishes, ty's total population, the-element thatas were given see ire posts where they were it:ft- Franco-American in origin in 1950 repre-

movible (had IcHure for life) and, would /-sented a considerable increase over the 12,638. spend the ren4filder of their days in prestige found in 1930. However, if we take parochial and comfort, with .the services of severalcu- school registrations in Franco-American par- rates as assistants. Since thete appointments ishes as the best Single index of identification were in the hands of the hierarchy of the with the sub-community, we find that they Church, it appilihrs likely,that the absence of are only very slightly larger in 4951A than in vigorous leadership in the «national» par- 1930. Our studies indicated that no re ishes reflected a basic policy' of not encour- than 13,000 of the estimated total of 17 00 aging the further development of such par- Could beregarded in the early 195,0's as ing ishes. closely, identified' with the Franco-Amer an sub-society. Other evidence tends also to s p- The thirdperiod, from 1930 tq the port the general conclusion that this sub- middle 1950's is a more difficult one to cominunitii_has at best held its own A:luring' kt..r--- evaluate in detail, but it also clearly revealed these years. new trends,the most central and most important of which was a sharply increased Mokeover, certain qualitative changes ih rate of loss to 'the minority sub-community the «cillture climate* of the sub-community -6 of appreciable numbers of individuals of rinitheSe years seem to indicate a steady Franco-American background. In the writ- osion of values, traditions,zathnstitutions er'sstudy of Nashua, whose population that were firmly held to('in the past and a had grown to 34,666 by 1950, great care steady strengthening of the factors and influ- was taken to estimate. this loss as closely as ences vking for assimilation into the gen- possible, but only the general findings and eral Anierican culture in the future. Let us 150 us examine some of thesechanges. &for the experiment in survival 'were excep- nionally propitious, we find little basis for In the mid-fifties we are confronted'hy optimism about the prospects for the future. population in la Franeo-Americanie that is in The national parish as the social matrix for large part three generations and; in increasing Franco-American survivance and the French numbers, four generations removed from language so closelyidentified with both French Canada. Economic differentiation in- sacred and profane activities are the critical to the varied-strata of the working, middle, fealties. If they survive, la Franco-America- and upper classes has proceeded apace and tile survives; if they pass from the scene, lit- brought marked changes in residence, out- tle of any significance of «noire heritage» look, attitudes, associational affiliations, and will remain. Their prospects therefore de- cultural: values. En at the lowest levels the , serve special attention. habit's of life bf the community today pre- sent the sharpest contrast to those of twenty In order to understand what is hap- years ago. Full' employment and highlevels' pening to the Franco-American parish in of prosperity, in spite of the sharp economic New England in the middle of the twentieth readjustments that had to be made in this as century certain basic backgroundinforma- in Other New England communities by the tion is indispensable. Of crucial importance shift away from textiles to electric appli- is the policy of the American Roman Cath- nces and other new industries, havewrought olic Church concerning-the so-called national basic changes that tend in the aggregate to parishes. At the Catholic Congress of Balti- weaken the ethnic sub-community. more in 1889, when theissue of national parishes assumed great importance because Specifically, these ppst-wary,earsTh-ave of the swelling tide of Catholic immigrants brought military service, more and better from south and central Europe, the official automobiles,, travel, and television, and par- policy of the American Church was set i? ticipation in other aspects of AXrican mass these terms: that «national societies, as such, culture on a larger scale; substantial changes have no place in the Church of this country; in .the ecological distribution of the popula- after the manner of thiscongress, they tioft away from ethnic concentration toward should be Catholic andAmerican.»7 Since zonal patterns differentiated on the basis of that time they have been tolerated, regarded socio-economic Status in the community; basically as a temporary expedient, but they and incrased inter-marriage among members have not beemencouraged. of differentethnic stocks. These changes hp/ not only loosened, the bondsthat traditibnally It is especially significant that in recent bound Franco-AMericans together in a mu- years the hierarchy of theChurch has begun tuality of interests, bpt have also set in train to' exert marked pressure upon the tradition- innumerable intangibleinfluences shaping al Franco-American parishes. In contrast to individual destinies in the social and cultural the indirect methods followed in the middle multiplicities that characterize a contempo- period, such as the appointment of cures rary American community. who by reason of age and length of service could be expected to pursue a more or less If we examnrs, the influences at work passive course, a number of positive steps withinthe institutional structure of the have been taken to force changes in the di- Franco-American S b-society, as re resented rection of making these parishes conform to in a community Wh ch we should again note the basic policy of the Church. It is reason- carefully was one, In which the conditions able to assume that these steps are not being

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taken without a careful reading of theoppor- Frenchas a language in everyday use. One tunities, even the necessities, created by inter"- should not, of course, under-estimate thevi- ,nal changes in the habits of languageand the tality of a language that is still being usedex- interests and values of theFranco-American tensively in community centres of the size of parishioners. Pressures have beenexerted to the Franco-American community in Nashua. bring the curricula ofthe parochial schools Neither, on the other hand, shouldone be more closely in line with the standards of the blindto what appears to be goingon. public schools in non-religious subjects.The amount of time allotted to instruction inthe Itis 2still possible for members of the French language has been reduced andthat al- Oder generation to transact business,pray, lotted to English increased. Prayersmust be read newspapers, and converse, with their learned in English, as wellas French. English neighbours exclusively in French: One may is more frequently hear(' in church. still find individuals who have lived inthese communities forty coo fiftyyears without The implementation of a policy aimedat having learned English. When, however,one reducing bilingualism is nbtnew. it has always lister r to middle-agedpersons, youth, and been in effect in mixed parishes, and insmal- littkichildren, the speech isvery different. it ler communities where, althoughthe Franco- is not uncommon to findamong the middle- Americans might be heavily in themajority, ' aged an easy and rapid alternatinguse of they did not constitutea large or powerful French and English words and phrases with enough community to maintain their«rights» no apparent awareness of switching from effectively. This has beena lively issue among one language to another. Such instability in Franco-Americans from the earliest daysof habits of languageisnotlikelytolast. their settlement in New England. What isnew Among the young, English tends to be the is the direct implementation of thispolicy in language in use. French may be understood, the large parishes in centres of heavyconcen- and frequently is, but itis much less fre- A trations of Franco-Americanscentressuch as quently used. Very often'one;findsa marked Nashua and Manchester, New Hampshire, reluctance to speak French. Woonsocket, Rhode Island, andWorcester, Massachuestts. Strident voices ofprotest are In the course of Sie writer's field work still heard, but popular support forthe cries of in 1950 and 1951, af&fechampetre was held anguish that appeal' in the Franco-Ainerican in' the largest of the Franco-Americanpar- press is lacking. The fact that support from ishes to raise funds. The titlewas a misno- the Church is also lackingcan be taken to mer, because this was no more nor less than mean only one thingthat the time is ripe for asmall , with booths,merry-go- the hierarchy to press foran active start at round, and so on. Held in the parishgrounds, the process of changing the national parishes literally in the shadow of the church, the intoEnglish-language,American-Catholic carnival was well attended. The writer strolled churches and schools. through the dense crbwds for several hours on two evenings and was struck by the Outside of the churches and schools in marked_ use of English. French was heardon- the everyday life of Franco-Americans,hab- ly occasionally, and very rarely indeed from its of lailguage,give everyappearance of be7 children and young people talkingamong ing in a highly unstable state. Over-allevalu- themselves. Older people sometimes spoke ations and predictionsare difficult t9 make, French, sometimes called to their children in but such indicationsas one finds do not pre- French. About half the time the childrenan- sent a hopeful prospect for the future of swered them in English.

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It would be rash indeedtipredict,Iliat established in -the community. Several con- the French language will not beheard in vents that take day students as well as communities such as Na0ua in ten or even boarders ate now available both in the com- twenty-five years. There are still first and munity and within easy commuting distance. second generation Franco-Americans, among For several years there has been much talk whom the habits and tendencies of bilingual- of the establishing Roman Catholicsecond- ism and biculturalism are and will continue aryOchools.If8this should happen, the pro- 4 to be fairly strong. The massive inertia of the portion of the community's school popula- compact Franco-Ameriean,rieighbourhoods tion enrolled in the parochialschools-45 that characterize .Franco-Americansub -com-- per cent at liesentwouldrise to a substan- munities of the size of Nashua will doubtless tial majority. retard and partially holdolt the varied influ- ences making for morecomplete assimila- The evidence appears to be substantial that the central institulional structureof la tion4 Franco-Americanie, e* in comparatively Will the traditional rallying cry of the large centres such as Nashua, is showing in- Franco-Americans, (eQui perd sa langue;perd creasing signs of weakening. The evidence sa foi,» becomereality in the not -so- distant points to further weak ping in the future. future? This eventuality appearsunlikely- in This process is unlikely tto be reversed;it is so far as the majorityis concerned. Substan- equally unlikely that it will be slowed.On tial losses have been amd probably will con- the contrary, it will very probablybe more tinue to be suffered by the Church. But the rapid in the next twenty-five years thanit measures taken by theChurch to counter has been in the past generation,That is not this threat are impressive. Throughout the to say that it will be fast,however. Ways of history of this Franco-American experiment life, deeply cherished institutions,religion the «Irish» parish the community has. and language, are too centrallyin the grain beep available to 'those who desired to of a people to change rapidly. come part of it, eitherbecause of intermar- riage with Catholics of other nationalback- Whatever the future holds in store for grounds or because of changes in habits of the chinco-Americans of New England,their language; many have availed themselves of 'eighty years' long experiment in survival in this opportunity in the past. Two newRo- the midst of h.society and culture askinetic man Catholic parisheshave been established as that of theUUnited States is no inconsider- able letimony to the vitality andstaying in the last few years that have carefully 4 avoidedidentificationwithoneethnic powlfenotre heritage. h group. A RomanCatholic college tlas been ,

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Notes

1., See particularly J.-C. Falardeau,d.,Essais sur Large Cities(Washington, D.C., 1943), a special le Quebec contemporain(QuebePresses Uni- study tabulating a 5 per cent sample of the versitaices Laval, 1953). 1940 census returns, regarded by census offi- cials as accurate within 10 per dent of the fig- 2.NotreVie franco-americaine, i iifesto adop- ures of the complete returns. tedat- the Franco-American tennialcel- ebration held at Worcester, Mass., May 28-9, 5. The Author's study of this community isre- 1949 (Boston, 19449), 8. portedin The Franco-Americans in Nashua, New Hampshire: An Experiment in Survival, 3. L. E Truesdell,The Canadian Born in the Unit- unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Harvard Univer- ed slates(New Haven: Yale University Press, sity, 1951. 1943), Table 32, 83. 6.The F nch Parish and Survivance Nine- 4. The estimates in this paragraph are basedon teenthentury New England, Catholic Histori- data given inSixteenth Census, 1940: Popula- cal Review, vol.XXXV1, no. 2 (July 1950), 176. tion, Nativity and Parentage of the White Popu- latiob, Mother Tongue, by Nativity, Parentage, _7. Wade,The French Parish, 185. Country of Origin and Age, for States and

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%;. '156 Tamara K. Hpreven's article in the Spring,)975 issue of Labor History squarely confronted the superficial judgements of those who, havebeen too quick to categorize urbanized Franco-American laborers- asI( passive., Hareven djnonstratesthat the French in New England were not the docilard passiveemp'loyees that-They were most often pictured to be. Not only were hiring andplacement done alo9ng*inship and ethnic lines, but also kinship and ethnic solidaritystrehgthentil the worker's ability to control and slow down the work process during perickls ofincreased pressure for efficiency and maxima/ization of production. The article emphasize ,s theresourcefulness and initiative of the ethnic,groups in responding to, the pres§ureq ofindustrial life. Would that we hal mbre studies of the quality of this onel The product of original research in thefiles of the company and of interviewswith the former emplo9ees, it is intrmed ioy aire grasp of industrial history andsociology. Would also that we makemoreuse the

. . FrancoAmerican oral tradition! .

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4 'to THE LABORERS O MANCHESTER, NEW HAMPSHIRE, 1912-1922: THE ROLE OF THE FAMILY AND ETHNICITY IN AtJUSTMENT TO INDUSTRIAL- LIFE.- ft by Tamara K. Hariven I The ex!ent to which industrial laborers ing the-system 'to lit their wants and tradi- were able to control their working conditiolts tions. A first-rateexample of these processes and livingrnvironment is one of the central isthe experience of the laborers of the Amos- issues. of labor history. In recentyears, his- keag Mills in Manchester, New Hampshire.' torians have reversed prevailing conceptions of workers' passivity and entrapment in the Once the world's largest textile mill, with industrial systems, and have emphasized, in- an average of.. twelve to fourteen thousand stead, the resourcefulness and initiative In Workers a year, the Amoskeag Corporation workers' responses to the pressures of ef- controlled two-thirds of Manchester's labor ficiency and to the hazards of industrial life. f6rce dtiring the first two decades of the These departures from the traditional views ,twentieth century. Founded in 1831 by the have been reinforced by theoretical revisions Boston Associates on the model of Lowell, .of prevailing theories of social breakdoWn. tht Amoskeag Millsand the city around Migratidn is now being interpretedas a con: them belonged to the group of planned tex- tinueus process of the transmission of culture, tile communities designed to prove the moral rather than as a course of disintegration. and educational merits of the new indtistrial Modernization cea*.g to be seenas a linear order. For the entire subsequent century, proCess by which immigrant peasants, pushed Manchester was controlled. by the paternal- through 'a tube, emerge as «modern» individ- istic policies pf the corporation that devel- uals on the other end: It becomes, instead,a oped it. At a time when the original Ideals 9f ,.process of interaction by which pre-industrial planned New England textile townswere lieople bring theirown. cultural traditions to Waning in Lowell, Lawrence, and other sister bear upon the system which «modernizes» communities,the, Amoskeag Corporation them.' not only Continued the tradition of paternal- ism, but actually refined and modernized it.

This new historical outlook- presepts A new employee welfare program was intro- workers and immigrants as active agents, who duced by the corporation in 1;910 and lasted despite the presence of powerful andeco- until 1922, when it was largely wiped out by nomic institutions exercised controlsover the first major strike In the 'Amoskeag Cont- the, forces that tended to regiment them. In- pony -s history.3 stead of being submerged and absorbed,\ newcomers to industrial society tended to I Like the textile companies upon which shape the system to fit theii own needs and It was patterned,' the.Amoskeag Corporation subtly exercised a collective streit4th in their fecruited its early labor, force among rural adaptatioi to industrial conditions, modify- New Englanders. From the 1850s on, immi-

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P TABLE NUMBER OF EMPLOYEES ON PAYROLL, AMOSKEAG OCTOBER 1st, 1915, WI I0 IIAD BEEN IN THE COMPANY'SCONTINUOUS EMPLOYMENT FOR SPECIFIED PERIODS

Time Period Total Male Total Femalecfifti Total p Under 3 months 674 678 1352 3-6 months 493 536 10529 6-9 months 415 463 878 9-12 months 164 196 360 1-2years 1502 -1395 2897 2-3 years 1 118 996 2114 3-5 yeats 4 1078 1035 2113 5-7 years 548 469 ,101,7 7-10 years 238 229 467 10-15 years 337 200 537 15-20 years 247. (114 361 Ov.er 20 years '535 )245 780 Total Employees: - 7349 6556 13,905 Source: Amoskeag Corporation,Length of Employment of Persons Who Left the Service During the Year Ending December 31, 1915. grants from England,Scotland and new immigrant workersin the beginning of began to replace !lathe workers. In the 1860s., the twentieth century, the corporation em- following the textile industry's discovery of barked on a series of programs intended to the French-Canadians as the most «industri- modernize the system of production by in- ous» and «docile» labor force, theAthoskeag troducing. an efficiency plan, and by provid- Corpoiation embarked on the syStematic re- ing a welfare program ,aimed at socializing cruitment of French-Canadian laborers. By the workers into a permanent industriallabor 1900 they constituted more thanone-third force. The efficiency system was intended to of the labor force in the mill. While French .counteract the informal policiesin hiring Canadian migrate continued through the and firing, and to centralize the personnel first two decades of jhe-twentieth century, policies.Directed primarily against labor the corporation was also absorbing small turnover,the new personnelregistration numbers of Germans and Swedes, followed system, was to demonstrate tothe workers by increasing ,numbers_ of Polish and Greek that they were being Meld under close surveil% inimigrants. In .1911, French-Canadians con- lance. At the same time, the corporation was stituted 37.6% of the labor force, native hoping to determine, from careful research Americans (many of whom were of Irish and in the individual personnel records,which Scotch descent) constituted 18.6%, the Irish immigrant group was most reliable and per-, 14.7%, the P6les 10.8%, and the Greeks.8%. sistent in it) industriousness sand.discipline, By 1923 the number of French-Canadian and to concentiate the corporation'shiring workers had' increased to 46% of the labor policies in that direction. During the period force.4 1911. to 1929, the corporationkepi regular c9mputalions of the labor force composition In response to7the growing numbers of ,f of eachwork room, charted graphs of labor

167 159 turnover, and analyzed the age and sex struc- gradually curtailed its labor force (hiring the ture of the working populations. Although it I . From 1929 ,untilits shutdown in seems that even More embarking on these 1935 the corvration operated on a rump studies, the corporation had settled on the labor force, fluctuating front one-fourth tm French-Canadians as its first choice. one-fifth of its original payroll. This change drastically changed the relationship which The welfare measures, introduced sunlit- had prevailed between the workers and the tanemAly with the efficiency program, inclu- corporation in the earlier period-.6 ded a home ownership plan, superannuation for a limited number of workers, establish- During the years preceding the strikes ment of a Textile Club and a Textile School, however, the workers had exercised care tl and a playground and dental care program resistance in the routine of daily work, at d for the mothers. In the short run, manage- had brought their owto traditions and pri- ment hoped that tqfse programs would de- mary group affiliations to bear on their rela- velop, among the miorkers, a sense of loyalty, tionships with the corporation. The three and identification/with the corporatign as major areas in which the workers continu- well as socialize: them to the requirements of ously exercised control were job mobility, industrial work. The long-range intentions of family regulation of hiring and joh place- the prograiil, were to shape apermanent labor ment, and job control. force by attracting willing workers to the 4 corporation and by reaching their children as Job mobility was one of the most impor- a potentialsecond generation of textile tant instruments by which the workers exer- .workers.Far from 1,.),elng unique, the welfare cised choices and tried to maintain control and efficiency programs were typical of a over their own careers. Despite all of the variety of similar early twentieth-century corporation's efforts to tie them clown to experimentsinAmerican ,industryalong their jobs, workers succeeded in maintaining these lines. this flexibility through World War I, or as long as the labor shortage in the :city pre- Both programs virtually came town end vailed. Throughout the first decade of the willthe, nine month long strike in 1922. twentieth century, the company recognized 4 Vestiges of the efficiency program persisted laboturnover .is its severest problem. While however, iii the continued function of the skilled workers.such as loom fixers; and semi- tv 1,, , , Employment Office which maintained the skilled work rs such as weavers and spinners, employee files, and remnants of ,commaniled' AA rates of persistence on the the welre program, surviveld in the retire- job, laborers in other occupations were con- ment plaq .which, provided for the superan- stantly showing dizzying rates of turnover. nuation of a limited number of aged workers. A systematic analysis of employee turnover, on which the corporation liad embarked in Although many of the patterns in the 1914, revealed that in order 4o maintain a worker's behavior during the first two dec- labor force of 13,700; it had to hire at least adesof Oils century persisted after the strike, 24,0,00:workers. Of course, q comparison there was one significant missing variable in with the Ford Automobile Company, where the laborers' relationship with the corpora-. it was necessary at. this time fro hire 60,000 tionafter1922:... the availability, of jobs. workers in order to maintain t2,000 the Untler ate pressures of a declining market Amoskeag Corporation's rates of turnover . and growing competition from the Southern were not as dramatic as they appeared to be textile industry, the Anioskeag Corporation at first. Hoyver, from the perspective of 4 "V

the corporation the continuous turnover im- 19/2 and the careful registration of entry posed a constant need for new labor recruit- and departure of each worker, listing their ment, and. undermined the efficiency of the reasons and grading their conduct, did not workrooms.7 _.-succeed in curbing employee turnover, at it least before World War I. As additiOnal em- Indeed short-term mobility was the most ployment opportunities were opening up in characteristic feature of the Workers.; career the city after 1910, particularly in the she e patterns in Manchester. Admittedly the Ma- industry, workers' dependency on the Amo jority of workersPoleft the corporation keag Corporation was further w akened: did so only on a temporary basis. In addition to reasons of job mobility, illness, old age, or §eparation f mill was not identi- death:the corporation registered a broad as- cal, however, tmigration' from the sortment of workers' excuses for their tem- city. Even where it occurred, departure from porary departures from the mill. Altogether the city was hot habitually terminal. Because about -thirty percent to one-half of the of limited data available, most migration workers employed each year were 'coming studiesof nineteenth-century*population and gojqg periocatty. The seasonal pattern haVe treated outmigration as a terminal pro- in the workers' pr cessions in and out of the cess.9 ReConstruction of the careers of the mill,g significantr an understanding of the Amoskeag Corporation's workers, on the flexibility in therelationship with the cor- other hand, shows that most job separations poration. Wome worked until the birth of a that would have been interpreted normally child, stopped fora out,a year, and returned as terminal were actually temporary. Workers to work until the birth of the next child. left the city frequently for several months at Men left for hunting and fishing in the ap- a time, and sometimes for several years, but propriate seasons. Teenagers of both-sexes eventually returned. "During. their vglAtnce

Je drifted from job to job or alternated between they were in Quebec to settle 'family affairs school .and the mills. Entire familieweht to or went on to searchfor better imployment visit relatives in Canada. One-thitd of the in Rhode Island, Maineior.,sMassachusetts. workers were leaving, however, for reasons The. fluidity of the labor force can be under- which reflected their unwillingness or inabil- stood by the fact that the French-cardians, ity to adjust to industrial pressures. «Too who comprised about one-half ofthecom- much noise,» «too much dust,» «work too pany's workek still considered themselves hard,» «did not dike overseer,*was too"' «temporary,* even after ten or more years tired,» were freltiettly cited by the workers Of residence in the city.' as reasoils for :IeVing.,Most of these work were found 4,,.;- 44010on the job, or The certainty that they would be rehired another job e?.,.*.mill several months or a when they chose to return gave the workers yearlater.8 e , , an unexpected degree' of flexiblityand

.44 0".' I choice. While their choices of other occupa- Gavel e shorljabor supply in the city, tions were ultimately reltricted by the city's the Amoskeag mills had tcOolerate the fickle- occuptitional structure, the presence ness of the labor force 'and to readmit these of relatives outside of Manchester extended who had leftlor insufficient reasons. Even the opportunities to other French-Canadian those who habeen dismissed for disciplin- communities in New England. Personnel ary reasons stealing cloth, fortmamplewere turnover in the Amoskeag mills was thus rehired shortly after their departure. The in- part of a larger pattern of migration through troduction of the Employment Office in a series of industrial New England towns.

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Kin hnd family functioned asconveyor fording them partial control over the hiring belts in the migration process, thusencour- system and job placement. Laborers contin- aging mobility through-otheindustrialcom- ued to obtain jobs- directly from theoverseers munities. A French-Canadian resident of even after the introduction of the Employ- Manchester could move thrbugh Danielson, ment Office. Despite the corporation's em- Connecticut;Woonsocket, Rhode Island; ployment of 14,000 workers or more eacli Brunswick, Maine; Fall River and Lowell, year duringits peak production periods, Massachusetts; and back to Manchester,or hiring practices were still personal and infor- could-settle in any o' ne of these communities mal. Overseers hired and fired the workers in with the assistance of kinsmenor former their own rooms, as they had traditionally townspeople who-Were already there." done since the 1830s. The major difference introduced, by the Employment Officewas The corporation tried tp curb labor force more efficient bookkeeping. Confirmation of fluidity by making the city attractive to live thetraditionalsystemmeantthatthe in, by providing company housing that has workers' preferential access to jobs was de- been generally acclaimed by government in- termined by their direct connections with spectors and urban critics as the finestcor- the overseers. poration-owned housing in New England, fiend by developing programs that emphasized ..Hiring and job placement were frequent- seniority and permanence suchas the home lx carried out along kin and ethnic lines. owners plan which cancelled mnortages after Workers belonging to the same ethnicgroups five and ten years, work with the corporation as the overseers, enjoyed'preferential hieing. and the superannuation plan, whichwas re- French-Canadians began to develop such stricted to long-term workers.' 2 controls during the first decade of the twen- tieth century, despite the fact that onlya - These measures were generally more ef- sprinkle of French-Canadian overseers and fective in advertising the mills to prospective second hands began to appear in the mills workers abroad, than in tying down theones cotton departments. Polish and Greek immi- arready Jiving injlie city. Withthe exception grants never achieved the same type of entry of the rental of corporation housing,propor- that the earlier, groups had developed. Al- tionally few immigrant, workers partjaipated though the Poles became the third largest in the welfare and recr=eational programsor group of Amoskea 'workers during the in -the activities of the Textile Club. The second decade of th. wentieth century, not most important advantage that the company one Polish overseer was to be found in t grudgingly offered themwas work when entire mill. they wanted it and the freedom to leave without forfeiting their chances folobtaili- This hiring and placement along kinship ing a job upon return. (Itwas precisely be- and ethnic. lines was functional bit. the la- cause of these factors that French-Canadian borers as well as for the corporation, be- workers resented the entry ofnew Polish cause the system placed The workers in the and Greek immigrants who lacked thesame role of recruitment agents. At the same time, flexibility and who showed stronger signs of it enabled them to influence their own place- dependency on the mills.) ment, and-their choice of department even among those ethnic groups whose members A series of subtle, informally-structured were not represented among. the overseers., relationships with the overseers increased thl The character of a departmentwas basically French-Canadian workers' flexibility by af- determined by its overseer, and a work room

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-frequentlycontaining one hundred or overseers or second hands tobe well-versed more workers-was stillidentified as «Mr. in the functional terminologies of at least Smith's room,» rather than as «upper weave one immigrantlanguage, and the manage- room number 2.» The overseer was the man ment begun to issue all itsdirectiVes to the in charge of production, management,disci-"' Workers in several languages. phut' and distribution of pay slips in an en- tire work room. He was normally assisted by Job control through slow-downs thus be- «second hands» and foremen, and exercised came an importantfactor in the workers' a great deal of autonomy withinhis own manipulation of their environment. Entire work room. In the Amoskeag mills the over- work-rooms tended to slow down during seers were the pillars of thecorporation's disagreements with an overseer. Delivery paternalism. ''The workers knew very well men were oftenslow in appearing with sup- who among the overseers wa ho certa(ii depatinents, and the mes- was tough, who boregrudgewho was par- Auger boys who had beenspecifically intro- tialtogirls, and gel ra.11y ho harbored duced, by management as a new time-saving . what" prejt Worikrkcotial hus exercise ce,in order to prevent the overseers and some choice as whose njom, they -would .tendhandsfrom running back and forth I work .in. ,The informal network was particn to pick up orders orpayr011s-ended up as larly significant 10-hellOring-then;' place .thijr informal guides fot incoming workers who wives, and young.Uts anddatighters inioref were trying to find their way around the partments whre stex- millyard. These messengers, who were also ploited or .c tthe intended to act as interpreters fornew immi- I900s,_ work\ niv.Aa4iequently domi grant workers, became* expertadvisors on nated bye isgout,Certain rooliP the different shortcuts a worker-could fol- weleNkeferred as the olish» or the low in dealing vith the corporation. ,v «French» roor, rather titan by their opera- tional desigations.Wtfere there was more This does not mean, however, that.job Hu onenationalityiwi0, the labor force controls were always exercised by members- as often se giated by' its Own choice into of the kin group or ethnic groupregardless r-ettrnic clustenot unlike the sub- groups in of skill. It would besimplistiCto assume that . a otit-riiont s toolhouse. workers functioned as a homogeneousforce. The lines of division were not merelybe- tine and family solidarity strengthened tween workers and managemetit.Nor were workers' abilityto control andlow all slow-downs directed simply againstthe ,filie work process during periods of in- corporation. The checks and balancesoften creiseSressure forv. efficiency and maximil- occurred between different groups of workers ization of produCtion. Immigrant workers among themselvesskill versus unskilled,

-created' their own «mill language; and ont- males versus , females (and vice versa), old- AIN each other as well as the native Amer- timers against newcomers, and oneethnic ican overseers. Ignorance of English was also group against another. frequently used as an excuse for disregarding orders orvenstru'ctions. T dismissal of cer- %mom fixers were in a position to control tain workers on the grounds thatthey did the work pace of weavers by refusing to re- not understand English did not stopothers spond immediately to theirretitlests. Many from using languages an excuse for their workers recall pleading with glaz)%* loom slow-down, errors or disagreements. In cer- Fixers, and the loss of precious time and con- tamAlt? departmentsit *came essential for sequentloss of pay in piece rates while

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waiting for a loom to be fixed.Loom fixers complaints against overseers. «In making often took liberties with the4omen, se- insulted lection of operatives to be laid off, Ifollow them, and stirred up conflictamong differen,t the same method I always have, the survival workers by favoringsome and letting others of the fittest,» declared wait. Weavers one weave room were also dependent on the overseer, who over a period of thirty battery hands, a years less skilled occupation, had w.orket1 his way up froma sweeping boy whose pace of replacing empty bObbinsde- to overseer. The company's grievance and termined the speed of production of cloth. adjustaiefft'committeeconsisting ofcorpor- `114111/4- The second hands or overseer could thus ser- Iation and workers'mgriesentatives, uplie14, iously jeopardize,a weaver'swork by attach- his principles and turned down the ing to his section demands an inefficient battery band. of 'a young weaver to be rehired.' 4 The pace of burlers,allof whom:.were women, depended onthe speedby which Workers, in their effortsto ret0 their the perchers deli'Vered therolls of newly own work habits and trations, reflect on woven cloth from the weaveroom. Favori- two important resources: lily and kinship tism determined who received whatrollthe ties, and more frequent the defects to be repaired, the lower, 'the outpui and therefore the lower . l'ilalnilyconnections served not onlyas piece-rate pay _1 3 useful corveyors of jobs and housing. Within certain limits tite family,group controlled As the corporation O was forced to acceler- important decisions at toamong whS ong its ate its rate of production,after World War I, meinlietts worldbe working whelid where, the workers found it increasinglydifficult.to. atthat age sons and daughters willttldenter face the staggering demands forspeed. In- the- milk, the -particttia'r department they Creasing numbers of vv rkerswere found. wthird be joining, theamount of pay they «walking about,» hiding inlavatories and wonid be obligated to plotiti back intothe smoking cigarette's, or walking out complete- family's resources. Members ofone family ly because Work was «tOo tiring»or «too were often threaded through a variety of jobs fast.» Several days rater, these people reap- -in the same work-room. Childllkod,friends, peared in the room from which theyhad ju cousins, and neighbors worked in the able been dismissed, or in another department. room for years. Many' worker s met -their spouses in the mill and continued to work This mobility rapidly diminished 4, in the ae,- after their marriage. In times ofcrisis post-World 'War 1 years, iii thecompany sys- andsunemploynent, the -kingroup was an tematically..curtailed prodpction andaccord- , in important snrce Of assistance,,and reinforce- Wegain layingoff Workers. After 1918, ment,thusmowingits nembers flexibility workers could no longer affordto go back in their persistenceon the job which they rth between jobs. Overseerscaught in otherwise could not Afford. By makingdeci- aliiInd between management'sRemands for Mow over the workcareer lnd migration of daily quotas and workers' resistance to speed- its members within the-limits of thesystem,- upgot rid of «slow* workers. Overseers who the family. could thiteconSiol tosome. extent earlier had symbolized benevolentpaternal- the influx and tlersistence i;orthe labodrs in ism, and who had 4erved as criticalintegrat- the mill,' 5 ingagents, 'lbw beekme identified with the new oppressiveness of thesystem. The:Oev-, Ethnic identification re inforced kinship apce files of the Amoskeag Corporation for tiEsas sources of resilience and control. ,the period 1922-193Sare full of workers Ethnicity provided the major organizational

dre V..te 172 I te4 I

,I X fraesvOrk for workers' adjustment,tothe when two of their group werelaid off; the working. Fist pr .ssures of thefactory labor and city life. other ethnic gropps continued Th etlyc grow) offered thecultural heri- fights broke out in the SouthSide .when Greeks began moving into aformerly solid tag ,the commonality of ,langnage,residen- tial cohesion,entertainment in clubs and Irish neighborho94. Each group ofimmigrant bars: religious ties, and ni t i Ibenefit asso- workers accused the others ofbeing ,«clan- ciations. Most of the wornd a good part , nish.» The Poles and French-Canadians,in of the residential patternswere organized particular, carried on theirquarrels in the around the laborers' ethnicbackgrounds. work rooms. Tightknit clusters of ethnic residential areas in Manchester in the 1880s and The corporation was ambivalentin its re- *appearedcontinued thereafter. The Frenchsettled sponse to the workers'ethnic identalcation. labor. force, on the WestSide, the Poles in a downtown In its efforts to create a loyal neighborhood removed from the millsand management tried to compete withthe func- associations. The the Greeks gradually replacedthe Irish in tlw tions of familial and ethnic 4uth Side;` each group developed its' own Amoskeag Textile Club, aCorporation-initi- palidies, clubs, and grocery stores in the ated organization, was partlyintended to ethnic neighborhood) 6 draw workers away from their own

a. organization°. Through its entire period of Ethnic enclaves developed even inthe existence the majority of theclub's members corporation housing. Although these flats wereskille t! workers of native American ori- had to be secured throughindividual family gin, primarily- overseers andsecond hands. applicatipns, residents _managed tocluster The club succeeded in enrollingfetry immi- along ethnic lines in the samemanner in grant workers. Most ofthem continued to with rely: which they succeeded in aligningthemselves find their recreation in card games in the work-rooms. Officially,applications tiveror in the ethnicclues (which were male for residence in corporationhousing had to institutions.)' 8 .0 be submitted long in advance, and workers had to wait their turn. Inrealitierriends and It would/be simplistic, however, .to argue relatives notified prospelttive tenantsof va- that the corporation oRposedthe workers'- tied to homogenize cancies; managed to secure those flats ethnicity and that it ahead of their turn throughthe help of Aim. The relationship was far, more com- acquaintances in the office. Sons offormer plex. The corporation toleratedthe linguistic workers recall the invisible butclearly rein- diversity of its'laborers. Ratherthan forcing forced boundaries.,between their own gangs, workers to speak English,itencouraged which were organized along nationalitylines :overseers to learnPolish, French.or Greek. It traditional immi- in the corporationtenements.' 7 allowed the celebration of grant holidays, encouragedparades in native In the experience of Manchester'slabor- costumes, and endowedimmigrant churches. ers, ethnic solidarityoften superseded work- ingllass solidarity and at times ran at cross- The ambivalence in thecorporation's workers' ethnicity was purposesc, Conflictbetween different immi- stance toward the of early grant groups was not uncommonin the mills symptOmatic of the general attitude and and in the city. The first Greekshad stones twentieth-century industrial enterprises thrown on their heads from' abovethe entry': of contemporary Progressivereformers. On gate to the mills by workersof other nation- the one hand, theyencouraged ethnic diver- alities. Only Greek workers went onstrike sity as a means of counteractinglion so%

1 165

(lathy-. On the other hand, they tendedto bank ffoni which it had(Aginated.21 keep ethnic activities tinder control for fear that foreign affiliations would breed radical- For many workers the strike marked the ism and IWW activity. While the corporation end of their careers with the corporation. developed competing institutions with the Despite managemenes commitment not to workers' reference groups, it also recognized discriminate in rehiring workers who had the strength of the familial and ethnic tradi- participated in the strike; the «X» for strike tions of its workers, and utilized theseas a participation showed up frequently in for- means of increasing its control." mer strikers' files. Many of these were not rehired.Othersleftvoluntarily andstill The collective strength which the workei? others were put on the corporation's labor drew from their familiaLties and 'cultures at reserve _list. «Things were never the same times provided a substitute for industrial after the strike» reminisced retired overseers, unions. Prior to 1918, the United Textile workers, clergymen, and corporation clerks. Workers Union did not manage to achieve The strike not only destroyed the chalices even a foothold iii Manchester. Restricted in- for the development of a viable union itially to the skilled trades (i.e., loom fixers, Manchester, it Aso undermined the workers weavers, and spinners) the union \did not opportunities to retain the flexibility end make inroads into the semi-skilled occupa- choices available to them in the pre-strike tions until after World War 1. While the 1912 foeriod.22 strike was raging in Lawrence, the Amoskeag Corporation's workers attempted to hold This essay's emphasis on the workers' several meetings in sympathy with the Law- strength, and autonomy could be easily ideal- rence strikers, but these were obstructed by ized into an exaggerated reversal of the older the Manchester police. Following these 'at- view of industrial entrament. The controls tempts, families of the Amoskeag Corpora- which the workers exercised- -within the in- tion's laborers took care of forty children. of dustrialsystem,however, functioned is the Lawrence strikers, and subsequently held double-edged swords. The sources of the a mass meeting in Hanover Square. At the workers' strength were also inevitably sources same time, however, investigators who sur-' of weakness end vulnerability. The freedom veyed the -tenements, saloons, and work- to leave one's job in search for better oppor- , reported reassuringly to the manage- tunities did not result in upward mobility.23 - _ n ent about the workers' complacency and The circuitous`route usually brought workers: dependency on the coiporation.20 back to. their former job .intile mill. The price they paid for their temporary sojourns After World War I the narrowing of em- was in having to accept whatever vacancy ployment opportunities, the increasedlires- there was upon their return, to adjust to sure for speed in production, and the reduc- another occupation within the mill, and to tion of wages eroded the flexibilities in the another overseer. system and deprived them %fa the opportu- nity to control their work relations, workers The strength Which the amily wielded in begantoresort to Union pressures and placing its members in the mill carried its strikes. Yet during the sitike of 1922, many own built-in preciiriousness. An overseer's workers were either ambivalent about the favoritism towards certain 'families could strike or against it, and they took seriously easily change upon' his disagreement with the prophecy of the corporation's treasurer one family, and could subsequently affect all that Manchester would return to the sand- members. The dependency of a large family

174 et,

3 166 and kin-group on a single employer frequently chances to control the world they worked placed the family on the poverty line.It in. The continuous entailment of tie labor meant that during layoffs and strikes, the en- force and the subsequent strike tended to tire family, or most of its members, was un- limit employment opportunities and to un- employed. Thesituation was painfully dram- dermine the fle,xibility which the workers atized during the agonizing nine months of had previously exercised. The dramatic dif- the strike of 1922. Finally, intense ethnic ference between the two periods is expressed group identification and conflict between in the reasons for separation. Before the differentgroups weakenedworking-class strike, about two-:thirds of all separations solidarity. were voluntary. With thecontinuous decline of the textile industry in the-north and the The relationship between the workers curtailment of production in the Amoskeag and the corporation was one of mutual inter- mills after 1922, most separations were dis- action. The degree of cooperation or with- missals or lay o ffs (.1 drawal depended on a variety of (pctors for each: the corporation's strategies were gov- The Manchester study sho conclusively erned by labor force scarcity through World worker moving fron meindustrial War I, and by the necessity to compete for backgrounds into a new industrial -system the labor supply with the shoe industry in were not suddenly strippedof their former the city, and with other New England indus- habits and traditions and that traditional kin .4 trial towns, as well as by the pace of pro- and family groups did not break down under duction in the mill in response to the demands the pressure ot migration. The laborers of Manchester transferred their traditional cus- of the market. The response of the workers, A on the other hand, depended onindividual toms and institutions into the industrial sys- and family economic considerations, on their tem, and drew on their respective cultural career expectations, on alternativeemploy- ties as sources of continuity. At the same, ment opportunities available, on their work time, they were not «urban villagers.» They .habits, on demographic patterns (marriage; continuously modified their cultural heritage fertility, death); on the shifting margin be- to fit newconditions.25 tween cultural resources. The socialization into «industrial» apd The workers in their interaction with the ourban>s life that Manchester's laborers ex' corporation, varied in the style and intensity perienced was neither linear nor terminal. Older traditions of language, work and kin- of their response. TAtley were purposeful in certain situations,nd accomodationist or, ship perisited and carried over into the new desperate in others. Their response differed experience. Workers did not simply accept significantly depending on their ethnic origin, new conditions and new values.They strug- level of skill, family ties, age, and sex. New gledto shape the industrial environment arrivals had lesser flexibility available to which they confronted and to modify it in a them than workers who had already estab- manlier that would facilitate their own com- lished ties and developed connections. Ad7 patibility with the new conditions. justment wao more difficult forthe Poles than for the French-Canadians, and still The experience of the laborers of Man- more difficult for the Greekswho followed chester contributes to a further understand- later. The narrowing and final disappearance ing of the relationship. between working -class of opportunityinthe periodfollowing and ethnic behavior in itidustrial communi- World .War I further reduced the 4orkers' ties. Paradoxically; the corporation's efforts

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to assimilate worke,rs and to control their be- chester, the «wOrkitrg-class culture»can be havior resulted in the formatioo ofa stronger shown to be an 'adaptation of ethnic be-. working-class identity. Turnover on the job, havior, which was continuously revitalized family control of hiring, and job control through the influx of new immigrants. through kinship ties were all manifestations of working-class behavior, but this behavior Indeed,far, from being 110mOgeneous, had its roots in the ethnic and cultural back- the «working-class» itself was madeup of ground of the various groups of workers, and diverse elements, which were harmonious in was subsequently shaped by the common certain aspects of their- interaction and in industrial experience. In .th\case of Man- conflict in others.

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a 176 168

Notes

1. For crucial revisions of traditional working-class John Armstrong,Factory Under the _Elms historiography, see E. P. Thompson,The Making (Cambridge, Mass., 1968); Vera Shlakman,Eco-_ of the English Working Class(New York, 1963); noinic History of a Factory Town, Chicopee, Herbert Gutman, «Work, Culture and' Society Mass. (New York, 1935). On the significance of in Industrializing America, 1819-1918,»Amer- the architectural design of the Amoskeag Mills .., ican Historical Review,LXXVII (June, 1973), and on its relationship to corporate paternalism 531-88; David Montgomery,Beyond Equality: and control of the city, see Randolph Langen- Labor and the Radical Republicans, 1862-1%2 bach, «An Epic in Urban Design,»Harvard Bul- (New York, 1967) and «Immigrant Workers letinApril 15, 1968, 18 -28; ASense of Place, A and Scientific sManagement,» forthcomingin Sense of Time,forthcoming 1976, Augustus Immigrants' inIndustry: Proc'eeliings of the Kelley publishers..On the strike sec Creamer and Conference at the Eleutherian Mills,to be pub- Coulter, 175-81, and Amoskeag Manufacturing lished Summer 1975, Uniihrrsity of Virginia Company,History of the Amoskeag Strike Press. On recent working-class historiography During theYear1922(Manchester, N. H., 1924). On paternalism and efficiency in Ameri- see Paul Faler, «Working-ClassHistoriography,» - Radical America,III (March:April, 1969) 56 -68, industry, see Gerd Korman,Industrialize- and Robert H. Zieger, «Workers and Scholars: 6.4;,' LI /Mgr keaendmAilwmaetrikiceaenizta9t6i7).: The Recent Trends in American Labor Historiogra- Milwaukee Labor History,XIII (Spring,1972), phy,» of 245-66. 4. 'On the laborers of Manchester in the contelt other' textile communities, seeReport on the 2. The Manchester data is based on preliminary Condition of Women and Child Wage-Earners in findings from an analysis of reconstituted career the United States, vol. 1,U. S. Senate Document and family patterns of a fample 2,000 industrial No. 65, 61st Congress, 2nd Session, (Washing- laborers, representing different ethnic grOups in 'ton, D.C., 1901). On the importanceof French- Manchester, New Hampshire, 1910-1940. The Canadians in the textile industry and on their unique feature of this study is the availability migration to New Hampshire, see Ralph Vicero, of a set of individual employee files which the The Immigration of French-Canadiatis to New Amoskeag Corporation's Employment Bbreau England, 1840-1900(unpublished Ph.D disser- had kept for each worker over his entire caree tation, University of Wisconsin, 1968). The combinations of these records with vital records, corporation records, tenement rental 5. The corporation's welfare program isamply il- contracts, and city directories allow the recon- lustrated in theAmoskeag Bulletin, vols.I-IV struction of work careers, family cycles, as well (1912-1918), the publication which advertised as the reconstruction ofkinship networks,out- and. described all aspects of the program and side the household. The quantitative data was the various activities of the workers. corroborated by one hundred oral history inter- views which were gathered fOr this project dur- 6. On: tine decline of the corporation and thefluc- ing the years 1973 and 1974. Any study'of lusting employment patterns, sre-Creamer and Manchester is much' indebted to an incisive Coulter, 265-311. study of the Amoskeag Mills: 'Daniel Creamer. and Charles W. Coulter,Labor and the Shutdown 7. See tabre..In 1914, the Amoskeag Corporation of the Alhoskeag Textile Mills,Waits Projects was one of severalindustrial establishments Administration, National Research Project,. Re; subject to a compariti y of labor turn- bor Statistics. See Paul ti port No. L-5 (Philadelphia, 1939). over by the Bureau o F. Brissenden andmil Frankel,Turnover in 3. On classic planned New England textile towns, Industry: A Sta istica/ Analysis(New York, see Caroline F. Ware,The Early New England 922), 176. Cotton Manufacture(New Ylbrfc, 1931)r, John Coolidge,Mill and Mansion(New York, 1942); 8. These reasons for leaving are baste on a compu-

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7 y 177 5'

'1"%oafthir 169

union of a sample of 2,000 cases dravfn from 16. On ethnicity and residential cohesion,see Her -. the individual employee files of the Amoskeag' bert Gans,The Urban Villagers(Glencoe, 111., Corporation. 1962); Gerald D. Smiles,The Social Order of the Slum: Ethnicity and Territory in the Inner 9, Stephan Thernstrom and Peter Knights, «Men City(Chicago, 1968). For a comparative' exper- in Motion,» in Tamara K. Hareven, ed.,Anony- ienceIn a textile community, see Donald B. mous Americans(New York, 1971). Cole,Immigrant City(Cambridge, Mass.,) 957), and Marc Friel,The'World of the Urban Work- 10. This data is derived from tabulations of the ing Class(Cam ridge, Mass., 1973). «reasons for leaving» in the individuaremploy- ee files prior to 1922. Compare with reasons for 17. Based on oral history interviews and onapre- departure computed by Creamer and Coulter liminary Asurvey of the residential' clustering #1 (265-84) for the period 1923-1935. thecorpYration'stenementsandboardfng houses by Tamara K. Hareven and Randolph 11. This judgement is based onan analysis of em- Ltingenbach.- For comparison, see two signifi- ployee files and various interviews with former cant studies of the social space of the urban- Amoskettg Corporation employees. working class; Pierre Chombard de Lauwe, Vie Ouotidienne des-Familles Ouvrieres(Paris, 12. «The housing of the mill workers in Manches- 1956) and Andre Misibel, oLa Famine Urbaine. q, N.11, for example, was of a far superior et la parefite en France,» in Reuben Hill. and wro &e Lewis Mumfo.rdin The City in Rene Konig,Families in East and West: Social- History(New York, 1936),03. ization Process arid Kinship Tiei(Paris, 1970), 410 -441. 13. This information is based on interviews andon an extensivefile of reports gathered by the 18. Club membership lists were published regularly Amoskeag Corporation's Grievances and Ad- in theA'moskeag Bulletin.On sex segregation in , justment Committee. On job control in the .",etlinic and worki.ng=class institutikins, see HeE- textile and other industries, see. Montgomery., bat Gans,The Urban Villagers(Now York, «Immigrant Workers and' Scientific Manage- 1962), and Elizabeth BRit,Family and. Social ment.» Network(London,1957)1.

14. Amoskeag Manufacturing Company, «Adjust-, 19. See Samuel Haber,Efficiency and Uplift;Scien; anent Files, 1818-1935.» tific Management in the Progressive Era, 1890- 1920(Chicago, 1964). 15. These generalizations are based on oral history .41 interviews of 100 .for.mer employees ofthe 20. The sympathy meetings were recorded In the Amoskeag Mills, which will be published by Amoskeag Corporation's diary of «Happenings,» Pantheon Books, 1977, and on a computerized February2, 1912 and February 24, 1912. analysis of workers' kinship clusters in the (Copies of these reports are in the possession of Ambskeag Mills in general, and in certain wo the authtt.) See also Samuel Yellen,American rooms specifically, as well as °than analysito .Labor Struggles(New York, 1936.) marriage records of all French-Canadians Inhe sample. For a detailed discussion see-Tamara K. 21. Numerous workers remembered the«sand: Hareven, Family Time and Industrial Time: bank» threat when inteiviewfd for this project. The Interaction BetIkeen the Family and Work Most of them date the end of the Amoskeag we. in a Planned Corporatiog-Town: 1910-1924,» Mills in 1922 rather than 1935,ren when their Journal of Urba'n,History,I (May, 1975). Fur- records showed that they Were still in the cor- %, ther, see also Neil 'Srnelser,Simla! Change and poration ) employ after 1922. - the Industrial' Revolution(Chicago, 1959). I1 is important AO eememberAhat the situation was 22. This is based on a comparison of Gres er and different in non-textile commnities. See Mar-. Coulter'scalculation (265-84) of ert ployee garet F. Byington, «The Fhity in a Typical turnover after 1922 wita rough coriapVtation Mill*Town,» American Journal of Sociology, of theilfasons for leavingawiffrom the sample XIV (Maielt, 1909,), 648-59. of employee files utilizedthis project: ,

178 ) 4

23. This is very much reinforced by Stephan Them: 25, Herbert Gutman has already made this point strom's conclusion about the realitypf.Oceupa- eloquently by emphasizing the transfer of pre- tiOnal mobility jrt American society. See,The induit.rial customs igto the industrial. system.. Other Bostoniefis)(Cambridge, Mass., 1973), The Manchester data shows how this transfer 45-75. was made, and what the role of the family was in this process. Sec Gutman, «Work, Cluture, 24. See Creamer and. -Coulter,Shutdown,265-84. and Sodety ....»

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Laurence trench's chapter on the Franco-American working -classfamily from the book -Ethnic FaMilies in America: Patterns and Variations (C.H. Mindel and R.W. Hab- ensteln, editors; Elsevier, New York, 1976) Is a description of the author's own working- class Milieu, shaped by his sociological perspective, and set in the context of sociological studies of Quebec. Although the material taken from Canadian 'sources (especially that which refers to history) may seem questionable, and in spite of the apparent lack of sup- ', portibg apparatus for this docuMent as a piece of thorough ethno-methodological re- search, this article is nevertheless a substantial contribution to .the sparse literature on therntajor Institutions of Franco- American life.

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v.- A

THE FRANCO-AERICAN WORKING CLA FAMILY

by Lauroceus. French 4

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A Professor Laurence French has written INTRODUCTION an analysis of the Franco-Ameiican . lt-1. that follows the «eritical sociology» ap- The French-Canadians have Liad alo-ng proach. Since parts are perhaps controversial tenure in the New World #n4 currently share we are happy topr.' henit his scholarly and minoritystatusin :rt .orth _American research c>ederitkds. countries;-Canada-and ilkerica. The French- 'A Canadians are unique for severil reasons. et, «I an of French- Canadian descent,» First,they have retainedtheir minority - A. writes Professor French, «and was born and status for i!sarty 400 yeas* andsecond they mixed in FreniALCanadian mill towns, I lived have donemais.,without taiT21. any v1ible seventeen years in Suncook, New 'Hrupshire, radiak orAfsical stigma. My who have 0 (Saint John the .134tilst Parish). Ourifamily,, siadied therend' Canadians wquld argue wqs a typical working class one with both,. that the Main reascon, for the'minority stains is due more to internal res tance than parents working, in the. Mills. We had. nine p Children during a thirteen year span and my to externalhostilities. The. univetial. presence mother left scIfool:at 12, Which was qqite ,of -the cat,hoilic..eltireh in French-Canadian common then, and my father never flnishea 'culture is more thawfustlah sfdded consul ra- high school. Ill fact, I wqs the first in my& tion.r ytp tended family netivor k'to finish high school, z . , and thls,was .against their wishes. I left in -'re selection looks at the Vrenph- 195 9 to Join the Marine Corps and, when I Canadia.as an ethnic entity, traci its tra- returned eight years lath I was now'a collfte di'tional ture 'historically thro both s(udent. For the next siic years (1966-72) I Canada an ew england. The -fily -and, lived, visited antrworked timing the French-, the parish(French-Canadian Canadians aipait of an ethrromethological the most important aspects research cif my people., ,This took /e to both.. ditiowil and contemporary ad Canada' and ether Northern New England culture. One type of fang;cif the communities: Sherbrooke, Coaticook, SA working class mill workers is focused'ution. Marie,. Quebec City and the Gaspe in Canada Gtanted not all Fiench Canadians 011 intp - as well as milltori;ts In northern Massachu- this eategpry, but it is these peOple nonethe- setts, New Hampshire, Maine and Vermont» less who seem most regpotrible Mt the cot1- .f..,

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tinuation of the traditional French-Canadian$ situationsthlif French - Canadian frily ,. 4 culture among t! numerous mill towns and social life have emerged. scattered throughonorthern New England. A -.. The major attributes that distingm the French-Canadiiins as a minority group are: .HISTORICAL BACKGROUND (I) They have the longest ,tenure of any .. Caucasian minority group in the NewWorld; Tile French In the New World, (2) They hold minority status in twocoun- Unlike mostthittority ..groups La the triesin the New World, Canada and America; United States], the French-Canadians' initially and (3) -The-communicat4m channels with' settledNoin Canada, and it is there they first the -mother country (Canada) are still strong. established their minority status. In this re- The general historical backgroundlitecial- spect Feach - Canadianculture in' America ly important in that it provides th _name- actually effects a sub-subculture in thatthe work on which the French-Canadian fat ily Canadial French ire themselves A subculture style emerged. . of iseventeenth-andeighteenth-century

1 fcrance.; Relevant- parallel developutena in- The faiinly is the basic econotk and both-: Freitch4. subcultures lai be 'discussed .socializing unit, while the parish is tlM.elig-

4 ions and civil community in which thefam- since open lines of communication and influ- . , ence' contiutie -to facilitate the cultural -de- --ily functions. Tlie original French in Canada ?pment and Identity of 'Ffencit-Cattadians. .were' affiliated with theisatling companies, , ...

) I Ali countries. ,..'0 which more or less isolated them from -the

l' 1 r "41 'S ''' .1s ^, influence of the European industrial revolu- his enabled them to retain the medi- S1: The French-taliadians representlittique tip, minority in that"theidullural-heritage in-the eval and feual life style they broiight- with New Worlet equals that.of the English domi- 'diem totileNew Workli The, quasi-feudal- -rant grtoup. A Yreiich colbny, Frahce, , et ierged in colonial Cantirda was was established in eastern Canada in 1534, A pattern after the agrarip family 'csYstfiti in -. yearbefth the p ask landed at Fratice and 'consisted of: (t) government Ply south and two ce ries priofto Amer-' A'offiCials; (2) landlords ?seigneurs): (3) the ,_ canndependenceOne plight ask why they -priesthood (cure); id(4) :- thepeasants

ast;ihed a Minority status in both _ flahitants).. aai Canada lindAmerica - when most other . 4, . t Caucasian ethnic Itro have overcome this ewars ngland duringthe stigma, integrating into 41larger dominant , eightentircentiry greet altered the status ar culture. The'answer.-, perxinth, = French Colonies in the New World. question tests .in part OdiAltoreligifS thls urn had an effect on thelife style of 1 -and.titO4e of the domiiiinf PriVestantethnie,, sera-ed on the, 1 This, copied with the un'usual circurnstances ,-American continent: C3 treaty of. siktrouiidiug the transfer of French Canada Utrecht ended the Wat,,okthe Spanish Sue-. frout Trench to 'British.tOn. trol, accounts for cession, granting England iiVipi:Itint colonies I theunique- phenomenon concerning the 'that were previously owned by,france (to Ft*ach-Canadian's minority status.'Relevint bedothe ova ".Scidia, Newfoundland, and tt (.1 to these circumstances are numerous histor- the Iludsoit flity teiritoryr A "COrtisequente ical occurrenc6"that 'fkiieesoliditied. and .this treaty was-tile.; dispersion. of the polarized the two'kultures (t'renc'h and Aclidian .French, .who' previously populated glish). It. is in the conlext of thesefunique .1110\areas.,And in 1:755 the English author- r 4. . t

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,.. . / . ities finally expelled the remaining Ncadians spoke English,. were Protestant, andlevel- . - (some 7,000) fro411, ova Scotia. Thekatholic oileda -progressivt industrializedsociety.- Church refers to this Meldt as (kocie of the What resulted was a column fication and cul- greatest crimes-against civi izationAtiown in tural lag between the Frenchajority and the the annals of America» 411yrne, 18r).Ac- ruling British goyernment. This -situationis cording to churchsources families were sep- 4 reflected in FrenchCanadians' dissati/faction arated in the ,most cruel manner, andmany over their 'political impotence,. which began i were forced.. to 'migrate to the French ter+ .in the early 1700s and continuestoday. tory in. America, later known agt'he aoui4 ana 'Territory», winle Others fl7d to the 13 Local autonomy *as established, holm*" , colonie4s. Only 506 etscaxed removal, illegally' ever,Alitnthe. Treaty of Paris temporarily re'giding irir'-their,tiit 'Alan homeINd. The united orth ,Ainerica underthe'British hostility en the French a Eiglighf---- flag. The British authoriMs, facedwith reached sacntensity at thisile.,le that a gro,wing unrest in the 13 coittnies,gave up an k, Ajor Milan ifloccurreil - throughout the 13 early attempt toassimilateFrench-Can- , cAoesonesm duri ig. the years 17155-66 in an at- .,. adians. Instead, they established the Quebrc --, -tempt to rid the colonies of French-Canadians. Act- of1774.,recognizing the filajor instiM- /NO . , tiohs QA:.tl the French- speaking conimun ty, In 176.), the Treaty ofit ed the especially the chura and the French Ian- Seven Years :War,more comm .known as guage. .By doing . such, the efforts of the ((ie.-. ThiS'fecument rebelling colonies to ally tile French:Can- provided for French cession to England of , adians to their-use failed. Again, in .1791, Camada and all the territory east of the Mis- -.the Canada Actwasenacted to divide Can- t, sissipiiiRiver. After ,t1trdefeat of 1760, a for bett9r}epresentationby ethnicback- .Frentili government offici66 left for France, Lind. Vet, by 1834,4be French-Canadians, the leadership role to We Catholic! compromising-.three- quartet's :leaving.. of thetotal Church, The-French outnumbereittlie Britishfs population, still held less than one-qUarter of to one (70,000 French-Canadians and Only the public'offices.,In 1837 a series of small- s:000 British) at this tine,forcing the British scale. revolts the staged' by the French- lo-delegate French-Canadiancontrol to the Canadians in Oaction to the Ex-Quebec CttriiolicOkurch. With the deplirture of both Act, which advocated forcible assimilation.J vernmentofficials andfjpanse neurs TheAEx-Quebec At attacked the Catholic and hers), fr .thq Catholic elip ch cnvep- ,Church indirectly by outlawing theuse of at! filled the dnsuiig power vusUThis thetrenclf language and cnrtallinPthep . endowed the, CalhoisChurch. withoth Ojai edupition systein.-This act atsbenco sacred and secular poelsa sitiatiovIclosely aged Migration to other -areas of Canada in resembli4 that of,rndieval FrInce. With ties an attempttodispersethe French and a 4pi of'conimunicatio ered with France andar weaken their solidarity. in 1.040 the Union 4 lack biBritish ccern, the French-Canadian s: Bill,wfiichestablished "ta Provinceof continued tol.maintain-their traditional pre- - Canya, proved- to be the main vehicle. of industrial life spife. ;forced .0+) 4 In 1867, thif - British / s")4 orth :American Act created the' Dominion .From the beginning,- conflict en*rgeda- of Canada. This, act uced some of the ...1. ,tween the normative': values of these two. hats ness of 'the Icx-Iffekc. Act by. . recog- -Canadian groups.The _French - Canadians Ohrinig the. French la,nguagand allowed elich spoke' Frenth, were Catholict, and belonged province certain powers of its own, suchas toan . . agtariiiii,fconcimisystent.TheBritish edirtional control.-- . ,--- 'N) 00 a ;ts...

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Migration- to A l'nerica The French-Canadian family systemin Cali,' and Meanwhile,during andihimediately ada was, and still is, predominantly large after the CiVil War, the textile industry's patriarchal, constituting a strong,influence rapid growth in New England provided the on the rolesof theindividual members. When impetus for French-Canadian immigration to the French-Canadians came to NewEngland America. kn the mid - nineteenthentury to work in the factories,they di,d not origi- hundreds of mills were built along New Eng- nallyintehd.. to make the host state their Jand's many rivers. The Civil War, low status permanent residence. Their mainintent was with plans associatedwith millr work, and westward, that of ecodlimic exploitation 'migration caused a shortage of indigenous eventually to return to Callada. Theirinitial New England during laborers. The mill owners desired a readily . purpose was to work in available,' docile,easilycontn.tlled,low- ""lhe Canadian depression in an attemptto salarietl :work force,Southetn Blacks, Filip- alleviate the economic strain ontheir fain- Many did not plan , Altos, and other «minority» groups weAl ' flies left in Canada. While under consideration, but initial cost of trans- to remain, only la per centreturned to Can- portation and sensitive _racial issues made ada. The peak influx of theFrench-Canadi- theke4groupt4essa desirable to'the mill owners ans into NewEngland was. the decade 1890- than the CaucasianFrenclt-Canadians. The 1900. The rate dropped off thereafter,and French-Canadians metalltheideal, pre- in1930, during our own Depression,the requisites, yrpile remaining racially invisible. border was closed. IIP

The French-Canadians' ethnocentricity The motive for migrating was economic, . .. for in Canada the French-Canadians' tradi- in New England wv strong.While they tried tional ialues and mores kept them out of 'to retain their total etlintbackground, they commercial and industrial activities, and at succeeded only 7 ocacing a subculture the same time, their owneconomic system apart from their flierCanadian,culture. One reason forikis occurrence wasthat the of farming, lumbering, and trapping began to .. decline. The large stem 'family could no ethnic 'code was supported bythree diverse longer absorb and support the excess labor classes of people with different motivations: force ushered in by the deprAion of 1873. (I) the priesthohd; (2) the businessmen, and laborers. Th,eNew.England textile industry's man- (3) the bulk Qf the French-Canadian experience in power needsseined at the time to offer the The clergy knew from previous best solution to this crisis. The French-Cana- Canada that when the French identity ir as- dians proved be an ideal labor source, separalted from the etitholicChurch,Yhe with their large available work force, their people were prone t,(,)reject Catholicism. A as willingness to work for low wages, and the case, in point was theVrencli-Canadianywho es. relativelyshort distance necessary ,t,omi- led migrateil to Canada's western prof The businessmen, on the *hilied, Osttlsed grate, The French-Canadians prpved W be v. It They* docilelaborers,submissivetoauthority, ethnic unity because it,04 0.ofitable. with ,families,following `tradition,often virtually held aitionopoki5n the business in Nvr.o5king together in the mills. the French-Canadignghetto communities in the mill towns. Most of the businessmensent :v The French-Canadians' migration and their children back to Canada fortheir edu- thed4elop-ment ofa new Franco-American cation so they. woulklerf roperl ;posed to subculture had an adverse effect onboth the and supportive' of the Que .Con- prevail{\ig Qudbec jnd New Englandcultures. sequtly,' because they tended to. gain from

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4 the situation, the French-Canadiiin business ated in towns and cities, andsome 80 per group as a whole supported the church's cent of the French-Canadians migratedto doctrine advottcating cultural separatism.The urban areas in New England. Thepeople third group, the mass of the French-Cana- who retained their old traditionswere those dianlaborers and millhands, nourished -who kept their old occupations, suchas nostalgicties with their mothercountry farmers and lumberjacks. Thus, it' is ironic throng,' frequentcontact with relatives and that the French-Canadians should beone of friends from Quebec and (until 1930)by the last groups of Western Europeanheritage contact with the renewed supply of immi- to be exposed to industrialism, capitillism, grants front and urbanization. Afterall,itwas the French who initially influenced therest of Ethnic identificationwas also kept alive the world with theirown capitalistic. and byvarious organizations and institutions' democratic ideas. that were established to provide forthe needs ,of the immigrants. The organizations .TIT Early French Family in North Arneriea took the form -cif, mutual-aid corporations Extended families combining into small and ethnic activities such as.kdrama clubsidvv. parish communities provided the nucleusof credit unions. The first .,French-Canadian fel; an early French-Canadian society, whichtO a in America,for example, was largeextentstillexistsin rural Quebec established in Manchester, New Hampshire, province and in the Gaspe Peninsula. These in 1107. The Frenchnewspaper was another families consisted of the rulinfkatriarch, his medium by which eithnic unitywas 'pre- immediate family of procreation, andthose served. The majorinstitution promoting of his married sons. In this .respect theearly edibleidentificationwas.the'Catholic French:Canadian extended familywas both Churchwithitsparishes and .parochial patriarchal sand patrilocal-. Not only did theo row schools. The church was thelfeical- point_ of eldest male dominate the family, butmar- all .dirganizations, and the priestimd influ- ried sons were expected to take up' residence ence in both religions and secular matters. with their fathers. The patriarchs, inturn, Many organizationswereestablishedin weanswerable to theparish priest and the

conjunction with the local-parish, since the*priest to the bishop. , church's approval oftendetermined their success or failure. French-Canadian parOthialf Alkeneral characteristicof, these.exten- education was and still, is closely related witht .ded farOilies'*as their large -Constituent fain- the Catholic Church. Most parishes provided procreation. tncenti'es were provided at least primary4chool facilitiesjheput by, the Freneh*Lrown to stimulatelarge fam- pose of the parochial 4hbol -has been to ilies; thus strongly supporting toteCatholic educate the children 'within the conteaeof JoetrinesNegardingprocreation and pro).- the ethnic culture, hence ptovidinga major wing a strong culturalslue that still pefsiy,s - vehicle for die preserving and perpetutting angling. French-Canadians. Women were sent 'of that culture. *IP from France-to _become the wives of lettlers, while incentive bount were allott4males In spite of numerous attemptsto pre- who married prior to lie 16. Speca Com- servetheFrench-Canadianculture,the sensations were given familieS with 10or sOltem has undergonechange. The old rural more children, and,. au coritraire, patr,laichs family system was threatened, by the mech- who failed to marry off their childrenat anisms of rational capitalist enterprise and prescribed ages were fined. economic organization. The millswere situ- cv

178

The parish community, which its noted transferred to the next eldest male, while the was comprised _of .extended _families, ap- moral leadership of the,. clan remained_ en- poached an autonomous socioeconomic trefichedinthepatriarch'swife.Daily unit. In such a commonity. the priest, not prayers and coniyulsory;churchattendance the landlord,, became the center of coip- helped weld the family into a sacred unit. munity life, and the church pervadedall Mores and folkways providedeffective in- the aspects of French-Canadianlife from birth formal modes of -control both within to death: Miner ( 1967 :91)writes: family and the largerparish community. Marriages were aritnged with the plryineK The philosophy of this religionisin- of dowries and were closely controlled so grained in the, people from .childhood. tot to- disrupt/the ctommunitybalance. The Emulation of the socially powerful.indi- church, in tot, exerted considerablecontrol viduals in the community+ means the over the family not onlymorally but econ- acceptance of c&tholic" ideologyand omically. The upkeep of the parish waspaid behavior patterns. All -methods of or- by a yearly dime or tithe bywhich- every ienting the child in the society are em- twenty-sixth minot of grain belonged tothe ployedto develop in him emotional 'church. attachment to thivarticular set of be- liefs: Lack of cont t with persons of Righ--odupational, political, and social oth6r convictions and the relative -lack :.- . of functional problems In the mode of aspiiltions were not emphasized. Sons took living mean that the particular native on the occupationof their fathers, suchlas The belief is seldom questioned. farming, loggingt trapping, or fishing. women and childrenheld subservient posi- Religious ritu came an indispen- tions in the family scheme. Inahierarchy of sable part of comm y and familylife. controlnd doininance within the'parish records were kept b the parish priests,and commuy,'Ilie priest ranIrd highest, the all decisions' awaited their approval.Until extende familypatriarc isecond,his married sons next, while womenand child- British rule the only tailks the peasantspaid , were tithings to thechurch. Religion and ren ranked last,playing submissive, subord-. education were inseparable. The onlyformal ink, roles. The Catholic Churchitself/pro- . education (primary school) was andstill is vidtd the highest aspirations for therienoli-. parochial. In shOrt, the church bothdefined Canadians. Nearly *very faingyetad atNisi and providedthe French-Canadians with onemember in the charch,-occupyingOw their social, cultural, and normative systems. of prst,.. brother, oMM.. IIthis . - I led strenetlioi. the interrela ss And: he , ish compuni But. Thee family providedthereat' basis 61_ autosoiIL; ()aril '0-rayedubser- rural life in the parish* Owearly extended .even ..'rile'churtir drnied Isunilyall members, regardless of sexydud 'vient rol.141u9sioe'sisiers eithei age, shared in the'family .enterprise. The\ftServitude roles forAt4 priest of rothekiaor is. females. did the 'Spliming,Weaving, knitting, `taught -, in The parish 'parochial .41 4. sewing,- cooking46fd-servliii:of Meals, wash- a Frqn-co-t' ing, gardening, milking,sand housekeeping,-'. Mill -Town Subculture -of .Ea#y p 4- if. .1; while the males tended the farm.All profit, \Americans ' 'he gration of F:end)aitadiansio whether it be capital gabit ormat$rial olf .,- jects, was received and-4ndled bythe fain- Nevit' Eng,. hd Mtd a tremendoits itiflueixe .4ratd but on taib.: ily patriarch. When witriarch died, the net Only on itio,r who management of the familyholdings 'Irts life styte4pf their doontrfinenWho', remaine#,:"..4 , ...... ' a . . . fir ft ..

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in French Canada. Theopen American-. THE MODERN FRANOO-AMERICAN Canadian border from the1860s to -1930 FAMILY allowedculturaldisseminationnotonly from Canada to New Englandbut also vice Once the French-Canadian ininiigra,tion versa. The areas most resistant to. these in- to America began,an interestingsocial Iluences were the small farmparishes along Olrenomebon occurred that altered-the life the lower St. Lawrence, bothin Quebec pro: style of French-Canadian fomiliesin both vince and in the Gaspe. bi the rest of French countries. The new family/structurecreated Canada there was a trend toward urbaniza- in the New England, millcommunities soon tion and industrialization,which eventually had a reverse effecton the life style of replaced the archaic agrarian life style. The FrenchCanada,providingimpetusfor new Franco-American life style 6ecamethe Quebec province to industrializeand urban- focal point of social change among French- ize, something the British Canadianshad Canadians. By the Same token .it provided a_ triedin vain to initiate for decadeS.The new French-Canadian subculture. The mill Irony of this situation is thatthe lines of ghettos -became autonomous social units, communication between Franco-Americans bringing with them their. own parish priest, an& French-Canadianswere better estab, and while the migrants did succeed in retain- d than were those betweenthe dom- ing a distinct ethnic identity, their life style nant British Canadians' culture and thesub- nevertheless changed considefably. The new ordinate French-Canadians. Whathas emer- economic life style, the 4 exposure to other ed isa dual F IL-Canadian subculture types of social institutions, and therelatively alo_ R rural-urba s, with similar charac- higher standard of living alteredthe French- terist in each su -culture in both countries. Canadian's social system suchthat it even- tually emerged into a distinct New England, The older, rural subculture stillexists Franco-American subculture. virtually unchanged inthe farm parishes along both.banks of the St. Lawrence,while In the early Ftanco-American fvmily;, in northern New England (Vermont,New I French was still the primarylanguag but Hampilire, and Maine) Franco-American , contrary to the Canadiansituation English farmeg and -*kers stillmaintain a _rural was often learned as a second language. evisience. Today, however,the rural F Education stillconsted of -primaryparo- Canadians represent .a distinct mino'ty of .chialeducation provied by the church:The the French population in both area . It it priest and church stillad a strong influence, estimated that less thana quarter ofthe but the patriarkles dominancediminished as residents of both Quebecprovince and the extended family -often broke into con- nbrthern New England reside in ruralareas. jugal tn& andno longer remained patri- The major differencein the population local. The male head of theconjugal but composition between the twoareas is that in usually large family became the dominant Quebec 90 per cent' of the populationis figure, while women'and children still played French-Canadian, while it is estimatedthat subservient roles and often spentlong hours -approximately 30,to 40 per cept of northern in the millsghemselves: New England's populationis of French- Canadian descent. In southern New Englandt the proportion' is somewhatsmaller, con-

111 prising 45 to 20 per cent of the Obpulation. Most of the Frenoh-Canadianpopulation, in both areas, reside in Urban,industrialized 0 . .

da. --. 0 .

4vot, 4. p* I. 180 settings. This does not necessarilyimply the dominant Socioeconomicrole is ascribed eelatively small mill to the father, whilethe role of socialization large urban settings, for unlike towns with populationsvarying from 2,000 Agent is left to the mother. However, into this category. Interest- the normative conjugal familymodel, which to 10,000 fail milts, the Franco- ingly_enough, northern New England,which ,portrays small family A generation is considered to be an industrialized area,has American family is often large. ago it was not uncommonfor there to be 10 nocities. with, apopulation' exceeding in members within a Franco-Americanfamily 100,000. Itis the French family, living to be de- industrialareasin both unit. Currently, family sizes seem thesemill-town be attributed Canada and New England that representsthe creasing. This phenomenon can that has totrying economic ,conditionsand -new new French-Canadian subculture laws emerged within the last hundred yearsand child-labor and minimum-educational economic thatremains the focus of thischapter. that place excessive children as. liabilities.Nevertheless, children seek to help S ocial claracteristics. now to be dis- the family economy, oftenleaving school employment, and cussed (family structure,educition, occupa- early as possible, seeking until. they tion, social and physical mobility,and com- contributing to the household their own munity organization)refer tothose Franco- themselves marry and set up American ghetto mill communitiesthrough- family unit. This systemfunctions because out New England thathave physically and of the unique socialization processand kin- culturally insulated themselves,effectively shipstructureofthe Franco-American resisting. outside influences. The. commun- family. Franco-Americans, liketheir French- ities most susceptible to thislife style are Canadian dou4ins,establishcomplex pri- those, that have managed torentin both mary relationshipswithin their parish com- French Catholicism and theFrench-Cana- munities, Whereby reciprocalfamily, kin- still supercede dian language while at the sametime remain- ship, and religious obligations in! ing isolated from divergentcultures. the individual's self-interest. This phenomenonis beV explained Family Structure French-Canadian kin- Today'sFranco-Americanfamilyis within the context of although strong ship. Piddington (1971)*notedthat French- basically a conjugal unit, closely re- intergenerational kinship ties are maihtained.' Canadian kinship patterns more 'than they do The family hierarchy of socialpositio nd semble those of folk cultures responsibilities still focuses on the«earthly Westernsocieties. The French-Canadians, kin, coupled trinity» analogy, whereby thefather, like have a wide range of priority prescribed social God, dominates, controls, andprotects the with a large number of °family interests, while the mother's role, like relationshipwhile in most Wfttern*ocieties Virgin Mary, is to be compas- the priority of kin are fewer; mostbeing that of the family unit. sionate to the family whileremaining sub- restricted to the closed conjugal is distingpished ' ordinateandlubinissive to the* father. Her The French,Canadian family specific role is to moral support for as a discreteresidential and economic unit the family.. T e _religious auraencompassing through its constellaticin of kinshiprelation- the networks and binding he family,together through the ships. And through these ,kinship Qiebec and New use of daily ritualis analogous tothesbinding ,parish communities in both interparish '-. , .- 'England are closely linked. The ,.effect.of the4(holy -sliirit.3, ' -,-- , linkage serves to _provide,acceptable mates e In. the franco-American-family moJ and dbes . much to roffsetthe disruptive ..,

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effects of migration. It also provides facili- taboos, imposed by both the Franco-Aar: ties for social contacts and economicoppor- leans and the dominanteulture. Catholicism, tunity. From. the standpoint of religious especially FreneWCamidian Catholicism, has

organization, the kinship network has long traditionallyoppoied . interreligiousmar- been the handmaiden of a French- Canadian riages. On the other hand, Protestant Yan- Catholicismthathas managedtoeasily kees are opposed to marriages with Franco! transcend Onernaticnial boundaries in the Kmeric:ms on the grounds thatit would maintenance of its Quebec and New England lower one's social status. Franco-Americans parishes. are also opposed to most types of interracial N marriages,theexception being between Male dominance in Or Franco-AmericanFrench-CanadianandAmericanIndians, 5 family and community is readily evident in since'intermarriagebetweenthesetwo both Canada and New England. Family -krotipshasexistedforover 400 years. status and identity is transferred through the male lineage. Informal nicknames, passed .Premaritalsexual 'behaviorlikewise &wit from father to son for generations, plays an important part in the mate selec- play an important role in the preservation of tion process. It is prevalent among trench family status, while at thesame time pro- Canadians in both New England and Quebec viding 'a secure identity for the male child. and seems to provide one of the few outlets ,Females assume their husbands' status upon to an otherwise restrictive French- Canadian marriage. In this fashion, family andcom- life style. Illicit sexual behavior, officially munity status is preserved through the male condemned by the Catholic Church, has lineage. Even childrOn bornout of wedlock, nevertheless emerged as a somewhat expect- trace their sus anidentity to, the bio- able mode of behavior in Freneji- Canadian logicalfatheri identityis known. communities in both conntries. And,as matched marriages decrease in popularity, Early marriages are commonamong the mate selection among French-Canadians will Franco-Americans mainly because they lack becoMe more 'contingent on chance and the restraints their Canadian 'retativesem-,, correspond more closely to the prevailing ploy, such as matched marriages and dowries. American patterns! The absence of these,. controls and the church's- continued opposition to birthcon- The substantial incidence of premarital trol have produced a situationamong I* sex without the safeguards of birth control lower-classFranco-Aefiericanfamiliesin make illegitimacy a common threat. to- the which pregnancy is often the determining working-class French-Canadian community. criterion for a decision to Amy. Accord- .However, the situation fft usually handled ingly, early marriag 7-while frequent,are _withou much, conflict-. Both abortions and not met with any niceable reaction from adOpti'Snsare frowned upon, soinkmost the Franco-American. Community otl'ter than cases the unwed mother keeps her child, and mild: token resistance from the 'Catholic if she later marries, the child 'is generally Chad]. Nevertheless,the practice does con- accepted, taking an.unheralded place in the tribute to the negative stigma of the ethnic new family. ilntil she findsa spouse, the girl) 'held by the dominant Yankee culture.. participating conjugal family units,/cont- Slid fosters further resistanceto interaction . prising the unwed' mother's larger' extended and eventual assimilation of the two groups.. family, help the mother and childsecure a The impact of such \resistance manifests positioninthe ..community. Their aidis itself in. interreligious litid ethnic marriage subtle, so that the unwed mother and her

1"` 182

41; child may appeartobe a self-sufficing their everyday life and relative, cbrtimunity autonomous social unit, thus improving her status., chances at marriag. The same holds"' true when a divorce occurs. Deprived , of her Peer Grouping husband's status, the estranged wife must Another interesting and relevant attri- revert to her family lineage fot social sup- bute of the Franco-American family structure port and identity. isalso shared by their Canadian relatives, that of like-sex peer-group-association.These When a couple marries, the new con- relationships are fostered early in the pri- jugal family unit seeks to establish its own mary family tellingand endure into adult- neolocal household. Quite often the family hood. Itis Atkin these peer-group associ- residesin an partment. 'that belongs to ations thatmales and females encounter either thehusbind'sor wife's lineal each other, with the success of the relation- When this situation-occurs, it is preferable to :- ship often being dependent on the approval reside with the husband's lineage (patrilocal) ofeitherpartiCipant'speer group. The rather than. the wife's ,(natrilotal), since female, once married., Most likely forsakes (. living with _the wife's relaitive implies depen her peer-group interests for that ofher new dency on the wife by the husband. Franco- marital role: The male, liowever, continues American communities consist physically of his peer-group membership all throughhis mostly tenements and private homes. A adult life,' with peer-gioup interests often su- perseding those of his immediate family. family t n generillx starts in a rented ;Wart- 14nt, ithall e4ble familymembiers Membership clubs, licensed. +serve-hard wine, consist of nu- work* aid saving so that, if successful, quor as well as beer and they later will be able to buy their own merous ethnic and nationalorganizations, in- 'eluding the Knights of Columbus, and Ameri- tenement to live in and rent or to purchase a . private home. can Legion, and t eVeterans of Foieign. Wars. These drinkin ablishmetits are the central the The tenements are old, plain, 'two- or social meeting place for the adult nialeS in three-story wood-frame units, housing from Franco-American commu.nity. Many men fre- quent these establishments daily in a more or 4 to 12 families. These were popularhOtising units for previous Franco-Aiherican getter- lessritualistic,Rattern.Inthe *Met iitions beclose they provided a convenient months the clubs and bars are filled with the 'residence for.. the entire&tendee-' family. seasonal construction workers who draw un- Large brick or wood apartmentComplexes, employment during the off season,pn week- the known as «cooperations,»stillpro *de end evenings coup socials highlight housing for theimmigrantFrench-CanaIan commit-44! weekly festivities. Consequent- Nmilies. Regardless of the nature of the ly,therelativelyautonomousFranco- Franco-American family residence, most are American community is ,organized to pro- adorned with religiotts objects,personifying vide two opposite I)ut complementarysocial the crucifix,childJesus, and the Virgin functions. The church,through its manifold Mary. HolyiWater receptacles; blessedpalms, social and religious activities, provides the picture's, and statues are -found in moralistic_ and ideological support for the komes. The most affluent fami.s *torn community 'members, :while the clubS and their lawns with larget statues, usually ofthe bars provide acceptable avenues of tensioji ftinctions seetp VirginMary. The function of religious and frustration release. Both crucial to-the main nce and preservation objects in Franco-American familiesis two-, fold, providing both religiouscontinuity to of the Franco-America VbcultUre.

/. 490 9

!Educations Americans findthemselves, for Mt" most As noted above, the French-Canadians part,relegatedtomarginal' occupational whooriginallyimmigratAtothe New roles. Englandmillcommunities brought with them their church and parochial educational The traditional occupation of, Franco- system. The French. Catholic Church,paro- American fimilies has been employment in chialschools,andtile.French-Canadian textile -mills. During the early 1950s; after language., all closely interrelated, provide the nearly a century of operation; the larger three most crucial cultural institutionsre- textileindustriesmovedSouth,- seeking sponsible for the preservation and perpetu- lower operational costs."' Shoe shops,. fiber- ation of the Franco-American subculture. glass and electronic industries, among others, Parochial schools,. although currently under replaced the departed textile- industriein considerableeconomicpressurein New the milownt throughout New England. In England, Still provide the basic' educational norther pew. .England (Maine, New Hamp- needs of the Canadian French in bothcoun- shire and Vermont)woodcutting and other tries.French-Canadians have traditionally lumber and pulp-related occupations provide been opposed tothe public educational employment for Franco-Americans. A thild system, viewing it as an instrument of the major source of employment provided dominant Protestant culture. Publicschools through seasonal construction Work related are viewed, in both countries, as really being to highway, bridge, and building construe- << Protestant schools.>> The French-Canadian tion. parochial educltional system, through the preservation ofits language. /culture, and The above-mentioned occupationsac= church doctrines, provides the Franco-Amer- 9nunt for the employment of the majority icNs withtheir .(strong senseof" ethno- oftheworking-classFfanco-Americans. centrism, which in tarn keeps theM isolated Other occupational specialtiesrange from from the larger. .dominant 'culture and tore- sniall-business proprietorstoprofessional - stalls 'assimilation. pccupations. Each Franco-American com- munity has its own small ethnic businesses: Occupation clothing and shoe stbres, smallgrocery and When theo'r'iginalFrench-Canadians variety stores, plys an ,array cif other small emigrated to New. England, theiroccupa- community enteirinises. Other Franco -Amer- tional status changed from that of peasant ican faMilies own ;add operate their Own farmers to factory laborers. The occupational dairy farms, truck gardens, or small-scale transformation was' succesiful due to the loggi pe eons. 'Professionals of F.,,inco, ininined degree of specialization and training Am nheritge, provide the necessary required for either occupational role. Corres- medica dental, lidlegal services for the pondingly, the low value placed on formal commu city. education provided socioeconomic situa- tion wherewherely the French-CanadiansWere The factories, seasonal construction, andr unprepared to occupy the mort specialized lumber-related industries are not high-paying and prestigious occupational roles available occupations,yetthey seem abundant in the commercial and ittrial economy. of enpughtoprovidethe Franco-American NeW England. Lacking necessary man- famaies with a somewhat stableand suffi-

agerial and techn61 skills, and having failed cient' source of economic support to sustain. to attain the educational prerequisites tv their life' style. Ironically, theareas of ninth- t. quired of these occufations,' the -Franco-. ern New England bordering Canada are those

91 I, 184-

with the highest rate of unet )loyment (at Within. the an system. A resultof this least a percentage point higherthithe states' situation, and in 'tticontributing to it, is Franco- average), andout-migrition of yo! adults. low-achievement motivation among ft This creates a fluctuating manpower srtage, Americans. In one such studythey ranked and subsequently bondedand visaed French- lowest among ethnic groups,with Blacks the being the -Only minority, groupbelow them Canadians have.to be imported to rectify 1 situation. They are needed on ayearly basis (Secord and Backman,1964:579): as cutters in theluniber industries and on a * for de- seasonal basis in the harvesting of apples.This That the most salient criterion, action requires permission fromthe U.S. De- termininghighsocialstatus among the partment oftLabor; and althoughextensive ef- Franca- Americans,thatis,C...1Mrch-related forts are made to recruit nativelaborers, each roles-,has littlerelevancetothe vertical year the effort seemsin vain..This fresh source social-occupational structure of the domi- of French-Canadian contactthrough the im nant culture and reinforce§and intensifiei ported laborers reinforces thecommunication the ecologicalboundarid surrounding the lines between the two Frenchsubcultures.; Franco American communities. As aresult, the Franco-American communities'evolved Social and .Physical Mobility into psychological ghettos that perpetuate Social and physical mobility or the lack the same values that restrict theirsocial And*. thereof reTlect the degree of internal co- physical mobility, consequentlythe assimila- hesionWithin Franco American working- ti;ni of heir members into the larger culture. ty class communities throughoutNewEngland. The selectivealocializationthat occurs among Both plienomelpre closely related tothe the faun!' s and institutions -within the con- high degree of thnocentrism andthe,resul- text of 1 heserotective ghetto gommunities «resistance within. > Social creates in its t embers both apsychological t mg process the com- mobility verticalmobility, that is, and sociologicill dependency op moving tough thevarious social strata that- munity for fulfillment of thebtc human instilling .be- comprisetljelarger -dominantculture. needs, whileWthe same time Physical mobility, -on the other ,hand, re- havioral pat ternS and; mannerismsthat! a& presents the degree ofout-migration from count for the negativeimage'vf theFraiico- the Fianco-American communities toother Americans in the eyes of the dominantcul- witlithe larger ; iinegratedcolitmilnities withinthe ture. As a result, encounters larger culture. As a consequenceof their culture are often viewed as being.neiitivistic basic value system_ Franco-Americans are and undesirable-and reinfv9e thedesirability restricted in both forms df mobility.As pre- of the Franco-American comtuttnity,whether tile_ franco-Aibericon it,;.11161he home community or, anadopted 4 erM viouglymentioned, socialization process curs through a co- one -oluntaryphysical, mobility among operative relgtionshibeteeen the Parish Working-class Franco-Americans ismostly church and the prithary familyesituation. restricted to movements- to 'otherFranco- Education is a quality thattacilitateS vertical American .communities or to co nimmitties-in social mobility in our society bypreparing, Canadainwhich re4ativesreside. When its 'members to enact occupationalroles that iiivoluntary\ohysicatmobilityoccurs, such as are highly valued., in themselves.It seems military tottOriptjon,man' iftulitt to the apparent that the !Ow level ofeducation relative' security. of theirtbome community, among the Franco-Aniericans canonly serve*, remaining- there for thedutatiod.sofheir and 'restricted toreitrict)wertical, soda! mobility as thy lives.Hence, lawsocial competeboth socially and .economical physical mobility amongFranco-Antericansf YI

`1, 9 2 a 1 0

41 185

results from, a unique. socialiotion process, relatives. The concern about children, which .that creates the member's community de- in its intensity is a. relatively -nemf-phenont- pendency while instilling those social charac- -enon, is associated with .the smaller Franco: teristicsthat make the Frarico-Americans 11merlian families and such other factors as visible, as a minority group. , pregnancy leaves from work and the ireaier 2, accessibility to modern. conveniences, such Family Life Cycle and Socialization' as laundromats, diaper services, and the like, C1111.1)110QD. The birth ofa child, since which permit more lime for the mother to h brings additional social and religious status nurtureher children. to both parents, is a significant factor within the working-class family. For the female, The preschodl child learns both French childbirth,especially with thefirstborn-, and English, withitsdiMinctivelEranco- signifies 'her rite de passage into adulthood. American accent, in the home during the And while both children of either sex are first six years. Preschool institutions such as welcomed, male children are more indulged. kindergarten, nursery schools, and the like by both parents. Flthers, as noted above, are rare occurrences among this group. Early n give their first-born son their nickname family socialization is supplemented by the

44.alo,ing.with the responsibility for continuing ;). churchactivities andinvolvements, with the male lineage 'and tradition. The result' most young children attending church with may well be rather heavy pressurei brought- their mothers on a weekly basis. In all NO, on the son toexcel in thesame activities as the high mass,,it is not' unusual to sO ;nu- the father, such as hockey, pool, street merous mothers holding infants in their arms fighting, and hunting. as well as all other preschool children attend- f ingchurch.School -agechildrenattend Pregnancy, alsoiscussed above,. o church by class and sit in a special section, up precipitates marriages between young coup- front accompanied by their teacher-nuns. 'les,.or when not folloWed by marriage, the 4 infaril is usually accepted by the girl's family. Franco-Americanchildrenlearn quite A third avangement is to have an unmarried early the 'norms of sex peer-group separa- couple !Re together withtheirchildren. tion.,The division is maintained even within After a number of years these arrangements the fimily selling, and early-founded peer become recognized as common-law marriages groupcontinue to Ire maintained during the subject to the same church and community school years. This wespecially the case expectations as are. church and civil mar- when the parochial school system flourished riages. in New England. The. nuns themselves rein- .z forced sexual separation in the classroom, Regardless of the father/mother relation- the girls sitting on one side and boys on the ship, 1E-a-child, in qrder to secure its appro- other.Similar seating arrangements were priate position in the hereafter, is baptized made for morning Mass, a compulsory daily assoonaspossible. Prebaptismal deaths activity in the parochial school system. Asso- bring great sorrow to Franco-Americans, ciated with the primary,educational process mainly pie to the belief that the infant's is the child's first communion, which is the soul will remain in :limbo and be denied first conscious formill activity for the child access to heaven. Considerable affect, atten- 'and a well-attended ceremony by family, tion, and liberties are showered on and made relatives, and friends highlight this activity. available to surviving children, especially by In fact, religious ceremonies such as baptism, the mother, grandmothers, and other female first communion, confraternity, and marriage

193 , r

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haveaseemiii.ilytar greater sigMficance mate selection. Female youth, however, rely than civil ceremonies such as convocations less on the influen0 of their peer group an4 graduation exercises.Allinall,the, (luring this. period than do their male.coun- working-class Franco-American child isal- terparts.Thefamily, school,and churOh.still lovied considerable latitude in.his or her be- play an important role for many Franco- havior within the family, with its patriarchal American girls; this is eviitetv(pu..;4ne thing overtones, and in most community settings. intheir' higher -educational achievementg. The church, notably through the parochial Yet the leniale peer group is an important school, on the other hand, is more file strict_ instrumentality for dating and for determii- -disciplinarian. ThesecOntravening behaviOral ing one's, social standing at this time. The expectations sometimes lead to conflict situ- main difference, then, lyween the male_and ations, but when this does occur, the person femile adolesCent peer -group structures is- in these days is more likely to reject the pro- that the former is somewhat more salient scriptions of the church. and enduring tWan the latter.

ADOLESCENCE AND YOUNG ADULT- Since it is not unusual for working-class 11001). Puberty, as a biological phenomenpnr Franco-Americans tomarry during their and confraternity, thePsocial recognition'IC14 teen, the male's occupational status is often puberty -through. a religious rite de passiikeA,ri.determined during this period. And%while_ highlight adolescence in the Franco - American so thefather's occupation is an important con- community.Simultaneously,the church, sideration, certain occupations are held to be family, and peel' group compete for the more prestigious than others. Ironworkers, youth's attention and devotion. The sex-peer truck drivers, machine operators, and con- groups becomeallthe more significant'. struction and mill foremen have consider-k during this period, especially for the males. ably more status than laborers or some Within 'them they find thentelves pressured white-collar /Yorkers. Th6 female's occupa- to live.up to their father's image: Family ex- tional status is less crucial since her para- pectations are more or less consonant with mount role is to raise the children and main- hum of the peer group. To atcommodate tain the househoia. Many Temales db work, these demands, the school and church often but sporadically, and the primary consider- become less crucial to the adolescent male. ation is her pay rather than the job itself. The days of complete integration of all local institutions and associations, if they ever The- youhg married couple often lives in existed, are apparently over. an apartment in a tenementowned by one of their relatives. Their children are indulged Dating as well as the establishment pf by the relative's on both sideS, again with. the socialibilitypatterns emerge duringthis first-born male child shown special attention. period.Although many Franco-American The young father continues to associate with youth have been drinking beer and smoking his peer group, spending considerable leisure cigarettes' for a few years, the social signifi- time with them. This is important since the cance of these activities becomes internal- peer group specifies and evaluateshis social, ized during adolescence. In fact, most activ- success. Ritpalistic drinking, card andpool ities, whether they be related to sports, re- playing, along with an avid interest in ,sports ligion, or 'social events (dating, drinking), are such as hockey, baseball, boxing, hunting?' closely tied' to the peer-group structure. In wrestling, and horse racing are all important this sense, then, he peer group and not the aspects of the lives of young, adults. family or church is the ultimqte influence in while most still attend church during _this

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period, itis more of a formality than it de: They helpit4rirchildren with ensolionaf Votion. Adolesdnt and young adult males concern and support but do not see the can be seen ,standing in the back of the wisdom or need ,for mortgaging their-Own, church during massthe last in and the first futuretoassure that of their offspring: out_ The female, in comparison, establishes i . 40 a new interaction networkx one based on her Old age, unlike in the larger dominant own and her husband's family and relatives, American society, brings considerable status as well as a new cluster of girl friends who on both the Franco-American male and fe- share a life situation similar to hers. male. If both grandparents survive, itis, the female who: has the higher status. Most soci , MIDDLE AND OLD AGE.As the male and religious events as wel,s Sunday-afte,r gets older, he comes, increasingly to incorpo- 4 mass visits require a slayvith gray-mere. rateintohis personality his peer group's When both 'grandmothers are alive they share perception of hint. If this is a positive 're- this status. Considerable/ reverenceis flectionl andis reinforced by his11'1t1, 4 associatedwiththe grandmother's status, community, and church, then the p_son and she is the repositoiy of knowledge-con- usually develop§ a good self-iniage, at least cerning the entire family kinship'network. withintheFranco -Americansubcultural setting. But not all adult -males- find them- Death' to the' Franco-Amerians carries selves in this situation. Numerous interaction both religious and social.significance.The confrontationsare -discernible,the most person has borne his or her cross and now notable occurring 111etween thepeer group awaits God's judgement., With the exception and the family. When this situationoccurs, of death prior to baptism (infant death) the peeroup usually emerges thevictor, death is viewed somewhat pliilosophically by and a bra ing of the marital bond results. the Franco-Americans. As with baptism, Dependent children normally remain with . first communion, confraternity, and mar- theirmother,and she continues to receive riage; itis a time for formality and social support from both her family and her es- interaction. It is often said that the dead. are tranged.husband's family; as well as from the better off now. This refers to passage of the 9ommunity and the church. trial of life and the ultimate reward of ever- lasting peace orpunisirment, depending on The middle years are a particularly im- the final judgement. An interesting social portant period for those who have adequately ritual associated with the death of veterans adjugtedto the working-class Franco-Ameri- who occuyy an important male peer-group can life style. This is the time when their membershipisa military or paramilitary years of working and saving finally bring representation at the funeral, acconipanied theirreward.Unliketheirmiddle-class with a rifle salute and 'an American flag counterparts,these Franco-Americans sel- diaped over the coffin. After the burial ddm get 'involved .in lon*-term loans and those participating in the burial ceremony go mortgages. Instead, they save their money, to the local American Legion Hall, VFW, or rent an'apartinent, and drive used cars until Lions Club to drink to the deceased. In any the time when they can afford to buy their event there is little alienation from the dead-. own home, new car, and boat. Such affluence Like birth, it is a Rhenomenon too mystify- as they enjoy is possible also because Franco- ing to be dealt with rationally and exped- American's are not traditionally burdened itiously. The knittliig up of torn social and with financing their children through anex- personal fabric and the re-establishment of , tended andexpensive period of adolescence: social _solidarity require ritualization and for 0 .)

1138

sonic period of timeceremonial remem- prevail in Cal da theirra will be 40' residing brance.( fe ,ltamong, the Filanco-Americans below the border -% in New -England. The . , French-Canadianp4entculture has numer- CHAN,GE AND ADAfTIOtr ous life lines tolt1 NewEngland relativqs, and these continue to nourish the Franco- Thsr current situation in Canada has been American subcultin*. turbtait. bisact polar, political, and social boundaries have been drawn and reinforeed The Franco-American problem, inasmuch between the English. and French-Canadians.. as New. Englandis TA engaged in any overt French radicals viewthemselvesasbeing political and social conflict with the French 1,oppressed «white » while a substan minority group, is not as 'severe. Discrirtrina- tial proportion of the less radical French - Lionis subtle and different in New England. stronglysupporttheseparatistpolicy . Some -states, especiolly those with "other (Vallhwes, 1971 y. The -current political and minority populations, openly ittempt to sociar indkat ors sreem to imp0 more chaos accomodate the French much: in that same and conflict betvlieen the French-Canadian manner they do other minorities.Innonhern 4 subculture and the dominant English Cana .New Ealgland,' in which the dichotomy be- dian culture. tween the French and Yankees is morevivid and distinct,. thedegree of discrimiwitionin- Theseturns of events minimize the tensifies.It manifests itself particiaaffy in chances for assimilation, convergence, or political,occupational,edUcational, t. and homogenization of Canada into one mass life residentialdiscripination. However, some style. Yet some feel that French Canadawill changes are slowly coining about. Maine has long resist assimilation and will remain a recognized it has a French minority problem strong separatist Canadianisubculture.Wagley and has recently implemented Franco-Amer- and HarriS( 1'*4:200-201) drew this conch,- ican -programs such as workshops forpUblic *skirl from-their UNESCO study: schoolteachers and university and college faculty. Attempts are being made by some What will be the future of the French academieinstitutionsto provide Franco- panadian minority' in Canada?Itis .,American awareness programs, while other obviously not a group that will be assim- institutions are engaged in collecting and ilated into English-Canada society rapid- preserving the historical and cultural dev'el- ly or easily. It is composed of a large population with an exceedingly high opment of the Franco-Americans. birthratb. It has political power in the nation and political contiol over Quebec. Another contributing fagt)r that could It has its own schools frop the primary reduce the isolation of future enerationsof level to great universities. It takes pride Franco-Americans is the rapid disappearance in qs French traditions and cultures ... of the parochial school system. Due to the French Canada has its national sport rising costs of maintaining these institutions, and its sporting heroes in ice hockey. Many are earmarked for closing within the The French-Canadians as a group have next decade. This changing situationcould all the elements in a vigorous social unit mean a reduction in the useof the French- which cannot easily be overwhelmed Canadian language and a loosening of chur611 even by the more rapidlyexpanding of English-Canadian group. control over the primary socialization

1 young Franco-Americans.However, the suc- And as long as these conditions continue to eessfril accommodation and7 assimilationof

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the new generations will depend consider- 4, Frako-AMerican familylife style by the ably-\tT how well the public-school s'ygtent middle-class-dominated public-school system facilitates., and supports the family .speialit.a- could very' wet11increase the conflict and Ition of the Franco-AmeriCaiis. A total dis- 'differences benen the minority 'grOup and ...... regard for, or perception of; the the hoSt,; culture.

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References

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- Metalious, Qraoe. 1964.No Adam in Eden.New Antierson, E. . 1957. «The French-Canaflians in \ Burlington, Vermont's in M. L.par? n (ed): York: Poet Bolik. American *porkies.New York: Knopf. Miner, Horace. 1967..,gDenis:A frnch-Canadian Beattie, Christopher, and Byron G. Spenser.1971. Parish.Chicago: Universitj, of Chicago Press. «Career Attainment inCanadia&Bureaticracies: Unscrambling- the Effects of Age, Seniority, Ministry of Industry, Trade, andCommerce. 1972. amide 1972: The Annual Handbook of Pres- .Education, and Ethnolinguistic Factors on' .. Progress:; Salary.»American Journal ofSocioagy.77 ent Conditions and I:Went cNovember): 372-490. le Ministry of Industry, Trade, ,ancl-Commerce.1971. !, Byrne, William D. D. 1899.History of the Catholic Canada Year Book-197-1971. Ottawa. Church in the Maw kngland States.'Vol. 1. Os Boston: Hurd and Everts.t NewsWeek.1972. (November 13): 53.

Darroch, Gordon A., and Wilfled Marston. 1971. Ong, Walter J. 1961.Frontiers In American Cathol- Nbw «The Social Class Basis.bf Ethnic Residential icism: Essays on Ideology and Culture. Segregation: The Canadian Case.»American York: Macmillan. Oslovember4: 491-510. Journal of Gociology!..77 Piddington, Ralph. 1971. «A Study ofFrench! CanadianKinship.»InK. lshwaran (ed.): . Department- of Forestry and Rural Development. Toronto: Holt, Rinehart 1947.Development Plan' for Pilot Region The Canadian Family. Lower St. Law4ence, Gaspe, and Iles-de-la- and Winston of Canada. Madeleine. Ottiwa.: Rose, Peter 1. 1968.They &We.New York: Random Grayson, L. M. and Michael Bliss (eds.). 1971.The House. Wretched of Canada.-Toronto: Unisversity of Unequal Union.New Toronto Press. Ryerson, Stanley B. 1968. 'York: International Publishers. Grochinal; .Bernard, Jr1969.An Analysis of the 1964.Social Social Stratificaton of TheFrench-Canadian Second, Paul, and Carl Backman. ComMunity of Newmarket, New Hampshire, Psychology.New York: McGraw-Hill. Unpublished Master's Thesis, University of. Historical Statistic of Canada. New Hampshire. Urghart, M. C.1965. Toronto:acmillan Company of Canada. Hughes, Everett. 1943.French Canada in Transition, Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Vallieves, Pierre. 1971.White Niggers gf .America: 'The Precocious A'r'tobiography of aQuebec, Kramer, Judith R. 1970.The American Minority otTerrorist.)Translated ¢y Joan Pinklam. NewVork: Monthly Review Press. , Community.New York: iiftomas Y. Crowell. Minorities Lieberson, Stanley.1970.Language and Ethni Wagley, Charles, and Marvin Harris. 1964. New York: Columbia Uni- RelationsinCanada,New York: Wile ; in the NeW World. versity Press.

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192 Despite the, fact* that the majoritylof the French- Canadians migteal to Vennont- prior to 1930, anthropologist Peter Woolfack finds a strong thread of continuity be tween the traditional French-Canadian rural family patterns and those of today's rural Franco-Vermont family. Chief among these continuity items are the role structure and the trparadoxical combination of authoritarian structure and individlial,independence.); 4 It seems plausible and probable that these conclusions apply to many other types of Franco-American families, to the extent that they do, the author'sViscussion on thetint- plications for the social services are useful beyond the boundaries of rural Nennbrit. Mien from the point of view of the observer rather than the actor, Woolfson securely tchors'his article in data. from interviews, questionnaires, and observations. One can cify wish thatwe had the same kind of in-depth and reflgctive studies for all parts of 4. \ New England and for tift classes of Franto-Americans 7 10'

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4 C.; 199 N .TRADITIONAL FRECH .CANADIAN FAMILY LIFE PATTERNS A HEIR 'IMPLICATIONS FOR SOCIL SERVICES IN VERMO

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PeterWilogson -4, I -4 - . Origins _parochial -in his 6iimitation:the parish -was his boundary; I is familywas his focus Sec-r TheFranco-VermonterinNor-ern ondly,thenrsicirity of Freiich-Canadians Vermont traces his originsto the French- in Vermont i imigratedduring .the period Canadian rural farm family in theperiod pre- 1840 to 1930,Ithe heyday ofthe woolen and ceding the Second 'World Var. He has little cotton mills in thestate. There Was no large in common With themodern, urbanized scale immigration to Vermont afterthat: Quebecois found in the suburbsof Montreal. French-Canadians in seareli offactory work Quebec has changed. Ther1- usheied in headed for Biddeford, Maine,Manchester, the, modernizqtion process whichhas been New Hampshire, and Lowell,Massachusetts. called Quebec's Rerolution , tranquille: the The former mill towns Lakesidein Burling- quiet revolution. At the heartof this revolu- ton and Winooskiwhile still servingas resi- tionwas a burgeoning new middle .class- ... dential bases for the Franco-Vermonterpre composed of white collar urbaniteswho were mereshellsof their former selves. The majois. aware of the limits of their economic and ity of French-Canadians who haveimmigrated political power. The catchphrase:of the new to Vermont after 1930 have cometo the less emerging ideologywas Mattres chez nous: urbanized regions topursue work in farming, let us become masters in our own house; let P lumbering, and related industries. Somehave us wrest the econo lie and politicalpower come to work in the ruralfactoriesthe from both the Engh h and theChurch. And Ethan. Allen factory Beecher Falls; and dint the cry went out firstfor cultural sov- ButterfieldTool: andDieinNewport. ereigntyand as resistance intgnsifiedto Moreover, the emigrants fromCanada who . . Independence the extreme solutionof sep- came to Vermont were not, toany degree, aration from the. Canadiannationto Be- residents of the highly urbanizedcenters of come an independent nation-enclosed within Montreal, --QttebecCityor Sherbrooke. the boundariesof Labelleprovince, ThefamilieswhichIhave interviewed, Quebec. at least were tesidenasof the ruralQuebec border 'communitiesmany ofwhom .had It comes as no surpriseto those who moves les than ten miles fromtheir original know the PrancO-Vermonters well,that this homes. In addition, 'there isvery little 'evi- new spirit of nationalism in Quebec has had dence of much- immigrationto VerniPnt little impact on the people ofFrench-Cana- after 1965a period justpreceding the dian origin who live in thestate of Vermont. political 'agitation whichculminates, in the There are several reasons for this. Firstof all, 41 kidnappings and assassinationof the FLQ the French-Canadian farmer hasalways been in 1970.

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It is my contention, then,t4it is the There -are. other reflections of French- Frelich-Canadian rural family which forms Canadian patterning. Discipline remained an the traditional base of the Franco- Vermonter. important concern both for Franco-Vermont The evolution of the structure and behavioral parents andtheir children. Both these gOups 'patterning of the Franco-Vermont family preferredexternaldisciplinewhiletheir must be seen in the forces at work inthe Anglo-Vermont counterparts preferred'self State of Vermo" nt,and not in the evolution control. At the same time,-both Franco-Ver- indepen- of Modern Quebec. [ . . .] mont parents and children valued dence highly in matters which could be con- The ranco-Vermont Family strued as being personal, while Anglo-Verz mont parents and children seemed more re- In 1970, using the records of the Derby sponsive to outside help and advice .The Project, the first Bilingual program in Ver- parallelswithtraditional French-Canadian mont, and using materials collected by my- families are striking: a strong acceptance of self in subsequent interviews and question- pakentalauthorityinmatters demanding naires, ! discovered that the French-Canadian discipline, but an equally strong orientation' model [of the family] was applicable to many towards independence in matters regarded as of the- behavioral patterns and Value orienta- private and personal. 'A paradoxical -combi- .tibns of dy rural Franco-Vermont subjects. nation of authoritarian structure and indi- The Franco-VermontParents,who had vidual independence is at the heart of both chien in Grade three at thetime, fell in French-Canadian and Franca Vermont family the e. range of thirty to forty. Most of life. then ere from rural backgroundsin Quebec, Vermont, or other parts of New England. Lesley Elton, as part of a field work as- signment -for a master's degree, workedwith oe"'TWomen, at the time of the study, tended to haVe large families: 14% had eight ornine me in Canaan, Vermont.Her responsibility children, 52% had four, five, or six children, was to interview theSouth gaanan Franco- how- Vermont families- in order tc discover'pat- ... and 33% had three children. This trend, how- ever, seems to have changedin recent years. terns of family interaction. Her findings re- Data collected in Canaan, Vermont in the inforced my own. She writes: summer of 1975 suggest thatbirth rates are dropping rapidly. Father Baudet, pastor at In examupg life on the farms one can St. Albert's, reports that in the last ten years still see obvious traces 'of old tradition and patterns. Certainly change has taktn baptisms of 'infants here haveBeen cut in place, an inevitable event with the pas- half. sage of time and influence ofliving in the United States, yet certain elements Educational achievement also followed of the Cidture and ways of the past are the Quebec pattern : many of the women'were still maintained. highschool graduates, While few of their hus- bands had completed even .grade One of the elements that remainsis-the basic Nevertheless,allof the Franco-Vgrilunit division of labor and role structure of the women who responded to myquestionnaire rural Quebec family: answered that the eropgr place for awdmai'l was in the home;41s in the face of the fact Since fattier must spend most of his that several of the respondents were em- time outside of the house ... It is the Aloybd outside the home at the time they mother whoa to a greater extent possible than a woman in an urban setting, is filled out the questionnaires.

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largely responsiblerfor the house and the though traditional, patterns diminishedsome- vpbringirig of., the cliildren. Almost all what generationally, neverthelesssome of her activity .centers on the home with the traditional patterns persisted. She writes: few'outside distractions. -French-Canadian children A Elton asserts thatthe man represents the are raised to be independent but respectful ofau- authority in the outside world. Its he who thority. American childrenare raised to decides op matters outside of the home.The be disrespectful of authority, theyare wife, however, is responsibl* for thebehavior expected to develop their independence of the children within the dailyroutine. As thriiugh discardingauthority. one wife put it, «C'est lui k 'grand boss: "inoi le petit.» It is interesting that attitudestowards child. training remain eveninsituations where Eltonalso.characterizeSthe South language,life-style, and ethnicawapness Canaan farm faMilies as large, butnot aslarge have been replaced bymoregeneralized as the luta! Quebec families. Modern tech- American ones. As. nology, shttsuggests, is one of the reasons I for the sma ler size. Modern .milkingma- Implications for Social Services chines, for-example, have reduced thenum- ber of people necessary to milk thecows. There are several implications of these HoweVer, these womenare also more inter- find ingsi for health and caretakingservices. estediti, limiting the size of their families It is necessary, however, toq alify the pos- than Were their French- Canadiancounter-- sible use to which these findins can be put. parts. Although. many4f the cliffrteciSticsJ(ited here represent comei and general char.er - Elton also points out that childrenare traits, each comnitinit add, indiyid-- expected to fulfill family, obligations and nal is unique. There is a great.dangri aver - responsibilities, espe'cialfy0ither theylave application of thesecharwten s. Stereo- started school. A child e:xpected,to do his types are too easy to appli ConsequtintI9, chores both before and After his classes. Boys the implications Which gri discussedAre have responsibilities involving themanage- betr seen as areas in which' there are poten-

ment of the farm; girls, .1tke their mothFrs tials . cross-culturalmisunderstanding, before them, are expectedto work in the rather than behavioral antecedents which house and the barn. Distinct sexual rolesare could have precededany situation under Maintained :/boys are riot usually expectedto study. withkthe dishes. There are, however, several 1ossible One major; change in Vermont farm areis of misunderstandingto which an aware- families is the sense of continuity. Few of ness of French- Canadian patterns 'can aid in the sons have any desire to follow -in their becoming a sensitive. counselor. For example, father's footSteps. And inevitablyas thq. in any situationin which the clientis a `farm is sold,many of the traditional patterns Franco-Vermont juvenile, it is-worthwhileto and values go with it. 1 interview the mother carefully, whatever 1 role the father assumes in the interaction-, In Josie Schneiderman, in .ahirldividnally order to facilitate the instrumentation of designed study compared first, second, and any course of action concerning the child, thirdgenerationFranco-Vermonters.Al- . allow sufficient time to present to her what-

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196 I) I whatever benefits can accrue the Franco Vermont in .Her whole lifef ever rationalelor %hen her from the specific action recommended.On is tied up in her rdle as mothitr. would lam' ptudent to ad- children are grown especially ifthey have the other hand, has a dress the father directly when there is afinal movedaway%many do, she.no longer decision to be made, especially if it,involves sense of purpose.She dries not look forward 6eCause her N outside social or !vial agenciiis. toher husband's retirement j education and interests are quitecqferent Be sensitive to The high Value placed on from his. And, his companionship'is unre- e independence andsecurity of the family. warding. ecbuise. tooutside aid, be it 9mrch or social agocy, isrindication that ..thefamily lie sensitive to thepotedtial Alit cannot handle its-own affairsitis a defeat .4ios ideas play in theirFranco-Vermont the only accepted as a laSt resort. approachtocrisissituations. Often, French - Canadian traditiondisplays a strong Be sensitive to the possibilitythat the sense of the miraculous..It is to the Virgin Franco- appear as passive andsubordinate and the Saints that tnany a troubled who hope whom. he perceives-to be official authori- Vermonter turns for intervention. The is for some dramatic and spontaneousresolu- es may, "also,displaycharacteristics.of tubborn indgpendence, if he perceivesthat tion to the crisis: And if it does not occur, Christian the authority is transgressingwhat° he con- then, the burden must be born with personal ter- resignationit will be resolved in thelife siders his personal territory, a remedies May ritory which may be quite different fromtht hereafter. And thus, long term of Anglo-American children. not be readily accepted. Be aware that the father whopublicly Be aware that it is oft the local priest washes his hands of his son maybe saying to whom the troubledFleo-Vermonter mistrustedes- 'something. quite different,. The maleFranto- turns. Qther outsiders are which Vermonter is a proud man. In part,his pride pecially those agencies or institntions of the him- are perceived of asgovernmental. The priest niay be manifested in the values 1' hard fighting, and is a man of God, but otheroutsiders have berjack,...hardworkiitg, and hard drinking. But,' it is alsomanifested in their own responsibilities to consider, the values of the French-Canadianfarmer: thus are suspect. independent family and farm a secure and that many firmly under his control. All of hislife has Be sensitive tothe fact .btlen measured by this standard: it IS at the Franco-Vermonters speak English as a second k hit self-identity. Anything which language with what appears easeand compre- root of there is undernaine his authority, orsuggest%his fail- hensiol. But one cannot assume that Words which arerelated ute in maintaining it,is potentially dangerous near native control. this case, it is a in French and English may not meanthe to his sense of worthin is often the cals in second child gone wrong, and hefeels..responsible. same thing. If, as perils of unem- language speakers, anongbinglirocess of He alse_jis vulnerable to the e are ployment, undpremployment, anddebili- translationistaking placeten t capacity to many chances fortnigunderstanding: de s- tating illness. He is 'proud of his physically ex work hi, authority in the familyand his re- se in Canadian French means 'misted; depressed in English means-emo- spectinthe community depend onit. tionally low. Disinterested inEnglish means/ uninterested;disinteresseiri sensitiveto the special problemsofifil*boredor

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s?. Frenchtheansunselfish.lincase '\there And so, in the final anaiNsi,I., one must be English is a. second, language, .14 is nOt dif- a9 re that thereare traitsand characteristics -fictilt, to sec where it WQ(1(1 consiler- whleh--distinguish Franco-Vermot tersi from able .tophisticalionto be aware of these, other kinds, of Vermonters. Tit r under- differences. iti also easy to see `'Wheee standing and awareness of theseifferences ranguagedifferencescanproduce cross- health or caretaking workers can have, the cultural misunderstanding. more sensitive and effective job they can do.

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., Selected Bibliography

4drian,Patricia Woo'dil 970.Ethnic and 'C /ass Off- Miner, Horace. 1939.-St.Denis: A Frelph Canadian ! ferfnces in Definition of 'Mental Health .alid Parish.Chicago.: ,University of Chitago.Press. Deviance. A Study of4'TfiirdGenerotion Franco-American artik..ltalo:American Oom- Murphy, H. B. M., K.atinier", and I. Vachon-Spilka. munitiesin Rhode Idea&Unpublished Ph.11: 'March, 1968. TheComparability of Psychiatric Ms-Citation Catholic University. rj' Assessments in Different Languages and Cul- t tures: FinalReport on Federal-Provincial Braillr, G. T. 1972. «New England French Culture.» Mental Health Project No. 604-7-550,-1966:.'

. 'The French Review.45: 831-37. T , ' Schneiderman, Josie. 1976.Systems Under Stress. Chapin, Miriam. 1958.The FrenCh Vermonter,.» Unpublished Undergraduate Thesis, University VermonLife.Vol. 12, No. 4: 21-26, of Vermont,-

Elton,Lesley.19'16'Child Raising Among the Wbolfson, Peter. 1975. «French Canadians in Ver- Fr:loco- ericans of South Canaan.19npub- metrit:Their Problems and Congibutions.» lished per, Vermont Teacher COrps, Burling - Focus. Vermont: 4975.Center for Resea ch on ton, Vemont. Vermont, Burlington.

GaLigue, Phillippe. 1968«The Frerich tiiidnadian --. Fall, 1974. «Public orParish: A S tidy- Of Family.»,..cio/ogi6alPerspectives.Edited by Contrasts in Acculturation of Franco- cart Bernard R.'. Mistier. Toronto: Macmillan.. Schoolchildren.»Man in the Northeast 8: 65-75. Gerin, Leon. 19641 The Frog* ian Family: Its Strengths and,W.ele s :nchbara-, 1976. i(ThaFrenCh Canadian Heritage of'. dian Society.Edited. by 1011X'aild JackjCerouac as seen in his.Atitobiographical Yves Martin. To'ronto: MAI d and Stecv- Word.»Revue de Louisiane.Vol. 5, No. 1:. ar .2-57 35-43.

7 1r, Hughes, EverettA. ...French Canada in Transition. --.Spring, 1976. «.The heritage and Culture of , Chicago: Phoenix, -the French Vermonters.»Vermont th.itory. .Vol. 44, No. 2: 103-109.

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`0?4'7.. t 200 Politics is-one of the phases of Franco-American- history touched upon in some way in each of these Overview ,elections. But in his article published in the August, 1962 is-

sue of the Canadian Journal. of Economics'and Political Science, David B. Walker specifi- cally surveys the political leanings of the Franoo's in the presidential elections of 1880 through 1060, using histories and election returns for thirty representative Franco- American communities from 1892 through 1960. The balance of Republican-Democrat- ic parry percentages in.the presidenTial vote of these Franco-American communities be- came decisively Democratic in 1928 and Democratic votes reached their peak in 1960. It is important to note that in both years-(J928 and 1960) attacks on the Democratic candidates seem,t6 have been an important factor in the voting patterns of the Franco population.

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206 THE PRESIDENTIAL POLITICS OF THE -FRANCO-AMERTANS

by David B. Walker

Th way. the Franco-American views the selves with one of America's two major par- issue,candidates and the parties largely de- ties. But the transition, from Canadian to termines the. vote in at least thirty cities and American politics was apt easy. Political in- towns in New Eagland.1 Though constituting terest and activity were 'kept at a minimum about .12 per cent of the region's inhabj by the language barrier, intense concern with and considered by some t unas- economic betterment, and massive efforts to similable of all the ethnic gros in the area,- erect the basic institutions of ethnic identity : the Franco-Americans have not enjoy9t1 the the French parish, church school, press, and same degree of attention from stud &its of ethnic societies.5 Many considered their stay politics.that larger, more widely distributed in the States as temporary, which Strength- ethnic minorities have received. Buta brief en dtheir apOlitical tendency. However, survey of their political past and of their frcini the establishment of this battle for ola vote in the 1960 presidential election will survivaace» and from severe inter-ethnic ri- demonstrate that the French providean ex- valryinthe religious and social spheres, cellent case study in ethnic politics.3 There emerged a drive to set up liaturaliza- `tion clubs so that directoparticipation in the Migration and other processes swelled political life of their communities Might be the Franco-Amerisan' population of New hastened. Led fiy editors and officers of the England from an estimated 150,000 in 1850, ethnic societies, this effort to protect «French- , lib 400,060 in1880, to 800,000 by 190§.4 figlits»against ,polentially hostile govern-govern- Though some influx occurred in subsequent ' mental action succeeded in placingmore and decades, especially in Maine, the great mi- more French names on the registration lists. gration from French Canada ended by the Early evidence of growing voter strength was turnof thecentury. Overp4ulation, a the subsidation of\a portion of the Franco- dwindling supply of good agricultural land, American press133\ Democratic campaign and the absence of a good transportation strategists during the 1892 -Harri- system to the Canadian northwest were the soncanvass.6 reasons for this exodus southward. MoSt of the emigres settled in New England's smaller Pat;alleling the evolution. of other immi- cities and larger;Alhwns, and became tektite, grant groups, ethnic .considerations primarily leather, or papef -mill workers. shaped Franco-American voting beliaviour during the initial phase of their political de- Accustomed to the two-party politics of velopment. Authorities disagree, however, Canada, practically all of the early Franco- . about which party benefited most from this

_Americans sooner or later associated them- influence. One view holds that since «the

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ti emigres were mostly liberals» and «had left emphasis on order, andalOocacy of sane Canada because of thehill* tariff,» they economic doctrines.' 2 tended to favour. theDemocrats.7 Another interpretation contends that the.docility of TABLE I the emigre workers when confronted with Selected Median Democratic Percentages the strong Republican bias of the mill own- of tho Presidentiil Vote for Thirt, ers, coupled with the dominantposition of Fianco-A meric4i,:Comm tin it ie s I the Irish in local Democratic organizations, _ resulted in a fairly solid vote for theGOP.8 Median Median The record suggests that neither view is en- Yerir perncl,tagC Yea, perCeniage tirely accurate. Careful examination of the 1892 50 1932 63 historical accounts and the meagre statisti- 1896 32 1936 67 'cal evidence available indicates that a ma- 1900 38 1q40 65 jority of the Ffanco-Americans favoured 1904 39 1944 4 67 General Hancock find Grover Cleveland in 1908 40 1948 66 the1880-1892presidentialelections.`), 1916 52 1952 56 Such factors as the growing nativism of the,, 1920 41 1956 49 Republicans, the religious issue in the 1880 f 924 39 1960 71 and 1884 campaigns, the low-tariff position 1928 57 of Cleveland, and the forementioned sub- sidatiorkof the Franco-American press in (Nevertheless,if the eight presidential 1892 worked to the Democrat's advantage elections from 1896 to 1924 are taken as a during this period., unit the Magnan interpretation is basically accurate for a majority of these votersin 4 The histories and aggregate election re- majority of these contests. Woodrow Wilson turns for the thirty representativeFranco- in his campaign for re-election was the only American communities reveal a marked Democratic candidate during this entire political realignment in 1896: Like many period to carry this group decisively. The other eastern, Catholic -minority groups, even voting divisions in190,8 and 1912 in- the Franco-Americans were repelled by dicate that these two elections must be Bryan's unorthodox fiscal ideals and funda- classified as' doubtful. In the rest, the-ma- mentalist, agrarianProtestantism.' 0 At the jority of the regional group favoured the same time, the electionfigures show that Republican presidential caiidida this ethnically inspired distrustfor they measure, for ethnic and religious reasons. Great- COmmoner declinedprogressively each time he ran. The assertion that Orrin. A culturally rooted sense of fiscal or- «41id his bit for the party by helping to 'win t lodoxy and pn uneasiness over Bryan's over Catholic ethnicminorities» applies wholly alien personal'traits motivated the with some force to the 'Fillnco-Americabs, initial realignment *'Theodore Roosevelt's but only if his final attempt at the presi- friendliness with various minority groups dency is considered." The increase of 8 and his publicized reception of prominent per cent in the FrenchDemocratiC vote Franco-American leaders helped, sustain it. from 1896 to 1'908 also tends to modify The many church disputes during this per- the claim of Abbe 'Magna]] in hisfilstoire iod over the selection of a French clergy de la race francalse aux hats -Uni,s that and the building of bilingual parochial Franco-Americans had always preferred the schools nurtured an abiding hatred for the Republicans becaus% of their conservatism, Irish that frequently manifested itself in 203.

tX thepoliticalarena. Celtic ascendancyin ganization helped to produce more Franco many of the New England locals' andai Ameriea as was the case in eagerness to avoid imsettled Working con- Maine and Vermont. ditionsengendered ananti-union,anti- 'strikebias among asizable number of Despite theApparentlystandardized French workers, and c-Onfirmed theRepub- character of these variations, the pelsonalre- lican orientation ofmany. The dullness of action of the individual Franco-American Taft, the Bull , revolt, and theperson- voter to these inter-ethnic rivalrieswas the al magnetism of Wilson helpedto conceal ultimate determinant. And here the proverb- This basic tendency inthe returns for three ial individualism of thegroup only served as successive contests._ But by .1920 and 14324 anotlrr ethnocentric force producingan the Republican nominees again carried the even more variegated pattern of political be- Franco-American group by ample majorities. haviour. As candidateMartin noted in The former election was effected partially Foster Furcolo',s novel Let George Do It, by an early version of «revenge politics.»14 «With the French it was differenttheywere The crisis that rocked Canada allleader'sand no candidate couldtell in1917 helped to producean anti-war, whether he was coiningor going with hence an anti-Democratic, vote in the United them.»I7 All in all,the French version of States in 1920. ethnic politics for ;this, initial perioldpro- duced a far more fractured voting pattern Though personality and «pocket book» than is normally the case with recentlyar- politics affected Franco-American 'presiden- rived ethnic minorities. tial preferences during this early period,as the 1908, 1916, and 1924 results suggest,' A new Franco-American politicalera and clearly the ethnicand religious factorswere a modified form of ethnic politics were all important. The record demonstrates that ushered in with the nomination of . the Franco-American grolip did notvote as a Ignoring the New Yorker's ethnic Origin and unit for either the Republicanor Democratic remembering his religious, urban, and immi-, party, in marked contrast to the usual ten- grant background,- the vast majority of the. dency of most minority groups tovote this Firanco-American electoratemoved over into way during the early, ethnic phase of their the Democratic camp and stayed there for politiealdeveloliment.15. the next 'six ptesidential elections. Smith's personal appeal and the nativist Protestant A divisive pattern was evenI. morepro- crusade against him submerged theusual pouncedon the state and local levels, where FKench aversion to an Irish candidate. ..the Irish were in one,and the Yankees in the other, political party. No completely satis- The momentum of the realignmentac- factory political was available, and celerated with the advent of the Great De- k party affiliation hinged largely on which of pression. For the,firsttime, the 'voting these two rival ethnic geoupswas most Franco-Americ'ans began to followa nearly feared -and hated. Certain conditionsthen monolithic pattern. However, social andeco- tended to create somewhat uniform localre- nomic rather than ethnic motiveswere be- sults. For example, a stronger political posi- hind their vote for Roosevelt in 1932 and tion for the Irish Democrats usually nurtured 1936. This was particulaily true of the latter a sizable French GOP vote, as in Rhode Is- election. There had been some division along land. A weaker Irish Democratic party anda economic class lines in the previousera, but potent, more nativist Yankee Republicanor- it required the Depression and the New Deal

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to nurture the sharply drawn image.of class By 1948, an extra ingredient was added required for this kind of electoral result. o Franco-American politics,for by this Since most of the group were urban, indus- time, kirgely because of the -war, they had- trial, «working class» people, much of the produced a sizable middle class of tiller own. older antipathy for other Catholic minori- The economic position of many had improved a. ties was blunted and the old -style ethnic pol- during the war and post-war periods and an -itics became a second-rate voting determi- exodus began. from he old tenement area nant. Thisdevelopi4ient in itself,was not un- to newer residential sections, where many usual.. Most groups in America began to be ethnic groups were mingled: The Brunswick- more affected by the politics of classduring Lewiston opinion survey, which serves as a the New Deal e What distinguishes it basis for the contempOrary pliase of this fromparallel dev opments among other study, revealed that the, vast majority of the ethnic groups is tha it requifed a non-ethnic sample'sintra-urbanmigrants were high- factor to roduce the first case of large-scale school- or college-educated, second or more partisan agreement among the French and generation American within one of the three this inthe middle rather, than the initial middle-class subdivisions and usually had a phase.of their political evolution. lower ethnic involvementratig than their less well-to-docompatriots.20 Unlike the Irish and certain other tradi- tionally Democratic ethnic minorities, no The election figures and the data of the appreciable number of Franco-Americans Brunswick-Lewiston survey show that the deserted the democratic ranks because of emergence of this class failed to produce any the foreign policy and war issues of the 1940 appreciable gains for Gover9orTim!** E. and 1944 campaigns. By this time, the vast Dewey in1948. AcCording to the -poll, majority tended to equate their economic Truman carried nearly all of the lower-class,, interests with the fortunes of the Democratic grade-school-educated voteandapproxi- party. This identification of interests.,added mately 80 per cent of the middle- class, col- to the personal magnetism of FDR, wassuf- lege-educated vote bringing his total share of ficient to overcome whatever remained of the two-party vote to 89 per_cent.21 Though theirearlier isolationism. -Thelame se pop- the lapse of _time makes individual motives ularity of Roosevelt in French Ca ad ii aid diffict to determine, the available evidence ti the generally interna,tionalist positionot\most suggests iat Sam Lubell's explanation of ,Franco-American editors also help to explain the «new middle class» voting behaviour in We French failure tofollow the lead of many 1948 probably holds for the French as well: Irish, Germans, and Italians, and practise the a strong Democratictradition and abeligf politics of revenge.'9 In general, then, the that they owed their prosperity to the Dem- presidential politics of the Roosevelt years ocraticadministration, in.Washington.22 were chiefly those of classfind pcksonality. gich considerations outweighed the Repub- Old-style ethnic politics persistedonthe state lican pressures of newly acquired economic and local levels, but the common-economic' . and social status. In short, the French,along interests of many within the rival 'ethnic with the broader group of which they were a groups helped reduce its formerimportance. _part, did not voteaccording' to the politics Another influence in the reduction of ethnic of status in this Truman-Dewey contest.23 enmities was religious. Since the lastmajOr Church dispute occurred in 1924, a more With the advent of Eisenhower, some of subtle assimilationist policy seems tohave the broader iMplicationsOf this development been adopted by the Irish hierarchy. became more evident. Though Stevenson

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205 carried the thirty representative communi- ticket in1956. Loyal Democrats who fa- ties by a tiny margin in 1952, the'Democrats, voured Eisenhower were able to view their failed, for the first time since 1924, to carry vote as consistent with party loyalty Largely them by a compaiable margin in the subse- because of his aloofness 'to politics. For the quent election.. A new political era had been growing number of registered Democrats and launched. According to the poll's findings .. Independents who view politics, parties, and for the 1956 canvas, the Democrats suffered professional politicians with increased scepti- their heaviest los,ses among voters of middle- seism, 'the Eisenhower vote was simply an class' (50 per cent) and' middle-range-edict:a- early manifestation of this change in attitude. tional (52 per cent) backgrounds. This evi- *The Stevenson image was not an especially dence would suggest that the heavy swing popular one, not even with those who voted to Eisenhower occurred becausea significant for tim, or so the survey indicated. Briefly, number of new middle-class Franco-Ameri- then, he personality of Eisenhower as well- caps were beginning to be affected by the ____as,t./he social and economic changes of the politics of status. late forties and fifties caused the break with old political commitments' nd the increase Butthisinterpretation obviously can of political independence and scepticism. apply only to those voters who had actually moved up the economic ladder. It does not These developments, of course,hal,a explain the circumstance that Eisenhower, profound effect on the 1960 elections. One according to the data 'found in the poll, of the underlying assumptions-of Democratic managed to cause sizable defections in.uear- strategists in nominating Senator John F. ly all\vf the demographic subdivisions which Kennedy was t tat his candidacy would help were' iormally Democratic. It does not ex- bring-the Cath lie back into the Democratic plain the large Republican vote within the party and thus check for a while the normal grade-school-educated (42 percent) and operation of class politics.24 For the benefit lower-class (39 per cent) groups. Moreover, of the expanding, independent-minded, per- the aggregate electionreturns show very sonality-conscious.part of the electorate, a littlegeographic variation in the reduced dazzling new personality was to be projected Democratic percentages for the thirty .repre- to take advantage of the void left. by Eisen sentative communities. Losses.in Pawtucket hower's retirement..In short, ethnic, relig- were comparable to those in Chicopee and in ious,' and personality considerations were Gardner to those in Biddeford. And when major parts of the Democratic plan for cap- survey respondents were' questiongd ibout turing the ,key industrial states in the North. their individual views of the two parties, the Eisenhower Democrats had the largest pro- However,the questionstill remained portion of individuals who claimed there was whether the ctlinges of the Eisenhower years no basic difference between the two major had been sufficiently. profound to make im- parties (62 per cent) or merely a difference possible a re-emergence of the pattern of in the candidates nominated (Thper cent). American politics before. 1952. An attempt to disco'ver some early clues about what kind All of this evidence demonstrates the Of answer the Franco-Americans would g ve powerful influenceoffthe now-legendary on November 8th prompted the initial p e- Eisenhower personality. Basically, then, the campaikn poll of,nearly two hundred Frank. interpretation based on the politics of per- Americaninhabitantsof Brunswick and sonality explains the great amount of Sup- Lewiston.25 And the results of thissurvey .11 port found in the survey for the Republican indicated, at least for ttiose included in the

211 t 4 1 206 r sample, that the fifties were not merely a him. The data of this survey, as might be ex- freak interlude in their political history., pected, showed -.a steady increase in the per-1 centage of those who favoured the Repub- The figures of the first poll showed that- licank as Jim higher levyls o(' thet social and the Democratic nominee would obtain ap- economic scales were reached: However, the proximately 78 per cent of the Franco- bulk of the Nixon vote came from lower American vote.26killnedy attracted the middle- and upper-lower-class respondents. support of many regular Republicans, rotjghly The'Nixon partisan was more likely than four out of every 'five Democrats who Itad Kennedy's to have a low or low medium supported Eisenhower, and practically all of ethnic involvementrating.27 the orthodox Demotrats. In terms' of the social backgrorid of the respondents, Ken- regard to party image, those who With nedy did well in' alleducatiOnal and class favoured Nixon tended either to, see a defi- divisions, but his margin ,of percentage points nite ideological split between the parties, or increased, not unexpectedly, asfrthe lower .to find it difficult to express any opinion at rungs -Of theeducational and sOadal ladder's all cbncorning the parties. This difference in were 'approached. attitude reveals a degree of intellectual diver- sitythat did not cliarataiie the usual In their attitude toward tiltArties, most Franco-Anierican ReNblican vote for the of the Kennedy partisans divided into two pre-Eisenhower period. Ideology was another basic groups. The firstidentified strongly factor coVitioning the presidential prefer- with the Democratic party on a basis of ences of these voters. On the basisof response clearly perceived" social and. economic differ- to questions on foreign policy, civil IiIrrties ences between the parties, Vilethe second and the domestic economy, an ideol4ical saw few, if -any, basicdifferenctween position was assigned to each respondent; them and preferred Kennedy because of his The sample as a *hole wasdivided into font. personality. The traditional class,politics of -groups. Within the groupsthere was, a :fair many of the low-ilicome groups,combined ,degree of consistency in the selection of can- with the personality polities of others in all didates. Liberals and moderate liberals pre- classes, provided the basic explanation for ferred Kennedy, by large margins, while the the results of this pro:Labor Dai estimate. prcentage for NixoninCreased appreciably The poll showed that a little mdire(than three on the ntoderateconservative side.' A out of every four Franco-Amdricanswould favour -the Massaclmsetts Senator. on Pee- By Labor Day it seemed certain thatthe lion Day. vote of the regular, Republicans, based _on traditional class politics, would be augmetifell Bt it in'1948 Truman had secured approx- in 1960 by the support of a number of ek imately 89 per cent of this vote, according Democrats and Independents in the «neVt, to the poll taken of the,oters'srecollections middle» class, anxious to affirm or raise of their decisions in the Truman-Dewey elec- their status. It would also be augmented by tibn. The pre-Labor Day estimate then 'other voters who indulged in the politics of showed that Kennedy still 'scored 11 per personality and who were favourably im- centbelow the probable Truman vote. pressed by the 'Nixon Image. The Vice-Presi About half of the traditional Republicans dent, then, was aided substantially by the polled favoured Nixon, and, more signifi- 'developments of the Eisenhower era. And if cantly, ,about one in every four or five Eisen- Kennedy's anticipated failure to approximate hower Democrats seemed certain to support Truman's 1948 French vote was symptomatic Vil 207

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of his problems with larger, normally Demo- predicted figure of 8 per cent. cratic mintKity groups then the fate of the election seemed.likely to hinge on the be- But tilt pivotal Eisenhower Democrats haviour of -these pivotal Eisenhowe4 Demo- were affected most dramatically. For those crats and Independents. who could not state a presidential preference- during the tirst interview, the campaigncrys- But both the final tally of the votes and: tallized their political thinking and produced the post-election poll indicatedthatthe a nearly unanimous vote for Senator Ken- extraordinaryTruman .perforiance- had nedy. According to the pre-campaign esti- been equalled, if not surpassed. f9 According ma5te, this particular group would divide ap- ti to the poll taken after the election, Senator proximately 60-40, 'with' Nixon getting the Kennedy received approximately 89per cent leSser number. This predictionwas shown to of the respondent's votes. In the thirtyrep- be false on November 8th. But perhaps most resentative communities, he had gained 70 important was the consideration that nearly per cent of the total vote, exceeding that all of the Eisenhower Democrats who Rad estimated for Truman by 5 per cent. Further, initially stated a preference for the %Vice- there was an increase in overall turnout of 9 Presiiient had switched, by 'election/lay, to per cent over the high 1956 figure of 670,710. John Kennedy. Somehow, the belief iffmod- Clearly, none of these figures weie in accord 'erate conservative political doctrines,;the de- with the estimates of the pre-Labor Day sire for statics, and the attraction of the Survey. "N) image projected byAN personality of Richard Nixon had been transformed-by the campaign The pertinent question ?) be.answered at into aft approval of Kennedy. 41 this point was why Nixon hind fared no better with the Franco-American voters than had Two major campaign developments, ac- Dewey in the 1948 election. TV post-election cording to the post-electionsurvey, caused taken in 1960 showed that had the elec-, these changes of attitude, which produced tion been held some time during the early the extra margin of 11 per cent foi Kennedy. part of September, before the beginning of he first of these wart the personality of the' the vigorous campaigning, the vote would mocratic candidate and that of his family, have been roughly in accordance with the par *arty his wife. Thesfavourable impres- predicted figures. As it turnedout, the cam-, n created by the Kennedys helped to in- pft)gn was the deciding factor with the crucial ence many of those originally in favor of subgroups within the Franco-American elec- Nixon because of their greater familiarity torat. with his.personality, family,,altd accomplish- \.- ments. TraditionalRepublica )isandregular. ft .e t Democrats supported their parties'no lineis In retrospect the relions issue pas more at the 'outset and the campaign serveonly' itn ortant inoghinin r Kennedy iris unex- to confirm their initial bias.3" However, the .. ped` support from dip Franco -Amercan campaign' apparent generated enough ex- grow Widely publicized efforts to defeat citemont to arouse isome 5 per cent of the the Democratic candidate were ,initiated /14y initial saniPle;' who had formerly been classi- fundamentalist and conservative Prgitestant idtas unlikely to vote in Noveinber, to.reg- groups; Most of thelFrancd-America re- i ) isterAnd even. to go to the pollson Election spondents`,who behaved differently in No- Day. Only 3 per cent of the survey group4, ,vembertthan had been expected in August failed to cast' ballots, contrasting *With the did so in reaction to these efforts. In the

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northern-tier New England states, there was under the circumstances their vote ,forKen- also, perhaps a growing realization that the nedy was not really arejectionof the pol- religious campaign -was having its desired itics of status.. Such a vote might seemto effectImong many Qf theirProtestant be a denial of their moderateconservatism, clearly neighbor since the Democratic nominee was the more liberal candidate.It might also In Maine, the election figures indicate seem to be a votefor the party of high taxes, that the religious issue Was a primary cause greater governmental services, andlow social and for the Republican outpouring that inynda- statusin short, of the major social class are ted the Democrats on November 8th. Voter policy positions that a new middle turnout increased 23.5 per cent oyes, 1956 supposed to disaiow. in the rural towns and by 28.5 per cent in it might bequestioned wheth- the largely non-Frenchcities.3I The Repub- however, er it is arepudiation of status if an aspirins, . lican share, of the vote in largely Protestant rural hamiks was 69 per cent: the Repub- Socially.Conscious member of this group pelt votcs, for a wealthy,Ivy-League co-religion- lican share for the Yankee cities wak 61 againv this can- foul en comnivnitiks with the ist, when there are ranged largest proportioa of Frenchinhabitants,' didate the nativist, agrarian,.fundamentalist, oonservative Protestant ,forces an. the incre.ise of vote -.3.'as-11 per cent. o find ,older America, ancritcularlywhen these the 19664camTigi.Kennedy received 73 'from forces are seeking Mbar thiscandidate from per cept of thisoe. When, the returns both the Fretich an Yankee% cities4ore the .highest civil office in theland. Though usual politics of \') compared, it WIIS feitncle that the incre'ases it turns tyside down the in, both groups 'terraed one anOther, with status,sucha vote 'under suchconditions theotal «city 4te» eiog divided between isstilla vote for status. . Nigo andKennedy. -Theextraor4ary se inthe Taitillry vote,» however, To stun up, 1960 .appearssuperficially psjprn of voting provid needed margin for a victory for to be a return.to an ancient biffIrthe stateand nationa) Republican." where etlini4 and religion onsiderations trnth,it was only the tickets.3 2Over-all,then,inMaine, the weredominCnt. GOP gained by the operaton°tithe ethnic third presidential election in apolitical era and religiims factoS,s in thecampaignlut, latinched 6yi the first campaign of Eisen- if things theprice for tlOs vic ory Itoger for president. This era will, as' we have seen, witness a wasth9 loss o approximatelytl per cent of \ continui in their present course, s,teady ?iosion of such ethnicallydetermined, the Franco-Atrican vote. --..,,,attitudes as intense partylo'yalty,ideological ext mism, and the tendenge to find vivid In addition -to the religious -factorin j parites." In one the campaign, a case- may be madefor corasts ' between the -the appearance of I the politics of person- respect,thefuture should resemble the the' Demo- initialphaseoftheFranco-America ality and status.on the side of wil crats. The Iliolitics of'personality were ob-7 polititial history, since 'neither party viodsly not forsaken by those who° voted automatlly assured of their vote. Butin will be for Kemiedy on thi basis of his more the long run, this future period ding alipearance, manner,,and.spegtcing abil- unique, foritwill probably witness the political phe- ity. And closer examination of .the motives disappearince of any such nomenon as the arcinchvote.>>' How soon of the Eisenhower. Democrats andIndepen- dents who voted for Kennedy suggeststhat this occurs depends innosmalls measure on

4 41' r/ 244 1 ) 209 how skilfully the political parties in' various ering ofthe explosive mower latent in the states succeed, in discharging one of their scrambled pattern of race, national origin, historically assigned funttions, the smo th- and religion.» 3 4 e.

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Notes

1. The thirty Franey- American communities that 3 A 63-item, «quasi-random» opinion poll was provides the aggreiate election figures for this conductedduringthe winter and spring of 1960.. study include Berlin, Somersworth, Nashua, in the Brunswick and Lewiston areas. For details Manchester, Claremont, Franklin, Laconia, and on sampling methods, see M.Parten,Survey ktochester in New Hampshire since each had a Polls and Samples: Practical Procedures(Ne*--... French-Canadian-born population .of 5_per cent York, 1950), 226, 267. Two of the better gen- or more according to the 1950 US census; eralFranco-American historiesare D. M. A. Lewiston, Sanford, Biddeford, Winslow, Mada- Magnan,Histoire de la race francaise aux Etats- waska, Van Bunn, Rumford, Mexico, Bruns- Unis(Paris, 1912), ami R. Rumilly,Histoire des wick, and Waterville, in Maine with a 7 per cent Franco-Am4ricains (MonWeal,1958). or more Franco-Canadian population in1950; Southbridge, Chicopee, Gardner, Fitchburg, 4. G. PriorTheFrench Canadians in New England Leominster, North Adams, Fall River, Lowell, (unpublished Master's Thesis, Brown University, and Holyoke in Massachusetts With a 20 per 1932), 66, 80, 86. cent or more French-Canadian-born and second generation population according to the 1930 5. Cf. K. Carpenter,The Franco-Americans in census;and Pawtucket,' CentralFalls, and Maine(unpublished Honor's Thesis, Bowdoin Woonsocket in Rhode Wand which the State College, 1958), 19-55. Board of Elections,Survey of Rhode Island Electors,1954(Providence, 1954) indicated 6..1. Ducharme,The Shadow jfthe Trees (New had a 24 to 65 per cent Franco-American pop- York, 1943), 168. ulation based on the ethnic distribution of names on voting lists. The widelyscattered a.7.Ibid.,167, 168. character of the Franco-American populations 4 in Connecticut and Vermont prevented inclu- 8. Rummy,Histoir-e,85;174. sion of representative communities from these states in the study's electoral compilations.It 9. Most of the pre-1892 election figures for the should be emphasized that a 5 or 7 per cent representative French communities or evenfor figure Vir the proportion of French born in portions thereof are unreliable, since the char- Canada is indicative. of a much larger group of acter of these small settlements was uncertain persons of French-Canadianbackground. Bruns- in this period. wick's 7.1 per cent of French-Canadian-born, for example, suggests the estimated 50 per cent 10. Cf. W. E. Hinkley,American Political Parties, of the community's citizens who are of French Their Natural History(New York, 1958), 320. stock and Lewiston's 15.8 per cent reflects her approximately 80- per cent Franco-American 11. D. Lockard,New England State PoliticAlkipce- population. The formerfigureis used, of ton, 1959), 313. -;. course, because it is always reliable. Though use of 1950, 1930, and 1954 ethnic data is not a 12.Ibid.,297. completely accurate guide for earlier periods, the Franco-American histories and previous 13. Cf. D. B. Walker,Politics and Ethnocentrism: censuesgurts underline their basic accuracy. The Case of the Franco-Americans(Brunswick, Maine: BureauforResearchinMunicipal 2. JOhn Gunther, InsideU.S.A.(New York, 1947), Government, Bowdoin College, 1961),'25. 465. Note That the terms Franco- American and French-Canadian may be used interchangeably. 14. Cf. Luba,Revolt 10 the Moderates(New Franco-American is employed in this study, be- York, 1956), 52 -74. er cause it is the term that is preferredby mem- 4 bers of this group.

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15. L. Fuchs, «Presidential Politics in Boston: The cent of the respondents and was given 14per Response of the Irish to Stevenson,»New Eng- cent of that group within the sample (18 per land Quarterly,Dec., 1957, 435-47. cent) that was unable to expressany presidential preference. This redAtribution 16. Cf. Ducharme, was done on the Shadow of the Trees,169 -75. basis of a careful examination of tke past voting record, class positions, and attitudinal traits of 17. John Foster, (pseud. for'Gov. FosterFurcolo), these no opinion» respondents. Let George Do It(New York, 1957), 58. 27. Cf. n. 20. 18. S. Lubell,The Future of American Politics (New York, 1951); 41-57. 28. Marr/ing the rational character of this voting pattern were the conservatives who overwhelm- 19. For a study of Franco-American and French- ingly favoured Kennedy. Non-idedlogicalcon- Canadian War at,titudes, cf. E. B. Ham, «french siderations were apparently more significant as Patterns in Quebec and New England,» New voting conditioners with this tiny group (4per England Quarterly,Dec., 1945, 441 ff. cent of the total sample). 20. Cf. n. 3; a modified SES scale devised by W. 29. This post-election survey polled thesame re- Lloyd Warner was used ih this study. Cf. W. L. , spondents tliat had been interviewed for the Warneret al., Social Class in America(Chicago, first. 1949), 121 -9. To obtaiivan ethnic involvement index for each respondent, answers tonumerous 30. Cf. P. Lazarsfelciet al., The leople's Choice: questions dealing with Franco-American life How the Voter !takes Up His Mind in a Presi- were weighted and the aggregate score placed dential Campaign (NriYork, 1955), 94-1 21. on a scale which yielded a classification: high, high medium, medium, low medium, and low. 31. 'The 1960 US Census figure of 2,500or less for Sixty-five per cent of the total sample hada defining a New England rural communitywas high or high medium rating. used as the differentiating factor in this analysis. There are some sixty-five largely non-French 21. Cf. Walker,Politics and Ethnocentrism,32. urban communities in Maine.

22. Lubell,Future of American Politics,59-85. 32. Rep. Frank M. Coffin, the Democratic guberna- torial nominee, received 53 per cent of the 23. Cf. L. Harris,Is There a Republican Majority? combined urban vote (3, per cent, more than (New York, 1954), 189. 4 Kennedy), but went down to defeat with only 36 per cent of the rural electorate (5per cent 24. T. H. White,The Making of the President(New greater than Kennedy's) supporting him. York, 1961), 240-3. 33. Cf. Walket,Politics and Ethnocentrism,18-22. 25. Cf. n. 3. 34. C.Rossiter,Parties and Politics in America 26. Kennedy had the avowed support of 64per (Ithaca,I 960), 58.

41.

217 O

212 The political orientations ofFranco-Americans in New England arediscussed in Harvard depth in Norman Sepenuk's recent paperfor the Department of Government at University. Sepenuk analyzes the reasafor t failure of Franco-Americans to be more successful at the polls.Inthepr ofhiexamination he provides a masterly summary of theJiteralure relevant to the study of the politics of Franco-Americans, with special emphasis on the conclusionsof Josephat T. Benoit.

,..=0.

41' A PROFILE OF FRANCO=AMERICANPOLITICAL ATTITUDES IN ENGLAND tak

"-* by Norman Sepenuk

L Introduction School. Considering my relatively short ex-

11. posure (hawevfer intense), it is hardly neces. In the. Six New England Oates, there. are fry to add that this will not be the defini- well over one-million Ammicansof French- tive work.' Ih vdeliberatel?-called this Canadian descent, thus making these «Franco- paper a Orofile».e., an outline of Franco- AmericanS)ot one of the largest single ethnic American political attitudes. I hope simply to groups in thearea.'Itis estimated' that provide a hint, to give the feel, and furnish Franco-Americans comprise at least 25% of some insight into Franco-American political the population in New Hampshire;2 22% in. behavior. Rhode Island;3 16 to 25% in Maine;4 10 to 20% in Mas:sachusetts;512% in Vermont, Finally, 1 will not discuss,xcept peri- mild somewhat lees than 10% in Connec- pherally, the political party Illations of ticut.6 Franco-Americatts7or how Fnco-meri- cans vote on candidates and specific issues in Despite their numbers, Franco-Atherifs city, state and national elections. Rather, my 1 have not demonstrated the same appetite for intentionisto portray` the attitudes of political participation and power as some Franco-Americans toward politics and public other'ethnic groups. This reluctance to enter life generally. My research and interviewing political life or to exercise political power lias has been primarilyinMassachusetts characterized Franco-Americans since their 'and New Hampshire, secondarily in Maine. French-Canadian ancestors began their. mass and Rhode 'Island, and I know very little migration to the United'$tates over a century. about the situation' in Vermont and Connec- ago. In this paper, I will explore some of the ticut. AccOrdingly, though this paper purports $1. reasons why this is sick. to deal with the situation jn New England, -Art; . the limitations I have mentioned should be I should note at the outset that I am not kept in. mind. However, except where. noted,- a Franco-American. Prior to my involvement I believe (based on my conversations with in this subject which started in mid-October Jong-time observers of Franco-American pel 1968, I had no awareness of Franco-American ',tics)that my findings and conclusions life in New England and no personal exper- about Franco-American political behavior ience of New England life politics except for are more or less applicable to the entire

three years (1956-1959) at Harvard Law region. ,

213 219 214

II.The Nature of the French-Canadian racial groups.» I° In any event, whether the Migration to New England: Impact on failure to become «Americanked» was due Political Attitudes (1865-1900) to either the hope of returning toCanada or some notion of lasurvyance, the fact re- The storyof- the migration of many mains that many Franco-Americans simply thousands of French-Canadian rural peqsants did not care enough either to learnEnglish to find work if the New England mill towns or` perhaps more importantforpolitical dtiring the post-Civil War Years (1865-1900) purposesto become Americancitizens. The has been frequently told8and need not be point is strikingly illustrated 3y the United repeated here except as it bears on the evolu- States census of 1890 whichshows that only tion of Franco-American political attitudes. 28,465 outof. 306,440 male adults of There are at least four factors of importance. French-Canadian origin had been natural- ized.' 1 To cite another example, there w ,rre First, many individuals and families orig- 12,000 French-Canadians in Lowell, Massa- inally migrated from French Canada with Chusetts,in 1883the great majority.of the idea-of-staying only:temporarily.. whom worked.- -milts.. tmt only .425 12 ject was to work for a few yearS in the mills perscnthis group registered to vote. I in order to make enough money to pay off the 'debt of the fArrn in Canada or to buy a Third, the lack of stringent labor and arm whentheyreturned.Forthis public education laws was particularly dele- roup,th ere was' httlwire to become na- terious in the case of the Francp-Americans. turalked or to len .Englishlet alone to Franco-Americans produced large families participate in the political life of the com- (ten children were not Uncommon),and the munity. - financial burdens were considerable.Child- ren dropped out of school at anearly age,to Secondly, even those immigrantsowho in- help support the family;and 72 hour weeks tendecWo stay usually were part ofgamily were the rule. Only a verysmall number of and, community that had movedeniasse the brightest and most economicallyfortu- from Quebec and had formed «LittleCa- nate children received secondaryand higher nadasV9 in the New England mill towns. The educationusually at a college in Quebec. object of these communities was primarily Moreover, the relatively few who became. to preserve their French-Canadian_identity priests, doctors, lawyers, tethers, journal- and culture, and little 'thought was given to ists, etc.,the ovious elite group tolead a taking an active part in civicaffairs. This political movementdid not always return desire to survive as a distinct cultural group to their _Net.:England mill' towncommuni- (fla survipance»usually led by theclergy, ties but chose to settle in some of thelarger required the preservation of the,french eastern. cities. It is significant thatLowell, language by the establishment Of. French Massachusetts,-had 12,000Francolmericans parishes and schools with French-speaking in 1884 Mit no Franco-Americanlawyers" ptiests and nuns..This struggle against assimi- the group usually the most active in, poli- lationaided by the establishment of numer- tics: By 1893, almost ten yearlater, there ous Franco-Americanfraternal and cultural were 20,000Franco-Arnericatis in Lowell Societies and the FrancO-American press but Only three Franco-AmericanlaWyers.14 was remarkablysuccessful; so much so that V Gunther, writing as late as 1951. in Finally,. there was a hostility to anco- Inside "U.S.A., called the- .French-Canadians American political ambitions firsty the «tlie most parochial. and unassimilableof all Yankee ruling class,including some mil

220 215

owners and then by the Irish, the largest most accurately reflected in an 1881 report immigrant groNip who preceded the Franco- on labor conditions in New England which Americans in New England. The Yankeeop- referred to the French-Canadians as «the position, had a «Know Nothing» flavor and Chinese of the Eastern States.»16 1,4)lis largely anti-papist. The conflict withthe Irish was part of the now familiar pattern of Franco-AmericansinPolitics:(1900- Une immigrantgroup displacing another by /968) accepting lower wages and harsher working conditionsin this case in the New England By the turn of the century, the.barriers textile mills. In addition, though both the to Franco-American political participation Irish and the Franco-Americanswere Catho- were Beginning to break down. Most of lics, increasing numbers of FrancoLAmericans those. who had hoped to return to Canada .resented both the religious and financialcon- had either done so or, if not, were adjusting trol of parish affairs by Irish bishops and to the inevitable. Exposure town American priests. Repeated, and usually unsuccessful, culture had gradually producedif nota demands were made by-Franco-Americans , mastery -at least a .satisfactory command of for French-slieaking priests and the establish- the English language. Beginning in the late merit of French parishes and schools. Failing. 1880s and early1890s, intensive efforts this, Franco-Americans were loathe to give were made by leading members &f Franco- their hard won earnings to support. the Eng- An rican communities toldbrm iglaturaliza- lish-speaking churches and schools. Though tioNObs and to teach the immigrants the large numbers of French-speaking And teach- essentialsof American government. By ing parishes were eventually established in 1896, the «Chinese of the East» of only 15 Franco-American communities, ihe'struggIJ years before had at least reached the point with the Irish left a legacy of bitterness that where one observer summed up their situa- survives to this day. Indeed, the fact thata tion at the time in an article in the «Nation» majority of IR'imco-Americans apparently as follows: wereRepu)blicans untilthe time of the New Deal can be largely explained by this anti- As a class, the NewEngland French are pathy to the Irishwho were Democrats.15 treated considerately in public because of their votes, disparaged in privatethe- In sum, during the mass migrations in cause of general dislike, and sought by the period following the Civil War, Franco- all for the work they do and the money theyspend.17 Americans were slow tolrter political life. This was due to the tempor t ry nature of the In fact, by the late 1890s, Franco-Americans French-Canadian migrationnd the struggle had capped a belated entry-into politics by to resist assimilation each o which tended being elected to legislatures in every New to discourage naturalization a d the mastery England state. They gradually began to chal- of the English language. Frao-Americans lenge Yankee and Irish control of local poli- during this time were orientednore toward tics in virtually every mill town in the area. Quebecinstitutionsthanth a seinthis In New Hampshire, by 1907, there were 18 country, and Yankee and Irish a titudes did Franco-Americans in the state legislature-- not encourage Franco-Anierican eptry into by far the best record of Franco-American 'civil affairs. political performance in New England.18 Four years later, in 1911, there was talk in The public attitude at that tim toward NeW Hampshire of running a Franco-Ameri- the French-Canadian way of lifew perhaps can Congressional candidate inthefirst

1. 221 216 district. TheSkingficel(Massachusetts) Re- elected is mayors, city councillors, aldermen publican, moved by the apparent political and selestilieninmill and manufacturing vitality of the Fianco-Americans in its sister cities throughout New England. These com- state, commented as folldws: munities,in iVhicle Franco-Americans are either a/ voting majority or have the voting This interesting movement indicates t power todeternbne who gets elec'ted, in- that the Canadians of the United States clude Berlin, Somersworth, Nashua,Mad- are inclined to engage' moreactively in chester, Claremont, Franklin, Laconia and our political life than in the past. * Rochesterin New Hampshire; -Lewiston, Whether the' atteript of the Franco- Sanford, Biddeford, Winslow, Madawaska, Americans. of New Hampshire is crowned Van Buren, Ruinford, Brunswick and Water- withviccess or whether it remains un- ville in Maine; Southbridge, Chicopee, Gard- fruitful, we can expect to see in the near Fitchburg, Leominster, North Adams, future several ,citizens of French origin ner, take the path toCongress.I9 Fall -River, Lowell, Lawrence, Sal n and HolyOke in Massachusetts; PawtuFket, Cen- However, in the 57 years which have elapsed tral Falls, and Woonsocket in Rhode I and; since this 'article was wrfen, Mkt& Islabd and widely. Scattered communities inVer,- isOtb..unly New England state in which 'mont and Connecticut including Putnam nco-Americans have approached the po- (Conn.) and Winooski(Vt.).21 al success predicted. It stands alone in tieing either a Frave-Americak Gov- However, despite' the election Franco- (Aram Pothier and Emery SAn Souci) Aniericans to important position,in these nited States Senator (Felix Hebert) and Other. cities,veteranobservers22 of and it has regularly elected a Francci-Ameri- Franco-American politics almost uniformly can as one of its two.Congressmen. for the agree that Franco-Americans have notin the past 30 years. New Hampshiredespite a past and do not now possess the degree of Franco-American population of at least25% political power which one would expect con- has had only two Congressmen(Alphonse sidering their numbers in the community. Roy and Oliva -Hunt) and each of those for The city of Salem, Massachusetts, may serve single terms in 1936-1938 and 1962-1964, to illustrate the point. respectively .Neither Massachusetts, Maine or Vermont has had aFranco-American Con- Since 1910, the .population of Salem has gressman. Connecticutelected its first four remained fairly constant at about 40,000 years ago, WilliamSt. Ouge, who was recent- people.22a"There are no .completely reliable ly re-elected. figures as to ethnic breakdowns of the Salem population, but a generallyaccetifecl esti- It is only in lo politics that Franco-. mate is that the ci y, since about1930, has Americans have beensignifidntly repre- been 45% Irish,41go. 49 to 45% Franco- sented. By 1929, Franco-Americans were American with thipemaining percentage serving as mayors in eleven NewEngland mostly Polish and Italian and scatterings of cities: Woonsocket and(infra; Falls in other ethnic groups (Greeks, Lithuanians, Rhode Island; Fall River, Southbrigge,Chico- -etc.).23 Though very close in numbers to the opee and Fitchburg inMassachusetts; Man- Irish, no Franco-American has ever been chester and Somersworth in NewHampshire; elected mayor, and since 1918 all the may- and Waterville, Wrightion andBiddeford in ors in Salem have beenIrish.Ihe city has a Maine.20 Thereafter, and to the present mayor-councillor form of government, and time,-Franco - Americans 'continueto be of the eleven councillors currently holding

1

222 217

office, there\kt..e six Irishmen, three Franco- can who was Mayor of Lewiston from 1965 'Americans, one Pole and one Italian. Of the to 1967, the reason for thisisthat the ol. top. 20 positions in city government (clerk, Franco-Americans do not seek these posi- tax collector, parks and public works direc- tions and generally are not interested in city tor,school superintendent, etc.), 80%are government. held by the Irish, and no such office iscur- rently occupied by a Franco- American.24 Salem and Lewiston provide two illustra- While there have always bee'n at least two tion's of the failure of Franco-Americans to Franco-Americmicouncillorssince1930 achieve political power in any proportion to jand as high as five duringone four year per- their population in the communitya pat-, it is clear that Franco-Americans have tern which persists throughout New England. played a decidedly subordinate role to the What followsis an analysis of why this ,Irish a familiarrefrainincitypolitics should be. throughout New England.

The situation As described in Salem holds IV.- Pl-arico-AnterkanPoliticalAttitudes. 4 more or less true in many cities throughouto New England whire Franco-Americanspos- To my knowledge, the only,, material sess potentially decisive voting power. There specifically on this subject in either English isa repeating pattern of the absence of or French is an article in French written in Franco-Americans inone or more of thefol. 1961 by Josaphat T. Benoit, fdr 18 years the lowing: the mayoralty, the city council,or . highly respected Franco-American mayor of the chief operative positions of citygovern- Manchester, New Hampshire.26 According ment. Other examps include Fall 'River, to 13fnolt, Franco-American political' pro- New Bedford, Lawrence, Lowell, Holyoke, gress in New England, has been sloiv and Springfield and. Webster in Massachusetts; sporadicdile to several «defects» in the Nashiia,Newer andLewiston, French character as folldws: maine.24 a tai First, as a consequence of several cen- The case of Lewiston, Maine, is, partic- turies of rural life, says Benoit, the 'Franco- ularly revealing. This city, with a population, American has shown avtimidity and modesty of 42,000, is about 85% Franco-American, which is inconsistent, with public life. Quali- and has been referred to as the «Franco- fied Franco-Americanswhether in govern. Americancapitolof New Eng4nd,»25 ment, teaching or the professionsdo not (although Manlister, New Hampshire and play an activist role, and wait to be solicited FallRiver, Massachusetts, also claim the by others. Generally, a Franco-American title). For many years the city has continu- seeking political office will simply put for- ally elected a Franco-American mayor. How- ward a rather bare outline of -his qualifica- ever, Lewiston has traditionally been run tions, and will not be inclined to a full ma- not by the mayor but by various «Corfimis- Ibilization of his friends and resources on his 4. sions» (Police, Fire, *fiance, Health and -kehalf Welfare, Public Woirkteach Of which is com- posed of five inemb. e 1. A majority of these Second, the Franco-American lacks per- Commissions have usually been n Franco- severance. A Franco-American who is de- Americaq., eventhough appoied by a feated for public-officeunlike politicians in Franco-AiArican mayor, According to Rob:* some other ethnic groupswill rarely' run ert Coutourier, an able young Franco-Ameri- again.

223

A 218

Third, Franco-Americans- show certain money in a political campaign and, as a re- . prejudices against groups who have gained suit, job appointments and other patronage political success because they are more ten- often elude them. acious or aggressivequalities disliked by Franco-Americans but essential in politics. In a recent interview, Benoitwho at age These ethnic rivalries forceFran&-Americans 68 is now the director of the FederalSmall into absurd inconsistencies, as in the case of Business Administration in New,Hampshire, aMassachusettsFranco-American«who reaffirmed what he wrote seven years ago. voted for Nixon because Kennedy iS kith, He underlined the economic factors invold. against Gelinas (Franco-American Republican Franco-Americans, until relatively 'recent running for district attorney of Worcester said Benoit, had to «work like blazes» to County) because he is Republican, but for support their large families. Thisallowed Furcolo (Democrat) because he is 'Italian' little time either to seek political office or to like the pope.»27 campaign for others, and even less money Tor such purposes. Fourth, continues Benoit, Mere is jeal- ousy amongst theFranco-American elite Another approach, suggested byBenoit which divides political strength andneu- and other experienced Franco-American po- tralize§theactionof Franco-American litical observers, is that the Franco-Ameri- leaders. Instead of uniting behind one II- cans, unlike some otherethnic groups, «do qualified. Franco-American candidate, I ey not vote for theirown.» In hisbook, Protes- often promote several candidacies at the tant and Catholic, a study ofreligious and sametime.28 social interaction in Holyoke, Massachusetts, Kenneth Underwood states': Fifth, Franco - Americans are inclined to hold po litical grudges among themselves and French Catholics cannot be counted against other ethnic groups. Political op- upon to cast a «block vote»for one of ponentsaware of this traitpromote and theirowlpeople. The French-dominated Wards 1 and fit! 1936 voted about 3 to provoke discord betWeen Franco-Americans 1 for two Irishcandidates over the and thus gain power under the principle of French candidate for County Commis- divide and conquer. sioner * * * [These French Wards], which . are also traditionallyDemocratic * Sixth, the Franco-American is disposed supported [in the 1944 elections]'the _ (to a 'kind of verbalviolence, which encour- Irish Catholic Democratic candidate for 'liges and multiplies quarrels. Franco-Ameri- theStateHouse of Representatives cans have not learned acardinal lesson of against the French CatholicRepublican politics,i. e.,to seek reconciliation even ,1 candidate. Holyoke Transcript, Novem; where strong discord exists. ber 8, 1944,p.12'30

Seventh,Franci:-Americanslettheir Two other examples outof many may emotional feelings overcome reason. Benoit be cited. In the-1960 electionsManchester, refers to the statement of Sir Wilfrid Laurier: Nev0 Hainpshire, which is over 50%Franco- «In Quebec, there are no political opinions; American and is two) tooneDemocrat, there are onlyfeelings.»29 gave .1112,000 'majority vote to John,F. Kennedy, but, a 700 vote majority tothe. Re- publican governor Wesley Powell, againsthis 4 Finally, states Benoit,Franco-Americans' are prsimonious ininvesting their time or Democrat Franco-American aoilversary Ber-

224 ti

219.. nard L. Boutin.3 I * * * Every nationality has some trait which distinguishes it apart sCion lan- In the 1956 Congressional Democratic guage or faith, and in the Frenchman, primary in Mainewhereno Franco-Amerit be he from France, Canada, car the United can has yet been elected to Congressthe States,itisindividualism.The Irish Yankee Frank Coffinwas running against a American is verymuchan individual, Franco-American. Coffinwon the prinuiry also, but he can adapt himself easily to and carried by a considerable margin those his fellows-, wheip,as the Franco-Ameri- areas which were heavik' Franco-American. -can makes teamwork difficult. I can re- meibber the trials and wars of the bas- An old .line .Franco- American 1 politician, ketballcoaches after, hearing of the overwhelming Franco- atAssumption [the Franco-AmericancollegeinWorster, American support for Coffin,was said tp Mass.], when they _would try to instill remark with tears in hiseyes: We didn't cl4 some tactics into the players' heads. what the Yankees said we wouldwe chose the long run, it was simpler to give them the best man, not the Frenchman.»32 the ball, and let them do what they wanted. *.*-* However, Franco-Americanpoliticians This individualism work's in devious unanimously agree that Franco-Americans ways. Alone or by the aid of oithers, a (regardless of their party affiliation) will Franco-American may rise a little -above hea/vily- supportan 4,1Itstanding Franco- the rest. Then some will say: . dl est orgueilleux. He is proud, and American candidatesuchas Benoit,or- forgets that we put him tliere.» Robert Coutourier in Maine. But since most There may be criticism: political candidates, like, inostXoRle,are «Flow is it that he rose to such a poil-'' not outstattling, the TeaSons forhis over- tion? » all lack of Franco-American voting solidarity Or jealousy: are worth examining. «Why shouldn't I have his position? » Itall endswith. the failure of the Perhaps the best explanation has been Franco-Americans to. support theiPcorn- given by Jacques Ducharme,a Nev England patriot, so that any importance he might have had as their representative is tost.34 Franco-American, who hasoffeidsome ., 4 penetrating insights into the Frtanco-Ameri- can world. In his 1943 boO, The Shadows Virtually every Franco-American whom of the Trees, a charming and highly personal I interviewed35 agreed that this individuality account of the Franco-Americans in New whether it is inherent anOthe French or de-, England, DUcharme looks atsome of «the" rived from notions associated with the French highly original vagaries of Franco-American revolution, of for whatever reasonisa basiC- politics.»33 After noting thedivisions which quality of the Franco-American, indeed of have characterized Franco-Ameriban politics, all the French, and has considerably weak-, Ducharme comments as follows: ened Franco-American political strengtp:

The root of all thilevil'is the individu- In addition to the factors already ality of- the Franco-American, his insis- men-. tenCe, on maintaining his own opinion tioned, there are perhaps some deeper ex- without regard to any partloyalty. planationsfor Franco-American political [This]intenseindiividualismofthe attitudes. Franco-AMericans have: been sloW% 'Franco- American is his greatest quality in seeking political pOwet as a reiult ofan and his worst defect' Everything begins almost unique ethos (outlook, orientatio

and ends there.* * * and value system) which has survived toe-

225

r 220 over three centuries.In .sum, this ethos is push and north, most of them'set- one derived from aFrench-Canadian pre- tied on farm lands along the banks of the, industrial rural ArcietY dominated by the St. Lawrence. These farmersqhabitants» religiou,)1 and social philosophy of the Ro- constituted the group from wind are de- man Ca toile church. If theFranco-Ameri- scendedthegreatmajorityof French- cans «latk that final touch inpoliti# (in Canadiansincluding those who later mi- the woills of Henri Goguen, f r Secre- grated to the New England mill towns in the tary of State of Massachusetts)ifthey have United States." Accordingly,itis most not shown that ambition and drive forpoliti-' pertinent to examine the culture and way cal powerit is to this ethos that we must of fife of these habitants and the societyin look. hi ft they lived. By 1760the time of the British con- V. The French-Canadian Ethos questthe situation-of the French-Canadian community, as set forth in a 1956 Report of By the time of the British conquestof the RoyalCommission of Inquiry on Con- New France (later to become theprovince.Of stitutiolialPrObkrns in-Quebec, niak- be, Quebec)in1760, the French-Canadivis marized asfollows: numbered about.65,000.36 This group turnwas descended mainlyfrom some 1) ruined financially, through many years 10,000 settlersmostlypeasants,altisans of war; during 2) cut off from its original mother coun- and soldierswho came from France of century:37 France, at the time try * * * from the triple viewpoints the preceding economy, culture and religion; when most of the Canadian immigration was 3) beheaded of its civil ,elite;its public takingplace(about1632-1740)was a administrators, traders and contracters, strongly Catholic nation; an absolute mon- as well as the social leaders,had re- _ archy .by divine right in which parliament turned to France. played only a consultative role; and an agrar- 4) deprived of its higher education; the ian nation with remnants of feudalism em- colleges of the Jesuits and the Recollets bodied in a seigneurial system underwhich which had provided secondary educa- the King granted land for a periodicfee to tion, were closed and [of thecolleges] a seigneur who in turndeeded parcels of the the sole survivor was the Seminaire de land to rent payingpeasants.38 Quebec; 5) separated from major business and fromthesouiVes of As the Frenchimmigrants'seThled in Can- consequently contin- wealth; * * * ada, these French institutions were Its clergy alone remained to direct itsi ued substantially without change.Settle- religious, cultural, social and even its ment and colonization weredirected in Can-. political life.'" ada by officials (the governor and theinten- dant) appointed by and directlyresponsible to the King (Louis XIV), whoreinstituted In short, by .the time that New France the seigneural system.Ecclesiastical adminis- was ceded to Britainin 1763, most of the tration with schools run by thechurch was.* French-Canadian community,except for its established by 1663 under the authorityof clergy, was hardly -aware of even «thepossi- Bishop Laval and the creation ofNotre bilities ofpoliticsm42as an instrumentfor conditions. Dame de Quebecparish.39 Though some of., changing social "arid economic these first :1.0,000 immigrants-continued to As Gustave Larictot has observed:

ri. 226 221/

:11the habitants ofNew France had no When the faith lay safe, no distant cal experience of common action in politi- to democratic liberty held much appeal cal matters. With no organization what:. to the churchmen. The reason may have soever that cotifsi groupand direct them been partly that the torch of freedom so they had become accustomed to sub- ea, often appeared to be borne by enemies mitting without question to the ordi- of the faith, as in the case of nineteen& nances of the Intendants, to the orders centuryrevolutionaries whose staple of ,the.governot's and t9 the edicts of stock-in-trade was anti-clericalisin.464 Versailles.43 I. For the next one hundred years and As previously wiled, of the elite there morecontinuing into the period of heavy primarily remained the _clergy whose'goals migration to the United States (1865-1900) were to safeguard the faith and keep its French Onada remaineda clergy oriented parispioners 'true to thspirit of la survi- rural societya society, in the words of vance. Kwavnick,the I CanadianpoliticalIA. R. M. Lower, «essentiiilly cut off from scientist, has noted that preservation of the the rest of the worla, turned inwardupon it- faith was no easy task inan Anglo-Saxon elf to a degreeyfew people of English speech controlled «milieu in which lifewas domi- can grasp; a society unbelievably parochial nated by materialistic impulses and the but in every sen a a strong blood brother- Protestant ethic, and in which most changes hood. »47 tendedtodevalue and undermine reh- gion.»44 However, thefears of the clergy By 1860, over 80% of French Canada were soon put to rest for reasons well stated Was rural, and it was almost exclusively the by Pierre Trudeau, the present prime minis- habitantsforced from their. land due to ter of Canada: obsolete agricultural practices resulting in soil exhaustionwho came to the United When CanadapassedintoBritish States.48 In 1861 and 1862,the Frenth hands, the Church naturally concerned consul at Quebec, Gauldree-Boilleau, madea herself with safegrding the faith by study of a typital French-Canadian rural protecting hera ority. And, asit family living in Quebec in St. berme Parish turned out, sh iscovered that her position thd in .a sense improved. For on the north coast of the St. Lawrence after the &bade of 1760, she remained River. The study (Paysen de St. Irenee) is alone as a social beacon to give strength valuable for itsescription of the ethoeof and guidance to vanquished people, and these habitants the eve of their great mi- to the victor she had the potentialities gration to the New England mill towns dur- of a formidable opponent. So, after ing the next thiffy and more years. difficult beginnings, both powers found it advantageous to work out a modus ThehabitatofSt. Ireneeo>states vivendi.Loyaltywasbarteredfor Gauldree-Boilleau, «still [in the year 1861) religious freedom, and the Church was does not quite understand the importance of as good as her word. During the wars of educatidn. At the time filed for the pay- 1775,1812,1914, and1939, the ment of contributions, the school commis- Catholic hierarsW prescribed submis- sion to His Majesty's government; they sioners are sometimes in an open struggle even launched an appeal against the with a sector of the population.*49 Withre- Fenian raiders In 1870. And at the time spect to secondary and higher education, of the 1837 rebellion,45 they used their Gauldree-Boilleau says: «Although several powers to check the patriots. habitants of St. Irenee would 13e able to

?27 222 A'

afford sending their childreu to college, they We are simple people, we habitants, do nbt have that ambition, and only concern said Isidore, one day *« and because themselves with training to be good farm- of our ignorance, we are forced to put educated citizens at the head of our V ers.»5 ° Some reasons for this indifference of municipalities and our administrations, the habitant tphigher education are,, com- but these leaders basically explqit us mented on by Gauldree-Boilleau as follows: Its and perhaps do not deserve the respect T ie parishoners of St. hence claim of honest people.53 th t most of the children that are sent to the Quebec colleges lose theirreli- It was only the clergy, of all the edu-. gious faith there and often learnObad sated classes, whoiwere respected by the habits: The behaviour of the «seigneurs» habitantsand were., the undisputed -leaders Gaul- --doctors, notaries, and lawyers of the of all aspect of community, life. As countyis used as proof of this claim. If dree-Boilleau noted: one Is to believe them, thisclass of edu- cated people fairly frequently give rise The authority of the cure is respect- to scandals through their immoderate ed;, he enjoys the esteemaccorded to

..behaviour, their sacrilegious speech and those whose mission is to teach and to theii absence of scruples in financial comment on the Gospel. People firmly transactions. These accusations arise, in believe that the priest has supernatural part, from sentiments of jealousy which relationships with heaven:The-habitants' exist nearly everywhere in the country will take the advice of their cure in all against the bourgeois classes; but it is important affairs, . whether religious or necessary to recognize that themorali civil. His intetvention wards off pro- of independent wealthy people- or of deedings at law or terminates them, ap- those involved in the liberal professions peases hate and reconcilesenemies. The are in contrast, to a certain extent,in civil law hardly affects them;they Canada with the simple character and hardly take it into account. On the con- the pious beliefs of the farmers.51 trary, for them, religion is apowerful brake and the only one capable of re- To pause for a moment in this narration straining them.54 of Gauldree-Boilleau's study, itis evident Reflecting on the attitude of both the that these attitudes towards education and . the liberally educated professionsattitudes habitantsand the clergy toward the state which thehabitantbrought with him to the during these years, PierreTrudeau writes: 'United Statesimpeded the development of either a politically sophisticated electorate A conquered people therefore not or an' eliteleadership group. Moreover, as only faced a state which they feared as Gauldrfe-Boilleau pointed out, the principle the creature of a foreign natioq, but also of organizing 'themselves for political pur- belonged to a church which distrusted that state as a rival power and as a child poses <

28 t irtMuillatirk, 223

to help the needy and, maintain order. «Do you think that you would like I Electoral processes" for. the mass of the public life, Pierre?» people remained mysterious rituals of «Yes, father. 1 think that I should like foreign origin, of little value beyond it very nun.» that for which the individualcan barter «But, Pierre, you have seen only one his vote: a receipted grocery bill, a bot- phase of it.» tle of whisky, orkman's compensa- ((What do you mean, father?» asked tion, a contract towild a bridge, a Pierre, who began to sense that his fa- schdol grant,a commumhospita1.55 ther's inquiry had a purpose behind it. His father made a deprecatory gesture, In sum, the many thousand habitants and replied: who migrated to the New E land mill «It is not clean work, Pierre. Coup towns during the years following the Civil you be sincere when you needed votes? War brought with them the attitudes of And then if you were elected to any of- arural,clergy oriented, anti-intellectual, fice would you abide by the promises anti-state society. which did not see political which you would have made? And action as very necessary and did not view would you keep clear of graft?». «Why father,-» protes* Pierre,«1 politics as an honorabte way to spend one's have no intention of entering politics, at life. This,. then, is the political ethos which least not for a long time. And if rdo, I the French-Canadian habitants passedon to shall try to do my job honestly.» their FranIco-American descendants in New Jean Baptiste nodded, for he knew England. that Pierre had much moral sense in him. Nor was the for& of this ethos much «I ktiow that you would, Pierre. It is 4 diminished by the transfer froma rural to an only that I would rather no son of mine industrial setting. For, in New Englandas in have anything .to do with politics. The Canada, the life of the new immigrantso- Irish are at present in the saddle, and in cial, cultural, and religiousc4tered around the last campaign I can't say that 1 cared the clergy, who were with few exceptions, for their inethods.»57 the only natural leaders who had emigrated Another acute observer o Franco- with the habitants from Quebec.56 Asa result, the old values were retained in sub- American world, George Theriau It,(currently a professor of sociology stantially undiluted formincluding the bias at Dartmouth), against active participation in politics. made ,a similar observation in his 1951 Doc- toral thesis at Haqvardan intensive study In his 1939 novel, The Delusson Family, of the Franco-Aniericans in Nashua, New Jacques Ducharme tells the story of Jean Hampshire. Drawing from his «notebook of Baptiste Delusson, who came froth his farm observations of Franco-American life,» Ther- iault in Saint Valerin, Quebec, in 1874 to work in describesthefollowingscene on the mills at Holyoke, Massachusetts. Some election night at the Laliberte family of Nashua, New Hampshire: years later, when the French-Canadians were making their first effort to break Irishcon- Suddenly Jean [one of the six Lalibertd trol of city government, Jean Baptists'sson, Pierre, children), a tall thin youth ofseventeen indicated 4aninterestinpolitics. now at home on vacation from St. Shortl), after the French-Canadians had been Charles Barromee, the seminary he at- defeatedinthis attempt, JeanBaptiste tends during the school year at Sher- questioned his son: brooke, in Quebec, Canada, butsts into

229 4'

224

room, crying in almost hysterical excite- Their habits being simple and their ment, «Les bleus gagnent!» «Les bleus living cheap, they aresatisfiedwith gagnent!» («The are winning!») little,andsocialambitions do not Jean has been listening to the Montreal trouble them much.6° radio, with friends next door, and he has just received the first returns on Ca- A. R. M. Lower,writingin1929in nadian national elections that had been «New France in New England,» portraysthe held that day. His father, Antoine, re- French-Canadian character as follows: bukes him mildly for bursting Into the room and says to him: «Tut'excite pour He has the Norman qualities of thrift rien, mon p'tit»(411'regettingall and industry, all the Latin's sociability worked up over nothing,n.») Jean, and that virtue for which the Latin is abashed and puzzled ate lack of in- not conspicuously famous, honesty, at terest in the news whicseems to be least honesty in the small things of life. clearly importantto him, turns and He is medievally conservative. His is not leaves the room.58 an acqiiisitive or materialistic nature.He 4 is cast in -rather a ,small. mould and is Jean Baptiste Delusson and Antoine La- satisfied to have things as his ancestors liberte were typical of the older generation had them. * **Essentially religious and of French-Canadian and latei Franco-Ameri- spiritual in his outlook on life, hestands cans who held politicians andpolitical power at the opposite pole fromProtestant to be unworthy of serious attention.lf, as materialism andindividuilism.61 ndted by Glazer and Moynihan, politics, is viewed as a vehicle to provide «jobs, * * Writini in 1937 in her study if ethnic recognition and prestige and the advance- groups in Burlington,Vermont, Elin L. An- ment of group interests,» thenclearly it was derson observed,. not a main area of interestfor Franco- Americans." For what was important to In Burlington those of French-Cana- the great mass of Franco-Americans was not dian descent form a bloa of nearly ten thousand people. Although individually power or recognitionbutsalvation. Nor was TR meant the volatile, they are as a group unassertive, financial success much sought concerned primarily with maintaining diminution of one's faith. Excessive ambi- - what they have in the way of national tionpolitical or otherwisewas not encour- integritytheir religion, Their language, aged, and an acceptance of place and station their customs. They" have never had to was ti sign of personalhumility consistent fight for these in the same way as the with the hope of salvation. Irish. The right was granted them by the British at the tithe of the conquest and Comineytators on the Franco-American they have preserved the characteristics world have been noting tills ethos for many by consiant.passive resistance to outside years. For instance, in1897, W. P. Green- influence whether British of French. ough wrote of the French-Canadians in New Even in Burlington they seem less per- turbed than others by the course of out- England: side events; they put their faith inGod and quietly produce the future popula- The people are mainly industrious, tion of thecity.62 but to a New Englander would not seem hard worked. Mechanics do not try to history in- turn out .the most and best work pos- In 1939, Constance Green, a sible, but only, enough to live on, and structor at Smith College,summarized the just a little more if the chance comes. earlysociallifeof French-Canadians in f:1

225 rw<

Holyoke, Massachusetts as follows: showy one. 'Theyare the laborers, the smalltaxpayers,the privates inthe Work, go to Mass, save money, and re-. Army, the millworkers, the small tyxn to Province Quebec that mer- was long chants, the women clerks in department the order. As time wore on the dream of stores, all common people.66 final return to Canada lollmuch of its charm and the French Canadianac- cepted Holyokeas his home. Yet al- Obviously, if thiswas representative ,of the though many of these peoplebecame group«tobe emulated,» then Franco- naturalized citizens, theywere not soon Americans clearlywere not destinedat or easily Americanized. Their children least for some timeto developthe kind of attended French schools;they spoke leadership necesiary for political success.67 French Canadian at home; they readthe Of, course, as previously notedutheFrench- locallypublished Frenchnewspaper; Canadian ethos did not preventsome Franco- they celebrated theirown special holi- Americans from achieving significantelector- days, New Year's and St. John the Bap- alvictoriesparticularlyinmunicipalities tist'sDay. Outside- their church few with heavy Franco-American knew much pleasure.63. populations. But the French-Canadian ethos, unlikethat of the Irish, for example, did not inspirethat Almosttwenty yearslater, Kenneth «final touch»68 that desire to attainthe Underwoodalso writing of theinteraction full measure oe political of various ethnicgroups in Holyokenotes power. that Franco-Americans «havenot shown so great a drive as the Irish forleadership and social status,» and that dheir[the Franco- VI. The Impact of Assimilationon Franco- Americans] stolid temperamentand accep- American Political Attitudes tance of the conditions of workmade them more acceptable to the Yankee millowners Franco-Americans almost unanimously than the aggressive Irish.0 4 agree that since the end of World War H .) there has been a slow but progressivebreak- George Theriault, in his 1951study, con- ing down of the elements of la surviOance. trasts «the typically American conceptionof Concerned Franco-Americans attribute this 'going places,'getting somewhere in the gradual loss of their unique cultureto many world'» With the French-Canadianattitude factors. They note the decline of theuse of as follOws: French in the home; the lack of interest in bi-lingualism and the increaseduse of Eng- Where, for the American, the father's lish by the younger generation;69the fall- material achievement is to be surpassed ing off in attendance at Franco-American and enlarged upon, for the FrenchCana- churches; the growing popularity ofpublic dian the father's life isa shining ex- schools; the number of mixed marriages;" ample to be emulated.65 the development ofa more cosmopolitan world view since World War II; theimpact of Theriault's observations haveparticular television; loss of popular interest andsup- significance as a guide to theevolution of port of the Franco-Ametican presS;71and, Franco - American political attitudes.For, as simply, the inevitable ad ption of thevalues Jacques Ducharmo observed in 1943: of the majority group inhich they live.72

The part that the Franco-Americans Perhaps the most eloquent spokesman in have played in New England isnot a"' New England for the maintenance of Franco- 226

American identity and cultureisWilfred social cohesiVeness and identityembodied in thenrea Beaulieu,theiklitor of La Travailleur, a la survipance was not transferred to Franco'-American weekly «journal ofopin- of politics. The Franco-American,largely be- individuality and his mistrust of ion devoted exclusively tothe recording and cause of his to the promotion of Franco-Americancultural politicians, could not be counted upon activities.» I visited fleaulieu on aSaturday cast a block vote or tosupport' without ques- afternoon in mid-November(1968) at his tion a fellow Franco-American.With increas- movement office in Manchester, NewHampshire where ing acculturation and a continual La Trawl lleur is. printed.A short, stocky to what Banfield andWilson have called the man with a strongFrench accent, Beaulieu «Anglo-Saxon Protestant politicalethos,»74 that Franco- was there assistingthe operator of the print- there is even less of a possibility politics ing press in getting out tipedition. Beaulietli Americans will be sympathetic to a ethnic recog- who noted That, as editor,le alsO occasional, of ethnic appeal. If a desire for -ly swept the floors, made nosecret of the nition persists at all, it willprobably be man- uncertain finahcial status ofhis journal, and ifested in the pride whichFranco-Americans spoke regretfully of the declineof the once have in the newer breed ofFranco-American vigorous Franco American. press inNew Eng- politicianmen like the able andarticulate land.73 «When I am dead,» said the 68 year Bergard lioutin of NewHatnpshirels who old Beaulieu, «no one willbe fool enough to are representativeof the ethnic group «but the attributes of the carry on.» Beaulieublames the decline of at the same time display model.76 the spirit of la survivance on the «newbreed» generally admied Anglo-Saxon of clergy ..To quote Beaulieu: Thedifferenceinpoliticalattitudes The clergy of 50 and 75 years ago was shown by the older and youngergqterations educated in Quebec, and brought_theN Franco-American politicians is particularly mentality, and institutions ofFrench evident. The older politicians whomI inter- Canada with them. These priests were viewed,, without exception, takefor granted dedicated to «la survivance» andtheir the existence of ethnicfactors in political creed could be summed up by the say- life. Indeed, they view theirconstituencies foi.» ing «Qui perd sa langue, perd sa largely in terms of their ethnicgroupings and faith.) (Who loses his language, loses his usually deploresome mildlyand othersve- Since the 1920s, the Irishbishops of of the New England have pressed forassimila- hemently the voting independence tion of all groups within one.Roman Franco-American electorate. Catholic Church. Thus, a new breedof Franco-American clergy, born andedu- By contrast, the attitudeof the younger cated in the United States, has been cre- Franco-American politicians was perhapsthe ated. They speak French(but rather best typified by Emile Bussiere,the 36 year poorly); and do not encourage presei-va- old attorney who was recentlydefeated as tion'of the language. Nor do theylave the democratic candidate for governorof the same single-mindeddevotiopto New Hampshire. «I have neverlooked upon maintenance of French culture. Ihave the ethnic aspect of political life asof over- spent my life trying to preserveFranco- whelming significance,* said Bussiere,«and I American culture. I, and others like me, hope the day will come whenethnic factors are losing the fight. will be of no impoitancewhatever.»77 Simi- The impact of assimilation onFranco- lalyiews were expressed by RichardGuy, 34, attitude's is difficult to a citycouncillor in Salem, Massachusetts, American political President of the assess. As previouslynoted, the spirit of and Maurice Arel, 31, the

232. 227

Board of Aldermen in Nashua,New Ramp- ethnic identification and sline.78 Guy cohesionso ex- and Arel are 'examples of the tends to politicOperhapsan inevitability a lturative process at -work. Bothcome for a Franco-American fin families who stressed politician in a city the «old values» where Franco-Americans_constitute about religion,_ the Frenchlanguage,' survival of gS% of the the faithand a bick.of population. Coutourier frankly emphasis on the role stated that, becoming-Mayor of Lewis- of edtication; both rejectthe old 'values; ton in 1965, he made both married girls who a special effort to ap- were not Franco- point qualified Franco-Americans to posts Amerikan; both are sending their children to in city government inorder to correct the public schobls; both doubtthat their clip- 'imbalance which "had favored dren will learn to speak , non Franco- French; both regard Americang formany years. (See discussion religion as subordinate to educatibn and under Part HI, above.) Itis this desire to both-attend nb,n. Franco:American churches. «stick tog-ethermore closely,» as Coutourier gave an interesting example of the put it, that distinisheshis approach from ging conception of the clergyover three that of Emile Bussiereand others. «Given orations: «To my grandparents,» Arel two candidates of roughlyequal abilities,» said,<

233 22)3

Notes

1. The Franco-American population inNow Eng- sachusettsand perhaps the most knowledge- land can only be estimated. The United States able Franco-American politician in the state- census of 1960 gives populationfigures in each says that up to20% of the state's population state for fore. ign stock (foreign born orhaving is.fra 'co- American. (personal interview) one parent foreignborn) «Canadiani* but does . . not break these figures downfurther into 6. The Vermont and Connecticutpercentages are French Canadians and Other Canadians.The estimates of Benoit(op. cit., 17).- 1950 census gives figures only for «foreign born* Canadian French and OtherCanadians. 7. 'David Walker hasexplorid this subject in The Pranco-Americans,» David Walker, fooily at the Bureau for Re- Presidential Politics of the- search in Mull" Governnlent at -Bowdoin °Canadian Journal of Etimomks and Political ko6.28, go. 3, --August 1962. See also Collage, estim in 1961 that_Franco-Ameri- Science, yltics and Ethnocentrism: The Case can; numbereat least 12% of the New. Eng- Walker, land population. David B. Walker,Politics and of the Franco-Americans, op. cit. Ethnocentrism: The Case of the Franco-Ameri- for Aexample, G. T.Paor,The French. cans,Bowdoin College Bureau for Research in 8. See, CanelianiN IV& England,(Unpublished "Mas- unictpalGovernment,Brunswick,Maine, 61, 7. the estimate of over one millionnoted ter'strhesis, Brown University); 19,32; Jacques The Shadows of the Trees ye As that of JosephatT. Benoit, former Duchanne, air Hampshire. Jose- York: Harper and Brothers), 1943; . Her mayor of Manchesterotiew Franco-Amerlcah Efforis on Beh AttitudesdesrFranco-Ameri- Lem re, phat T. Benoit, States,. calnes en folitique,(Brunswick, )Maine: Franco- the Flecits-Languege In thet\United 4mericali institute), 1964, 17 (infrench). (Langdige Resources Project: Dept. ofEduca- Henit-Gbugeii, former iSebretary of State bf tion),'1964, 2-3} Lemaire's study is also clog- Loyalty 4 'Massachusetts and President ofL'Union Saint tainid in Joshua A. Fishman,Lan}yage the largest fraternal the United States.(The' Haje, Mc:14ton), Jean Baptiste d'Amerique, book insurance society in the United States,estimates .I was not able-to procure this latter Franco- so my page references areto the «LanguagetRe- N. that there ze at least two million sertfme. Americans ir New England. (personalinterview) source4Project» whidh Lemaire kindly at:, 13. 2. Josephat T.Benoit, Attitudes les Franco-Amer- '9. Benoit,op. 5. e icaines eh Politique,(Brunswick; Maine: Franco- Inside U.S.A.,Revised Edition, ... American Institute), 1961, 17, (inFrench). 101 John Gunther, v. . 1951, 00. 3. This percentage is the estimategiven to me by of State of G. T. Prior,The French Canadians in NewEng-' August P. La Franoe, Secretary Thesis, Brawn Rhode island, who states that it isbased, on a land,(UnpublishedMaster's recent survey. Benoit(op. cit,17) estimates University), 1932,151. ' the Rhode Island percentage at 20%. 12.Difectoire des Canadians -Fraais de Lowell, year 1884 (in '4. Walker,(op .,it.,7) estimates the Maine per- MM., and' A/mariac for centage as st one sixth of the state's popu- Frer(ch). lation. Benciop. cit., 17)estimates20% and Robert, Coutourier, the former mayor of Lewis- 13. Arthur L. EnofillesAvOcats Fradco-Americains ton, Maine, places the percentagfk-at25%. (per- de Lowell(18864936) (in French). sonal interview) , 14.'Ibid. population is 5.Ten per cent of the Massachusetts Benoit, former the estimate of Benoit(op. cit.,17). Henri 15-Interview with JosephatT. Manchester; NewFaipshire; Ro- 'is Gougen,fo6er SeCretary of State of Mas- mayor of .

40.

2 3 4

r. 229

bert Rumilly,Histoire des Franco-Amlfricains mayor of Lewiston, who gave me most of the (L'Union Saint Jean Baptiste d'Amerique: Mon- information on Lewiston' . treal), 1958, 85, 174; Prior,op. cit,294. An- other explanation of Franco-American Repub- 26. See Benol .cit., 14-16. I have tried to dis- licanism prior to the New Deal Was offeredby cover all the vant materials in English on the Aram J. Potkner, the Franco-American Gover- subject and have some effort (although nor of Rhode Island for several terms in the not an exhaustive one) to root out the French ,.early 1900s who stated: (Quotefrom Prior,op. writings. I read French only sparingly and the cit., 243).«By instinct, by education, and,I will French materials whichwere found were read add, by our religious beliefs,.we are conserva- to me by a French-Canadian friend. tive; that is vyjy our political tendehcieshave lken generyepublican.» 27. Benoit,op. cit., 15.

16. Mass. Bureau of Labor Statistics:-Report- of 28. This same pointfis made in Min L. Anderson's 1881', Investigation into RegulatingLaws of .We Americans(Cambridge: Harvard University Labor in New Ensiand Statesr quotedin Prior, Tress), 1937, a study of ethnicgroups in Bur; op. cit., 1.4. lington, Vermont as follows: (atpp. 216-217): 1The French Canadians * * *say that instead 17. Quoted in Les Franco- Amdricains paints par of standing together and helpingone of their eux-memes (Association Canado-Americaine, members to attain public office,as they believe Montreal),_1936, 11. the Irish do, they jealously watch each other's advancement, and frequently holda member 18. Prior,op. cit., 273. down if he seems to be making to rapidpro- d gress beyond the group.» 19. Quoted in Prior,op. cit.,273-274. 29. Benoit,op. cit.,15. 20. Prior,op. cit.,293. 4' 30. Kenneth W. Underw'ood,Protestant and Catho- 21. David B. Walker, «The Presidential Politics of lic(Boston: The Beacon Press), 1957, 462. Franco-Americans,»Canalan Journal of Eco- nomics and Political Science,Vol. 28, No. 3, 31.1nterview with Bernard L.Boutin; See also August 1962, 353. , Benoit,op. cit.,15.

22. For example, Josephat T. Benoit, 68,former 32. Quoted in Duane Lockard,New England State mayor of Manchester, New Hampshire, Henri Politics(Princeton: Princeton University Press), Goguen, 71, former Secretary of State-ofMas- 1959, 317. sachusetts; Philip Morenzy, 61, former city councillor. of Salem, Mass. for 27years; "and 33. Ducharme, op. cit., 167. Others (personal interviews). e. 34.Ibid169-173. 22a.Monograph, City of Salem; Mass. Dept. of Com- merce and Pevelopnient, Boston, Mass: 35. -IncludingJosephatBenoit, Henri Gougen, POilip Morenzy, Bernard Boutin, Robert Cou7 23. This information, together with most ofthe tourier,op. cit.;William St. Onge, United States material on Salem politics, is basedon inter- Congressman from Connecticut; Edward Ladip- eviews with Philip Morenzy,a former city coun- ron, formerly city solicitor and Democratic city cillor in Salem for 27 years. chairman in Nas4ua, New Hampshire andcur- rently an Associ4e Justice of the New Hamp- 24. Directory of Massachusetts Municipal Officials, .shire Supreme Court; Donat Corriveau, for 32 196S-1969, Massachusetts League of Cities and years registrar of deeds in 14lishua, New Hamp- Towns, 67. shire, and others. The only politician who dif- fered with this point of view was August P. 24a.-Interview with Goguen,op. cit. La France, the Secretary of State of Rhode Island. Although noting that Franco-Apiericans 25. Interviewwith' RobertCoutourier, former are a «hard race to organize» and that a «certain,

235 230

amount of professional jealousy» exists, La control of the government. (footnote mine) France stated that there is a strong feeling of Franco-American solidarityin Rhode Island 46. Trudeau, op. cit., 108. which manifests itself at the polls. This solidar- ity according to La France, is due to the many 47. A. R. M. Lop. cit., 18. Franco-American fratethal and cultural soci- etiesin Rhode Island, including the largest 48. /bid:, 21; Lemaire,op. cit.,4-8. Franco-American Traternal insurance company in America (L'Union do Saint, Jean Baptiste 49. Quoted from Leon Gerili, «The French Cana- d'Amerique) which has its headquartersin- dian Family-Its Strengths and Weaknesses,» Woonsocket, Rhode Island. For a discussion of contained inFrench-Canadian Society,Vold, the vigorous support which this latter group Eds. Marcel Rioux and Yves Martin (Toronto: gave to Franco-Americans in politics in the McClelland and Steward Limited), 1964,51. 1920s, see Prior,op. cit.,280-281. 50. /bid., 52. 36.Report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry on Constitutional Problems,Vol. II, Province of '51.Ibid.,53. Quebec, 1956, 30. 52. /bid., 54. 37.Ibid. 53. /bid., 57. 38.Ibid.,30-31; See alsoQuebec Yearbook, 1966- 1967(Queens Printer: Parliament Buildings, 54.Ibid.,55. Quebec), 54-55. 55. Trudeau,op. cit.,109. 39.Quebec Yearbook, op. cit.,55-56. 56. Lemaire,op. cit.,10. 40. A. R. M. Lower,Two Ways of Life: The Pri- mary Antithesis of CanadianHistory(Canadian 57. Jacques Ducharme,The Delusson Family(New Historical Association, Report 1943),,Reprinted York, Funk and Wagnalls Company), 1939, in «Approaches to Canadian History,» Univer- 192 -193. sity of Toronto Press, 1967, 17-18. 58. George F. Theriault,The Franco-Americans in a 41.Report' of the Royal Commission of Inrry, New England Community(Unpublished Ph. D. op. cit.,39-40. Thesis: Harvard University), 1951, 16, 18-19.

42. The quote, as applied to the Irish peasants who 59. Glazer and Moynihan,op. cit.,67: emigrated to the United States, is taken from Nathan Glazer and Daniel P. Moynihan,Beyond 60. W. P. Greenough,Canadian Folk-life. and Folk- the Melting Pot(Cambridge, Mass.: the M. I. T. lore(New York, G. H. Richmond), 1897, 172, Press), 1963, 225. quoted intilloyd W. Warner and Leo. &tile,So- cial Systems of American Ethnic-Groups(New 43.L'Administration de La Nouvelle-France(Paris, Haven: Yale University Press), 1945, 77. 1929), 140. Quoted by Pierre Trudeauin Fed- eralism and the French Canadians(Toronto, 61. A. R. M. Lower,New France in New England MacMillan of Canada), 1968, 104. (The Southwotth Press), 1929, 281.

-D. Kwavnick,The Roots of Frenchdanadian 62. Anderson",op. cit.,28-29. Discontent,»Canadian Journal of Economics and Political Science, XXXI, 1965,5185. 63. Constance M. Green,Holyoke, Massachusetts 6 4New Haven: Yale University Press),1939, 371. 45. This refers to a rebellion against the government by a fiery French-Canadian, Louis-JosephPa- 64. Underwood, op. cit., 211. pineau. The uprising, soon crushed, was one over legislative (French) orexecutive (English) 65. Theriault,op. cit., 159-268. I 236 41,

231

66. Duaarme,The Shadows of the Trwesep. cit., 3. three dally Franco- American newspapers, and twenty-eight weeklies. Today, no dailynews- 67. It is significant that Franco-Americans have lag- papemremain)thd there ate only three weeklies. ged far behind other nationalities in producing See Lemaire,,bp. cit., 35,52-53. lawyerf. traditionally the most politically in- cliKed andactivegroup in tliecommunity.,For 72. For_an excellent summary of the' foundations example, Lewiston, Maine, withaFranco- ofla, survivance,see 'George Theriault,The American population/of over 85%, has 43 law- Franco Americans in New England, inCanadian yers of whom only 6 are Franco-American. In- Dualism, Ed., Mason Wade (Toronto: University terview with Robert Coutouricaplormer yor Toronto Press), 1960. of Lewiston.) Nashua, New Hampshire,ith a Franco-Ain lean population exceed'g 50%,. 73.See footnote 71. This some 71 ers but only 3 arFranco- American. (bite with Eikwar iLampron, 74. Edward C. Banfield and James Q. Wilson,City Associate Justice of :i ew plum Su- Politics(Vintage Books: New York), 42. pieme Court.) 75.Boutin, 45, was formerly the mayor of Laconia, 68. It will be recalled that this is the expression of New Hampshire, and was the Democratic candi- tifori Goguen, formerly the Secretary of State date for the governOrship of New Hampshire in o114aXachusetts. 1958 and 1960. '- 69. Dr. Robert A. Beaudoin, President of theed- 76.Banfield and Wilson,op. cit.,43. eration of Franco-Americans in New Hamp re and recently appointed to the_,Advisory Com- 77.I47 erview with Emile Buisiere. mittee on Languages in the UT1ted States De- partment of Education, states that 25 years ago 78.Interviews with Richard Guy and Maurice Arel. 80% of children starting in Franco-American parochial schools could speak only French. To- 79.Interview with Maurice Arel. day, says Beaudoin, 80 to 85% can speak only English. (personal interview) 80:Includingop. cit.,Bernard Boutin (45), Emile Bussiere(36), Maurice Arel (31), Richard Guy 70. Lemaire,op. cit.,64. (34), and Don Ethier (33), an alderman in Nashua, New Hampshire. 71. Interview with Arthur Clement, former editor oftheFranco-Americandaily, newspaper, 81. Interview with Robert Coutourier. L'Etoile,of Lowell, Mass.; 10937, there were

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Bibliography

Anderson, Elin L. 1937. WeA/per/cans.Cambridge, Department of Sociology and Anthropology. Mass: Halyard Univvity Press. Glazer, Nathttn and Daniel P.toynillan.1963.Be- Banfield, Edward C., and hates Q. Wilson. 1963. yond the Melting Pot.Cambridge, Mass.: The City Politics.New York: Vintage Books. M.I.T. Ptess.

Beck, Kenneth J. 1965.A Hispgry of French Cana- GreetirConstance M. 1939.Holyoke, Massachusetts. _diensin Salem, Massachiketts.Unpublished New Haven: Yale University Press., Senior Paper, Goddard College. Gunther, John. 1951.Inside U.S.A.New York: Har- Benoit, Josephat' T. 1961.Attitudes des Franco- per and Brothers. RevisedEdition. Ameiricains en Politique.Brunswick, Maine: Franco-American Institute. (In French). Hughes, Everett C. 1943.French Canada 117 Transi- tion.Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Binstock, Robert H. 1961.A Report on Politics in Manchester, New Hampshire.Cambridge, Mass.: Kennedy, Ambrose. 1948.Quebec to New England. Joint Center for Urban Studies. Boston: Bruce Humphries, Inc.

Carpenter, Kenneth E. 1958.The Franco-Americans Kwavnick, D. Spring, 1968.French Canadians and in Maine.Unpublished Honor's Thesis, Bowdoin the Civil Service of Canada.Canadian Public College. Administratio,n, Journal of the Institute of Pub- lic Administration of Canada. Vol. XI, No. 1. Caron, Damase. 1936. «La Politique.; Article, in French containedInLes Franco-Amdricains 1965 «The Roots of French Canadian Discon- paints ifbr (Rix-mimes.Montreal: Association tent.»Canadian Journal of Economics and Po- Canado-Americaine. litical Science. XXXI.

Cole ;Donald B. 1963.Immigrant City.Chapel Hill: Lemaire, Nerve B. 1956..«Franco-American Efforts University of North Carolina Press. on Behalf of the French Languagein New Eng- land.» In Fishman, Joshua,Language Loyalties Cook, Ramsey. 1967.Canada and the French-Cana- in the United States.The Hague: Mouton. dian Question.Toronto: MacMillan. Lockard, Duane. 1959.New England State Politics. Directoire de Canadian- Francaisde Lowell, Mass., Princeton: Princetsiiniversity Press. andAlmanacfor the year 1884 (in French). Lower, A. R. M. 1929.New France in New England. Ducharme, Jaces.1939.The Delusson. Family. The Southworth Press. Reprint fromThe New New York:Tunk and Wagnalls Company. England Quarterly.Vol. II, No. 2.

--. 1943.The Shadows of the Trees.New York: ---.Two Ways of Life: The Primary Antithesis of Harper and Brothers. Agnadlan History.Canadian Historical Associ- ation, Report, 1943; Reprinted in «Approaches Eno, Arthur L.Les Avocets Franco-Americs de to Canadian History.» University ofToronto, Lowell, Mass., 1866-1935.(In French). Press, 1967.

1/4) French Catholics in the United States.1909. New Miner, Horace. 1939.St. Denis: AFrench-Canadian York: Robert Appleton Co. parish.Chicago: Unlyersity of Chicago Press.

Ga rigue, Philip.1956. Bibliographical Introduction ,N cholson, Byron. 1902.The French Canadian. to Study of French Canada.McGill University, Toronto: The Bryiint Press.

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Prior, G. T. 1932. The French Canachia ns in New Truesdell, Leon E. 1943.The Canadian Born in the England.Unpublished Master's Thesis, Brown UnitedStates. New Haven: Yale University University. Press. l Quebec Yearbook, 1966-1967. Quebec: Queen's Underwood, Kenneth W.1957.Protestant and Printer, Parliament Buildings. Catholic. Boston: The Beacon Press. Ringuct. 1940. Thirty Acres.New York: Macmillan Wade, Mason. 1946.The French-Canadian Outlook., New York: The Viking Press. iRioux, Marcel, and Yves Martin. 1964.French 1968.The French-Canadians, (1760-1967). Canadian Society.Vol. 1. Toronto: McClelland Vol. I. Toronto: MacMillan of Canada. and Steward Limited. Walker, Drivid B. 1961.Politics and Ethnocentrism: Report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry on The Case of the Franco-Americans.Brunswick, Constitutional Problemi 1956. Vol. II. PrTince Maine: Bowdoin College Bureau fir Researchin of Quebec. Municipal Government. ..

Rumilly,Rober 1 Histoirees Franco-Amori------. August, 1962. «The Presidential Politics of cams.Montreal: Union SaAt Jean Baptiste dig Franco-Americans.»Canadian Journal of d'Amerique. (In F ench). Economics,and Political Science.Vol. 28, No. 3.

Theriault, George F. 1951.The Franco-Americans Warner, W. L., and Leo. Stole. 1945.Social Systems in Nashua, N.H., An Experiment in Survival. of American Ethnic Groups.New Haven: Yale Unpublished Ph, D. Thesis, Harvard University. University Press.

1960.The Franco-Americans of New England. Wessel, Bessie Bloom. 1931.An Ethnic Survey of Mason Wade, ed. Toronto: University of Tor- Woonsocket, Rhode Island. Chicago:University onto Preys. (In Canadian Dualism). of Chicago Press.

Trudeau, Pierre. 1968.Federalism and the French Canadians.Toronto: MacMillan of Canada.

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239 234 An analysis of the problems of _thedevelopment of New England French Catholic parishes in the nineteenth century Is thefocus of Mason Wade's article from theCatho- lic Historical Review of July, 1950. Wade mostadequately portrays the obstacles in the way of the French-speaking19th century New Englander wishing tofulfil( his religiotte duties in the face of an English - speakingclergy and the initial reluctance of the Canadi- an hierarchy to support theimmigration In any way. It is extremelyunforinate That we do not, at the present moinent;. have, inEnglish (0 in French for thatatter), a schol- arly survey and analysis _of all the difficultiesof the Franco-Americans with the Iris Catholic hierarchy in the twentieth century.(Cf. la Sentinelle` Revisited, in A F rarico-American Overview Volume Ill of thisseries.) 4

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240 E FRENCH PARISHAND 'SURViVANCE' IN NINETEENTH-CENTURYNEW ENGLAND

by Mason Wade

The foundation in 1850 of the firstFran- Though the first French-Canadianfami- co-American parish, St. Joseph's ofBurling- lies were established at Witsboski,Vermont, in ton, Vermont, has been chosen somewhat ar- 1814; at Woonsocket, RhodeIsland, as early bitrarily as the basis for celebratingthe cen- as 1814 or 1815 ; at Worcester, Massachusetts, tenary of the coming of the French-Canadi- in 1820; at Manchester, NewHampshire, in ans to New England. Protests have been made 1830; at Lewiston, Maine, in1831; and at by those who upheld the priorclaims of the Southbridge, Massachusetts, in 183,3no- Madawaska parishes in Maine, theAbbe where except in the BurlingtzWinoosiciand Alice's church at Burlington in1842, a mis- Madaswaka regions was therea notable can- sion at Littleton, New Hampshire in 1846, centration in the first half of the'century.- and the Abbe Zephyrin Levesque'scongrega- Thus the American religious histOry tion at Worcester in the of the im- same year. No one migrants centers in Vermont, since theMada- has quarreled, however, with choosingthe es- waska parishes remained tinder theBishop of tablishment of the first Franco-Americanpar- Quebec until 1842, under the Bishopof St. ish as the real beginning ofFranco-American John until 1852, and under theBishop of life in the United States. Ike parish was the Bathurst until 1870, when theybecame part basic social unit of French Can'ad'a, religiously, of the Diocese of Portland .4 Yeteven in Ver- scholastically, and municipally ;1 and itplayed mont it is a joipt Canadian-Americanhistory an equally vital role, at least in the firsttwo from the begiiiking. As earlyas April 8, 1801, respects, among the French-Canadian immi- Bishop Carroll-itccepted the offerof Bishop grants in News England in the last century.2 Denaut of Quebec; to have his clergyminister The contio,versy just mentionedreveals liv to Canadian Catholics livingnear the bounda- strong the parochial spirit remains today. ry, and empowered his Quebec colleagueto Therefore, this discussion of the religipusas- confirm in the United States .5 In1806 he ac- pects of the immigration Will becenteredupon cepted Bishop Plessis' proposalthat a Canadi- the parish, and upon the three-foldconceptof an missionary should visit Lake Champlain, preservation of religion, language, and cus- twhere there are a great numberof Catho- toms which is contained forFrench-Canadians lics.*6 In 1811,three years after the Diocese in the word !survivance. The firsthalf of the of Boston;, then embracingall New England, okentury, whichtight be called the darkages was established, Archbishop Carroll asked of thekrench-Canadians in NewEngland, will Bishop Plessis to continue workalong the bor- be passed over rather rapidly, in orderto do der, and for thatpurpose the Quebec bishop fulleri justice to theopore significant mission ,, wasmade a vicar general ofBoston, while period ftom 1850 to 1868, andto, the period Bishop Cheverus becamea vicar general of of expansion and conflict from 1869to 1900. Quebe(c).7 When BishopPlessis visited Boston

235 244 236 and New York in 1815, he wasaccompanied ing a church of their own. Stimulated by the on his return tripby Father Francois A. Ma- dedication of O'Callaghan's new church and tignon, the Boston pastor, and atBurlington by the visit of the Bishop of Nancy in the fall they found about a hundred CanadianCatho- of 1841, they held a meeting on October 12 lics, who asked for a Canadian priest.Plessis and passed resolutions in favor of building a said he had, no powei to grant their request, church and of obtaining a French-speaking but Matignon promised to visitthem on his re- priest.' 5 On November 5 Bishop Fenwick re- turn from Canada and onOctober 15 he bap- plied to R. S. M. Bouchette, the secretary of tized some eighteen childrenAI with French the group which was headed by LudgerDu- names.8With his enormous diocese boasting vernayboth men were refugees from the only three priests including himself, Cheverus Papineau Rebellion of 1837 in Canadathat was unable to spare onefor Burlington, but he favored the plan, and that he wouldwrite he arranged through Plessis for the mission to Montreal for a Canadian priest. The same to be served from time to timeby Abbe day he wrote to Bishop Bourget, speakingof Pierre-Marie Mignault, cure ofChambly.9 the Canadians' determination «to have a Mignault, who thus became the virtual foun- church in Burlington, as well as the American der of the Church in Vermont, reported on or Irish Catholics, achurch in which they October 15, 1849, that he was planning to may have a CanadianprieA to officiate for visit the east side of the lake as far as Ver- them, and to deliv4o them and their fami- gennes, ending his trip withBurlington, for lies the word o tad in their own mother «The people of that district are very eagerfor tongue.» Fen ick noted thatin addition to My visit.»1° No Boston priest wasresident more than a thousandof them at Burlington, in the state until 1830, and the AbbeMig- they were also to be found in «a hundred nault frequently visited his scattered compa- other places,» and that hefeared that they triots until the Diocese of Burlington was es- might relapse into their «former apathy and tablished in 1853, «always at his own expense despondency» if they did not receive a Cana- and without remuneration, exceptfor the dian priest." Bourget replied on December pleasure of doing good,» as BishopJohn B. 1 that unless a French priest whohad accom- Fitzpatrick of Boston noted in1846.11 panied the Bishop of Nancy remainedin Burlington, he would be unable to do more Benedict J. Fenwick, the second Bishop than send a plies there three or fourtimes a of Boston, vainly soughtFrench-speaking year. In Februar 1 42, however, the Abbe priests for Vermont and Maine inMontreal Francois Ance arrived to take charge of the and Quebec in1828.12 He preached at Bur- Canadians «in that part of the State ofVer- lington in both English and French onDe- mont bordering on LakeChamplain.»17 But cember 12, 1830, when churches thereand this effort to establish a separate French par- at Vergennes, St. Albans,and Swanton were ish, like the earlier one, proved unfortunate; being planned by Fatherleiehtiall O'Cal- before the end of 1842 Agee had returned laghan, the first resident priest, whOpadbeen temporarily to Montreal after beingdeprived charged with the Vermontmissiori .in that of his faculties by Bishop Fenwick,and in year.' 3 The Canadians of Burlingtonfor October, 1 43, he left the Diocese of Boston whom Fenwick ultimatelyhoped to proVide for goode" The Canadian chapel wassold Irish a separate church,had a separate pastor,the and the congregation reunited with the Abbe Auguste Petithomme, fromMay, 1834, and Yankee converts of the new St.Peter's, to October,1835.14 After the burning. of -42,.,which later came to be knownby theId Father O'Callaghan's church, St. Mary;s,in name of St.Mary's.' 9 1838, the Canadians began to thinkof uild- 237

After these false starts,a successful one ical of many another Franco-Ainericanparish was made in the spring of 1850, when the in its record of friction between the French- Canadian colony had been swollenby new Canadians and their Irish co-religionists. Such immigrants from the Richelieu parishesat- friction seems -to have arisen in the middle tracted by the establishmentof the Burling- years df the century as increasing numbers of ton Woolen Mill.Compahy .20 Abbe Mignault French-Canadian immigrantscame in the brought Father Joseph Quevillonfrom Mon- wake of the Irish immigrants of the 1820s, treal to minister to the Burling Ion flock. 1830s, and 1840s. It did not exist earlier,for Quevillon said Mass for 300of tl*m on April in the opening years of the century «the Irish 28 in the old court house,and immediately congregation in Boston hadno anti-French atierward a meetingwas held under the chair- feeling.»24 Frenchpriests had founded and manship of Abbe Mignault. Apetition to fostered the Church in New England, and Bishop Fitzpatrick fora separate parish was the chaplains of Rochambeau's squadron then drafted,21 and a committee oflaymen, had helped to weaken eighteenth-century including one Captain N. Tucker,was named anti-«papistv feeling in New England.But to choose a site and builda church. That the new Irish immigrant did not sharethe same day the committee, with Mignault lend- attitude of his predecessors. Though looked ing them his authbrityas vicar general, down upon by the Yankee as a foreign«pa- marked out a siteon the land given for the pist,» he spoke tht language of the country first St. Mary's by ColonelArchibald Hyde, and soon made 'himself at home here. The who had been treasurer of the committeefor Irishman tended to look down in turnupon the French church in 1841. Butthe Irish the more recent French-Canadian immigrant, Catholics opposed the division of theparish who was still more foreign because he spokf and refused to cede the chosen cite. Captain another language, and who also representea Tucker, a personal friend of thebishop, an economic threatAo the Irishman because pleaded the French cause in Boston, withthe of his willihgness to work harder andlonger result that the divisionwas approved, though and for less pay. Though Irish and French-Ca- the land questionwas left open. Another Ca- nadians shared thesame faith, their differ- nadian meetingon July 21 resolved that ences of religious customs and parochial h b- «considering the opposition of the Irishtof its, of language and temperament,were sh this city to the Canadians buildingon The old as to cause Father Audet, the founder of te land given by Colonel Hyde to theRoman French parish of Winooski, to *eculate Catholic congregation for the buildingof a whether God was going to separate them in church, it was expedient for the maintenance heaven.25 Aside .fromthe difficulty that the of peace between the two congregationsto French-Canadian found in confessing his sins yield, this right, in truth indeed due,but in English and in trying to followan English, which might later bea subject of disorder sermon, he missed the Gregorian chant and and of scandal for the faith and forour sep- the full measure of solemnity in religious arated brethren.»22 Another sitewas ac- rites traditionyal in Quebec ina virtually es- quired on a hill halfway betweenBurlington tablished:Church, butlargely scanted in New and Winooski, and the cornerstoneof the England in deference to Yankee prejudice new church was blessed on August 22, 1850, against «popish pageantry.» Therewas also in the presence of Abbe Mignault and Father an economic question. Many a poor immi- Quevillon. The new churchwas dedicated to grant found, in his own wordthat it en St. Joseph on June 1, 1851. cofite bien cher pour faire . 1 sa re igion aux Etats.26 Seatmoney, baptismal, marriage, 'The early history of St. Joseph's istyp- and formal offerings, and. Chkistmas and 41

r 238

Easter collections for the pastor were all on his faith as well as his country,31 the Quebec a higher scale or newburdens to. the French- clergy long remained (leaf to thereiterated Canadian, who had lived under a well en- calls for French-speaking priests to carefor dowed Church in Quebec and whofound% the religious needs of theNew England immi- that he had little say in parish affairs inthe grants. When the exefilus could nolonger be pew country. His reluctance tocontribute, ignored, about the middle of the century, coupled with the fact that he'dcrowding the Quebec clergy launched agricultural co- churches .raised at bitter cost by the earlier lonization movements for the emigrants, Irish immigrants, made him unpopular with who were to be established either in the pro- Irish pastors, sometimes rough-spoken and vince or in the American Middle West,since often insensitive to French susceptibilities. «as day laborers incities and factory towns Father O'Callaghan, the first pastor ofBur- theylost everything that Canadiansheld lington, whose objections to such current ec- highest: -religion, language, and nationality onomic practices as interest-takin& did not all of which might be preservedunder the extend to church contributions, used toread American as well as the British flag if the from the pulpit the names of those whohad emigrants were concentrated in farming com- given to the Christmas collection for the pas- munities, preferably in the West wheresociety tor in tins style: «Frank Leclaire ofWinooski. was still in the processof formation.»32 A Frank is a Frenchman, but not like the rest; handful of Quebec priests, however, were he is a gentleman. Thank you,Frank: God fired by missionary zeal -andfollowed the bless you.»27 This FrancoisLeclaire, despite groiwing tide of migrants to NewEngland. In such public favor, took a leading rolein the October, 1846, Father Zephyrin Levesqueof foundation of St. Joseph's and of the new Quebec offered his services toBishop Fitz- Freali parish at Winooski in1868.28 There patrick of Boston and after making a census was a teniperamentalincompatibility be- of the French-Canadians of Worcesterand its tween Frentik and Irish, reinforced by each' neighborhood," he was placed in chargeof group's racial prejudices, strong group con- the 150 families he found there, aswell as of sciousness, and mutual aid tendencies,which «thetanaclian Catholics of Manchester,N111.; plases.»33 In January, ledto the demand for separateFrench and thosf other parishes as soon as the French-Canadians were 1847, he visited Vermont and RhodeIsland, numerous enough to supportthem. Before but failing health forced him to retire toNew Fitz- these parishes were established, manyCanadi- Orleans after six months of laboringin ans ceased to practicetheir religion rather patrick's words---«with much zeal and success than to frequent what they called kseglises amongsttheCanadiansthroughoutthe irlandaises. Bishop Louis de Goesbriand re- diocese.»34 By October,. 1851, however, he cords meeting descendants. of thefirst im- was back as pastorof the mixed paiish of migrants who had lived for twenty orthirty Millbury, near Worcester, which heused as years in the States whenthere were no Cana- headquarters for his work among his scattered dian parishes and fipv Catholic churches,and compatriots.35 Father Hector Drolet, a New who had grown up in completeignorance of Brunswick missionary returning toCanada, the faith,29 while returned emigrantsshocked was recruited byFitzpatrick in January, their Canadian cures by revealingthat they 1850, and promptly sent off toVermont Montpelier hadnot frequented the sacramentsfor where he established a parish in .30 in November, 'after reporting thatthe people were pleased with theidea of a resident priest Since the opinion was widely heldin and willingtobuild a church.36 Father Canada that the emigrant chose toabandon Napoleon Mignault, perhaps a relative ofthe

244 239

zealous Cure of 'Chambly since he hailed its center at Burlingtonor Bangor and him- from the same region, was made pastor of self as Bishop:42 Rome acted, however,on Webster, Massachusetts,and of the Canadians the recommendation of the First Plenary of that vicinity. Under him Worcester'sforty Council of Baltimore in 1852, and Louisde French-Canadian families boughta lot and Groesbriand, the Breton-born vicar general sta'ed to build a chyrch soon after his arrival*1of Cleveland, was chOsen Bishop of Burling- in November, 1852. The effort provedtoo ton. He was consecrated on October 30, ambitious for their means, and after various 1852, in New York by Archbishop Gaetano vicissitudes the church begun by the Cana* Bendini, the nuncio who ha41' beensent to in- ans was finally dedicated in 1858 as St. quire into the trustee troubles, and who after Anne's. Though an English parish,it was his violent reception by the nativists strongly much frequented by the Canadians untilthey advised Rome against the appointment of finally achieved a parish of theirown in foreign-born bishopson the basis of racial 1869, when Father- J. B. Primeau founded proportions." Thenew bishop was accom- Notre Dame des Caniens.37 Father 0. H. panied to Burlington by Bishop Fitzpatrick Noiseaux, who bega iting the Canadian who had been his schoolmate at St. Sulpice centers of Vermont,ew Hampshire, and (Paris), and by Father O'Callaghan.They Maine in the 1840s,38 replaced Father Mig- were met at the station by several thousand, nault at Worcester and served the Canadians Catholics headed by Abbe Mignault who as assistant at Si. John's until 1857.39 Sub- now retired from his long apostolate to the sequently he was missionary to the scattered French-Canadians of Vermont.44 Hiscom- French-Canadians of New Hampshire, from patriots at last had a bishop whose language the Ashuelot to Colebrook, andpastor of was their own, and who was to do much for Littleton." Mignaultfinished a church at them during an episcopate which ended only Webster in 1853 and built another at Oxford with the century. in 1856- in thatyear he said Mass at Oxford and North Oxford oncea month, at each of After surveying his flock, grouped in the Brookfields onceevery six weeks, at seven churches though he had only two Warren and New Braintree twicea year.»4' riests to help him, Bishop de Goesbriand The record of these hardy pioneers, who e his Boston- predecessors appealed to ministered to scattered flocks in severalstates anada for priests. Noting the successful in the early days of the railroad andbefore missionary work of thoOblatesamong the the automobile, is complete bu nonetheless French-Canadians of northern New York,4. 5 eloquent. the bishop called upon their provincial in Montreal for missionaries to lakeover St. What I have called the darkages really Joseph's and to workamong their compatri- came to a close with the foundation of St. ots throughout Vermont. Father Augustin Joseph's in 1850 and the erec4ion of the See Gaudet was installed as pastor of St. Joseph's of Burlington in 1853, when the Diocese of and director of the new Oblate houseon Portland was also established, taking in New October 22, 1854, with Father Eugene Cauvid Hampshire as well as Maine. Thereseems to as assistant. But the Oblates gave up this gave beena project in 1848, hatched by the charge on January 12, 1857, whena choice French Abbe Charles-Etienne Brasseur de had to be made on economic grounds be- Bourbourg, who had served briefly in Quebec tween abandoning their Plattsburgor their and Boston after ordination in Rome in Burlington house. Since Plattsburgwas nearer 1845, for the creation ofa see to comprisek headquarters in Montreal, and issionaries Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont,with could visit Vermont on theirway to the new

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ihe'past, and that only a few of the min- French.: CanadiancentersarimdBoston, as in Burlington wassacrificed.46 'Failing to find migrants wouldreturnto Canada, since the help he needed in Canada,the bishop, thousands had «taken root in aforeign soil, - sought priests in Europe and returnedin by the ties of property, bymarriages con- 1855 with seven , FathersSalim Pi- tracted here, and by the jobs theyfill.» He card, Danielou, Dugfie, Cloarec,Cam and was also thefirst to advance the theory that Clavier.'" Another French priest, Zephyrin the migration, long regarded as aplague in Druon, who had served in Cleveland withthe Canada, might be intended byProvidence bishop, entered the diocese early in1854 for a high end. «We believethese emigrants and shared his superiors's concern forthe are called by God tocooperate in the con- their ances- F re nc h-Canad ia ns.48 version of America,» he said, «as tors swer called upon toplant the Faith on Aside from the Oblates and the-Sisters theshore.of of St. Lawrence.» They needed of Providence of Montreal whoanswered missionaries of their own stock: call, Quebec Bishop de Goegbriand's first God in his Providence Wishes that na- religious - continued to pay Nile heed to the tions be evangelizeckiliditast as ageneral reds of its exifed.Ans and daughters, asthe rule, by w o speak their lan- Civil War and the post-war boombrought an guage, who lu heir habits and dispo- ever-swelling tide of French-Canadians to sition;that n be evangelized by New England. Soldiers and millhands were priests of their own nationality. actively recruited in Quebec, andvisiting his diocese & the summer of 1864the bishop His experience had taught himthat the found tlit roads choked with «cartsfilled French-Canadians needed churches oftheir with Canadian families headed toward some ow)n, since they did not feel athoMe in other of the many mills towhich they were drawn Catholic churches and were reluctant to sup- by the hope of bettering theircondition.»49 , port tt em;but giyen churches of their own, Confronted with theeven greater post-war «the"berality of these poor immigrants» immigration, Bishop de Goesbriandmade a was «astonishing.»If Canadian missionaries .1 new appeal inMontreal and Quebec early in were supplied,«religion would becOme as 1869 for the Canadian priestswhocit both he flourishing among them 4 iiiCanada.»5 I and Bishop John J.Williams of Boston This appeal, which played upon themes wanted tocarefor the immigrants. The t' appeal he made in Canada wasprinted on dear to the Canadian heart, broughtresults. May 13, 1869, in Le .ProtecteurCanadiem'a Father Louisat.Gaignitr camefrom Montfeal newspaper founded a yearearlier at St. to EastRuilaitd tr:fieund the mission of Albans by Alfred Moussette, otganizerof the which the biskqfsti11 dreamed, despite the first New England nationalconvention of unsuccessful Oblatt experience:«It seems to the French-Canadians at Springfield,October4, us that amissionar use should be estab- 7, 1868; and Father Druon, now pastorof lished in some centrplace, which would St. Albans and vicar general of thediocese.5° not only serve a, parish,but give retreats in In this eloquent appeal, which wasechoed in4Canadian centers acid help to foundparishes, the years that followed, thebishop estimated- as a groupbecame numerous enough to.,con- priest.»52 He the number of French-Canadiansin the States struct a church and maintain a at more than 500,000, with thenumber in was joined byFathers Pelletier and Lavoie his own diocese more than doubledin the of Quebec, Alto were to serveadditional last three years. He was amongthe first to churches at West Rutlartd" and'Fairhaven, who started see that thiswas no mere seasonal movement, and- the Sisters of Jesus and Mary,

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a school at East Rutland. Fathers Gendreau Taunton, and Fall River Massachusetts;Pro and Audet of ,St. rlyacinthe,and Fathers idence,CeliterFalls,, Pawtucket, Rhode Verdier and Boissonault also responded to land; and Putham, 'Willimantic, andWater- the call." But .the hopes for thenew mis- bury, Connecticut, had noted French sionary center were not realized,and iti onies. .18707Gagnier left Vermont forthe.Diocese of Springfield which_had beenestablished in The record of the foundation of FrenCh that year. Eight French-Canadian priests parishes reflects the flow and ebbof migra- came to Massachusetts in 1869as a result of tion which, in turn, reflectedthe North de Goesbriand's appeal, and Bishop Williams American.economic picture.s 6, In 1ft69seri) no longer needed to remark: ((Theharvest is parishes were established, two in Vermont, great, but the workers rare.04 Though after four in Miisachusetts,one in Maine. In 1870 1869 the great development of French par- three, all in Massachusetts.In 1871 six, one ishes took place. in the teemingnew «Little each in Vermont and Maine, andfour in Canadas)/ of Massachusetts, NewHampshire, Massachusetts. In 1872seven, one each in and Rhode Island, Vermont saw French par- Vermont, Maine, and Rhode Islandand two ishes. established at St. Albans in1871, at each in New Hampshire and MassaChusetts. Alburg in 1872, and at Montgomery in 1890, In 1873 seven, four in Massachusetts,two in while 'many otherswere mixed parishes in Rhode Island, and one in New Hampshire. which both languages were used in thepulpit The .depressioliWin the United Statesthen and 'in the schools." Under thehand of made itself felt, with Imene parish estab- Bishop de Goe'sbriand and hissuccessor lished each year uit 1878two in Massa- Bishop Michaud, born in Burlingtonof an chusetts, two in ode Island, one in Ver- Acadian father andan Irish mother, the mont, ana noat all in 1879. The boom diocese passed almost painlessly through the which began ithe summer of 1879was transition from French-Canadian tqFra_nco- reflected byhe establishment of three American, which troubled otherdioceses , parishes in 1880, two, in New Hampshireand badly.. one in,Connecticut. In 1881 two were estab- lished, one in Massachusetts andone in New The development which in Vermont Hampshire; in 1882one in Rhode Island; was spread over the whole century -wit's tele- and in 1883 one in Massachusetts.After scoped into thirty or forty years in theother acute depression in Canada had fostereda New England states, and consequentlywas new exodus, six parishes were founded in not as. peaceful. Except for the Madawaika 1884, two in New Hampshire,threein 'parishesin Maine,' /he French-Canadians' MMsachusetts, and one inConnecticut. In were not among the first Catholics and at 1885 three more, in 1886two more, and in first thewere a minority, instead of being 1887 one more, all in Massachusetts. In on equal numerical terms with their English- 1888 there were two foundations,in Maine speaking brethrenas in Vermont. Wdrcester and Connecticut; and in 1889one in Massa- and WoonsocIwt were the only Frenchcen- chusetts..In 1890 the increaseof old colo- ters whiCh had traditions nearlyas old as nies and the influx ofnew imMigrants re- Burlington and Winooski. Butsoon Water-, sulted inthe establishment of fournew ville, Lewiston, and Biddeford, Maine;Man- parishes in Massachusetts, andone each in chester, Nashua, Suncook, Rochester,Wand tiMaine, New Hampshire, and RhodeIsland. Berlin, New Hampshire; .Lowell,Lawrence, By 1891, at ,the end of thegreat period of Lynn, Salem, Fitchburg, Gardner,'Spencer, expansion which closed with .depression in Holyoke, Northampton, Adams, Pittsfield," the United States .and returning prosperityin

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served until Canada, there in New England eighty Canadians of many other towns ire therii.63 The six Franco-American parishes,with fifty- -resident priests were found for attended by 25,000 French Dominicans of St.Hyacintlie, who- three parochial 'schools took over St. children, not. to mention many otherinstitu- only came to Canada in 1873, tions.57 The Diocese of Springfield led the Pierre, Lewiston, in 1881 and*Aline's, list with twenty-two parishes,Portland was Fall River, in1888.64 The 'Marists,- another The second With seven een, Providencethirdwith French' order, began their work among Franco-Americans at St. Anne's, Lowell,in A.% fourteen, and alchester fourth with eleven, Boston, while Boston th nine, Burlington with 1882; at Notre Dame des Victoires, eight, and Hartford with five brought upthe in1884; and at St. Bruno's,Van Btrren, college, in rear.5 8 Maine, where they established a the sameyear.65 Canadian nuns of many Croix, the 4.0k the men who led this'extraordinaryef- orders, notably the Soeurs de St. Anne, and fort, which is matched byn(ether ethnic Soeurs Grises, the Soeurs de Ste. group in the Church of the UnitedStates, the Soeurs de Jesus-Marie, wereconducting. 1890.66 wereextraordinary men. Only some of the forty parochial schools by them can he mentioned more -notable among French par- here. Father LouisGagar founded or or- This rapid development of and Mas- ishes, usually with a full complementof-pa- ganked eleven parishes in Vermont religious and na- sachusetts before coming to rest atSt. Jo- rochial schools, convents, where he tional societies, and closeconnections with seph's, Springfield, Massachusetts, without was pastor for morethan twentyyears:59- the French press, did not take place Father Olcarles Dauray made Woonsocket,of fricticni with both the original Yankees, who becoming New which he remained pastor until930, one feared that New England was strongholds.60 Franco, and with the IrishCatholics, who of the great Franco-American role in the The redoubtable Fathei. J. P.Bedard made a had quickly taken a dominant lasting mark on Fall River in his tenstormy Church in New England.The immigration 61 Father Joseph Augustin Che- from Canada first took onnotable prbpor- years there parishes were es- valier achieved such wonders in ananti-Cath- tions and the first French feeling ex- olic Manchester as renting aBaptist church tablished, just as anti-Catholic to house his congregation,persuading the plodedin the Know-Nothing movement, city fathers to Maintain hisparochial schools which swept New England in1854-1856.67 hatred. of and the Amoskeag Company togive land for To the old eighteenth-century been added the b -church,and taking over an abandoned Catholics and foreigners had public i-ehaaL-for his parochial one.He and new hatredbred- by the, nativistmovement 1820s onward, hiscolleagtie:rival,FatherPierre Hevey, which grew steadily from the played'a major part in making Manchester a feeding on fear tof the immigrant,snot only Worcester and Woon- ast'a Catholic, but as a menace.to the eco -' close competitor of structure which socket for thefitle of Franco-American cap- nomic, political, and social ital of NewEngland.62 Aside from these Americans -had reared with suchcare468 diocesan priests, the Oblates playedthe most This (Protestant Crusadv of the1850p was the notable role among ,the religiousorders who professedly sectarian, but it rested upon institutions and came front. Canada.Under Father Andre political basis of changing Garin, St. Joseph's in Lowell became amis- upon the economicbails of the immigrant's Challenge to, the individual Yankee'ssecurity. sionary center -in .1869 fromwhich St. 4. Anne's, Lawrence, and St. Joseph's,Haver-. When the newcomers from Canadabegan hill, were founded in 1871, andthe French.= 4 0 248 243

to make themselves felt in New Englandcom- ronment, came to a head in thelast two munities,* the average Protestant American decades of the century, though"there were had been conditioned from birthto hate Ca- earlierskirmishes. The FrenchCatholic tholicism 69 Anti-Catholic feeling h dalready troubles have received less historicalnotice led to the burning of the Ursuline Snventat than the Irish ones, because theywere char- Charlestown in 1834; to the school troubles acterized by rather thanphysical vio- of New York and Maine in the early1850s; to lence, but they were bitternonetheless. In the Bedini-Gavazzi riots of 1853-1854, when the early days therewere numerous incidents the nuncio was burnt in effigy on-Boston of Yankee refusals to sell landor abandoned Common and threatened at BishopFitzpat- Protestant churches to thenew French-Cana- rick's home; and to the infamousMassachu- dian congregations. Such, refusalswere cir- setts Nunnery.Committee of 1855243 Solidar- cumvented by purchases through dummies:72 ity among foreigners was viewed with suspi- Protestant missionary activityamong theim- cion, particularly when it was Carholic soli- migrants often created minordisturbances. dardarity, fOr «Nativists who thought that It was started by the AmericanProtestant priests barteref91 he political power of their Society in the 1840s73 andcontinued, by parishioners fir' favors and protection for preachers of the French-CanadianMissionary Catholicism were afiaid that this unholy alli- Society, established in Montrealin 1850, me would spell the doom of both Protes- who were driven from Quebec inthe heyday fantipm and democracy.»71 It isnot surpris- of Bishops Bourget and Lafleche,and con- ing That in this intellectual climate the Irish tinued their activity in the NewEngland Catholics, who had borne the brunt of anti- French centers.74 Narcisse Cyr,the Baptist Catholicism thus far, were unenthusiastic missionary, was at work in Vermont,New about the establishment of foreign language Hampshire, and Massachusetts in1869-1873, or so-called coational» parishes with foreign before he settled in Boston:75 T.G. A. Cote language schools. The French-Canadianswere began proselytizing for the Cdnicregationalists lunch more zealoui than the Irish in founding in Lowell and Springfield in 1878,while the paSochial schools, both becadse ofa different Baptists were active in Waterville,Burlington, -tradition ip their homeland and because they and Grafton, Massachusetts, at thesame per- saw in such schools a means to keep, their lan- iod.76 But ShoreFrench Protestants, known guage and customs, is well as their religion, as les Chiniquy or les Suisses found little aid alive. The Irish believed that rapid Americani- from their Yankee coreligionistsuntil the zation of foreign-born Catholics wouldease late 1880s, for they,'too,were unforgivably anti-Catholic feeling. They thought that the foreign.77 French-Canadians were dividing rather, than strengthening the Church and creatingnew an- The great M41ntreal St. John Baptiste ti-Catholic feeling. The rigid authoritarivism celebrationinJune.,1874, attended by of some Irish prelates and pastors, actingon 10,000 Franco-Americans andeihe. leadersof these principles, grated on the individualistic their national,..societies,78 Asturbedso French-Canadians, whose cohesive tendencies Yankees by its revelation of thenumber's as an ethnic group, whose insistence on pre- the immigrants and of their dividedloyalty. serving their language and customs, and whose So did such utterancesas Ferdinand Gagnonls love of the full measure of religious solemnity Loyaukaoui, Frqnfais toujouq,79and Father separated them from those whom theysoon errJPIViteau's Aiant tour;soyons Canadiens.80 caine to call the %Irish assirilators.) 61. The fwst:notable disclosure of Yankeeanti- French-Canadianfeeling came in 1881, with This dual conflict, implicit in theeTi-. the publication of the Twelfth AnnualRe- .

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Massachusetts Bureau of Statis- to the sincerity ofprofessions of loyalty port of the the part of the tics of Labor which referred tothe French- to our Nvernment on founders.82 Canadians 'asthe Chinese of theEastern obstacle to the States,» in citing them as an Wright was undoubtedly correct onboth adoption of the ten-hour day. It alsocensured French parishes of respect counts: tI4 establishment of their moral character, their lack meant the permanentsettling of The Franco- for American institutions, theirfailure to be- efforts of the and their opposition to Americans, despite continued come naturalized, Canadian government andclergy to repatri- education.81 ate them; and theFrench parochial schools have ever since remained abone of conten At the hearing whichwas forced by vig- tion. orousFranco-American protests,Colonel Carroll D. Wright, the chiefof the bureau affair, and the offending report, The publicity given this and the compiler of the b,ecosning of Nashua how realization that New England was asked Father J. B. V. Milette roused a new parishes affected in good paft French-Canadian, the establishment of French the French Protes- immigrants. Milette nativist reaction, in which the permanency of the Iliant missionaries played a part, despitetheir replied, «It brings on whatin Canada was own recent arrivaland foreign antecedents. feared ...when we priests were sent to the spiritual needs, it The new Protestant crusadeof the late 1880s States to attend to their rly 1890s was in part areaction against was only then thatthey saw what the result and rish Catholics' captureof political con- of their action [was]and thatthey could not the in Boston and NewYork and against a . hold the French among them.The perman- tro was served.» se of beingswamped by foreigners. But ency.of the French population by the influx of declared the crusade was stimulated Father Bedard of Fall River also Britain at this Church favored per- Scotch -Irish from Canada and that the influence of the this group . and opposed repatria, ,and the clerical leaders of manent establishment regarded the FrenchProtestants as useful tion. The report'sstrictures on the morals of allies, as they had been inCanada.83 the immigrants were elaboratelyrefuted by and law of- employers, prominent citizens, the Reverend Calvin E. Amaron,the son ficers:,In suthming up theproceedings Colo- of Swiss missionaries tothe French of Can- nel Wright concluded:, ada, president of theFrench Protestant In- The priest coming fromCanada, it ternational College atSpringfield, editor of may be on missionaryworlOo take its organ, Le SemeurFranco-Amerirain (later charge of the growing parish, soonfound Le Citoyen Franco ericain), and successor himself permanently establishedin New of the Reverend .A.Cote as pastor of England, and his natural desire was to see the French ProtestantsOf Lowell, was the tiffsflock grow.and prosper . .with foreigner who sounded theloudest nativist strong French churchesestablished in trumpet call aboutthe Frenchmenace." New England, repatriation is afailure. Lowell press and in a French His early efforts in the However much the effort of the book mildly entitled TheEvangelization of to educate theirchildren in these insti- parochial the FrenchCan*ni (Lowell, 1885) had tutions may be applauded, the sadly reported that school will always excite hostility onthe little effect at firer. He they have part of the native ...their estatlishmeni, s th pastorsof our churches think by the members of any raceWill alwaylNi giMthing else to'So than to attack the raise suspicion in the Americanmind as Roman CatholicChurch.*85 But with the

250 adoption of more alarmist tacticsthesecond of the religio-ethnic quarrels of Canada." edition of his book appeared in1891 as Considering his hyperpatriotic line, it issur- Your Iferitage or New England Threatened prising to find Amaron prefacing hisargument (Springfield, 1891)--he hadmore success. He with the hope that a «great religiousmove- failed, however, to convince ex-Governor ment on this side of the lines will exerta very Sawyer of New Hampshire, who hadattended great reflex influence upon the Dominion of" the national convention at Nashuain 18881 Canada, and help mightily in freeing it from from which Amaronwas excluded, that this the weight of an ecclesiastical tyrannyunsur- «an ti-Pro testa nt, anti-American, fic!id revolu- passed in any part of the world»,92 andcon- tionary* gathering hadxa hidden purpose cluding it with a plea for separate French which was irfimical to the Republicand its Protestant churches. Although hisarguments institutions.*86Since President Cleveland, for separate 'churches were singularly like the a Presbyterian-,isenta letter regretting his French Catholic ones, lie held that Protestant inabilityto be present as planned, itis churches would further unification of the doubtful whether the Reverend Mr. Amaron's races, instead of preventing it, since they alarm was generally shared .87 would bring the French «into contact with Protestant influences; and this is all that -is But Amaron put into print the dark necessary to make of them true Clulistian citi- fears which had arisen in the back ofmany zens, loyal to the constitution of the nation.»9 3 Yankee minds. He warned that «The French are here in large numbers and are increasing !This new Protestant crusade, at first main- at a fabulous rate. and willsoon have out- ly a Comgregationalist and thena Baptist ef- numbered you.» He described themas «a fort, although the Methodistswere also active foreign state withinyour state,» which had in Manchester, Lowell, and Worcester,"was failed to imbibe «the spirit ofyour Protestant largely unsuccessful,like the whole home mis- republican institutions* and had remained sion movement among Catholic immigrants, «monarchical and priest-ridden,a group and for Much the same reasons.95 Religion who were «creating a New France inyour was identified with group loyalty and ethnic Midst.»88Unlike Francis Parkman, who identity foi the Franco-American toan unu- believed that «our system ofcommon schools sually great extent. Survivance, preservation is the best for Catholicsas well as Protes- of religion, language, and customs, hadbe- tants,»89 Mr.Amaron regarded the public come an obsession with the French-Canadi- schools as «liberalizing influences* which ans, as a result of more than a century's strug- might fr'ee the French-Canadians fvom their gle to maintain their identity under British Aold dogmatism,* but would only convert rule in Canada. The concept still preoccupies them into «nk infidels.* In evangelizing today many Franco-Americans who havere- them lay «thei appiness' and prosperity tained a minority mentality. The whole Prot- and the safety of t,nation,* and he out- estant missionary effort probably didmore to lined measures to keep New England. «Prot- strengthen the potent cohesive tendency of estant and Ambrican.»9Q He attacked the the Franco-Americans, who like their brothers French clergy as «the uncompromisingfoe in Canada are never more united than when of our Protestant American. civilization,* attacked, and to stimulate nativism and anti- and the parochial scjwolas a «menace to Catholicism among the Yankees, than to win republican institutions* and as the tniost converts. The files of the Baptist Home Mis- efficient barrier to prevent unification of the Won Mdnthly from 187.8 to 1900 record main- ttworaces in New England,* threatening to ly scattered conversions and littlesuccess. One bring abriNLthe United Statesa repetition Missionary commented: «Our workamong

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the French in' New England has attimes, and possible to be both catholic andAmerican. suspicion to lime, seemed almoSt barrenof results.»96 Both groups cherished a sneaking The lot of the Protestant` missionary or con- that the other was made upof poor -Catho- vert was not a happy one in the«L-ittle Can- lic,~ The ancient doctrineOf sta Del per cojjlision with adas,» street meetings were broken up, Ailianeos came into ead-on churches attacked, and convertsostracized the equally ancient' one thatIrish Catholi- the Church. andboycotted.97 Such incidents occurred cism was the fine flowering of because the French-Canadian whoturned Among the Irish clergy there was acertain Protestant was regarded as a traitor tohis desire to keep in the saddle, and amongthe their position. race as well as to hisfaith. French a desire to strengthen The troubles which arose atFall River in The Haverhill school case in 1888-1889 1884-1886, at Danielson in 1894-1896,and indicated how nativist feeling turnedagaist at North Brookfield in 1899 wereoutbreaks this period. The of a conflict which was latentalmost every- the Franco-Americans at brought to a Haverhill school board toleratedthe estab- where in New England, but was lishment of an Irish parochialschool, St. head in these instances by personalfactors.99 hardening of James', in. September,. 1887, butobjected All three incidents reflected a for priests of from the first to the foundationof a French the French-Clinadians' desire which had one, St. Joseph's,under Canadian nuns in their language and nationality, the following year. The school was con- been noted from their firstComing to New It is pos- demned on January 10, 1888, onthe grounds England, into an insistence upon it. incidents sup - that half the instruction wasgiven in French sible to argue that all three and that various subjects requiredin the plil evidence that theFrench-Canadians In February the preservation of their languageabove public schools were not taught. faith. But the six" parents were brought to court,charged he preservation of their with having sent their childTen to an unap- French-Canadians were not alone inbelieving loss of their proved school. Three pleaded,guilty and paid that loss of their language meant the-charge. faith; the Germans, Italians,Portuguese, and fines, while the others contested Catholic groups On February 9 Judge Carterdemolished the 'other new foreign-language school board's position, declaringthat,«the shared thisbelief.'" legislature has always:refused to deny the children tothe The American hierarchy wasdivided in right of parents to send the school of their choice.» TheFrench &fen- the 1880s and 1890s into two camps on . foreign- dants were discharged, andthe fines already issue of,. territorial vs. «national» or sought to hasten levied repaid. But the verdict wasnot a pop- language parishes. One group Catholics as much ular one; it was greeted bycourtroom com- the assimilation of foreign. stood on the bank of as.possible, so that differences oflanguages, ments that Haverhill In a another St. Bartholomew's,whichsomehow traditions and customs would disappear American Catholicism: The other also involved «anarchy andsocialism,» and ' common the judge was accused of«having gone over group favoredthe conservation of language4 .pairishe0. to that demon,Rome.»98 traditions and customs in national under priests of the samestock, while en- militant couraging the development ofpatriotism 10 Aside from thes&conflicts with thought of French and Yankee Protestants,there were the adopted country. The former conflicts within the Catholicfold. By their national parishes as at best a temporary them insistence on remaining-French,the Franco - makeshift, while the litter"considered Americans spoiled the Irish case that it was a necessityfor at least a generation ortwo,'

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lest the faith be renounced along with other firmed the worst suspicionsof the nativists ancestral traditions. Though Rome favored and led the Boston British-AmericanCitizen the national school by urgingBishop Thomas to warn its readers that the «French Jesuits J. Ilendricken to give the Franco-Americans have conceived the project offorming a of Fall River a priest of theirnationality in Catholicnation 1885,'°' outof the Province of in 1887 it shifted to the otherside Quebec and New England, andthis project when in response to Get-aim-American pro- of making New England FrenchCatholic tests against the assimilative policies of Irish has already assumed proportionscapable of bishop's: and pastors, it directed that the alarming the most optimistic.»Trembling national parish should be regarded as a tem- Yankees did not need to fearthe uninn of porary expedient.' 02 The school of Cardinal French and Irish to rule thecountry far the Gibbons and Archbishop Ireland remained PopewhichtheBritish-AMerican dominant, and the Catholic Congress fore-' of Bal- told, since any union forany purpose be- timore in 1889 stressed that It must always tween them was highly unlikely.' °D .B111the be reniembered that the CatholicChurch re- extravagant statistics and verbal cogniz4 neither north excesses of nor south nor east St. Jean Baptiste Day andnationkl conven- nor west nor race nor color.» This resolution, tionorators continued to distil&uneasy adopted with reference to theGerman na- Yankees. The Boston Her on bine 25, tional societies-the congress held that «lin- 1891 viewed with alarmex- or Charles tional societies, as such, haveno place in the Thibault of Pawtucket's statethei church of this country; after the t on tit manner of previous day that hiscompatriots constitute this congress, they should beCatholic and the «future rulers of thecountry.»106 American» -was violently protested bythe Franco-American press. I u3 Though such, Quebec political figuresas lionoreMercier and Senator FrancoisX. The Franco-Americans were undoubt- Trudel attended the nationalconventions edly supported and, perhaps, -led in their and spoke at other Franco-Americangather- struggle against assimilation byboth lay and ings,itwas the French-Canadian clergy, clerical leaders in Quebec, whichwas in a from prelateto humble missionary, who very hotheaded state at this period. Bishop strove hardest to maintain the bond between de Goesbriand's old idea of the providential The separated halves of their people.Bishop mission of the French-Canadiansto convert Racine and two other Quebec the United States bishops pre: was re-echoed ,by distin- pared a Memoiresur la situation religieuse guished visitors from Canada,and sometimes des Canadiens-Francais given alarming political aux Ftats -Unis de overtones. In 1889 l'Arneriqug du Nord (Paris, 1 02), I 07which Bishop Lafleche of Trois-Rivieres, while on a was submitted toCardinal Ledochowski, visit to-New England, toldFather Birgit of the new Prefect of the Propaganda. Springfield that he foresaw the This doc- annexation ument- was seemingly designed tosupport of part of the United Statesto Canada to the notninatir of form an independent French a French bishop to the state..In clari- vacant See af Ogdensburg, since it stressed fying his remark in the Montrealpress La- the advisability of naming French-Canadian fleche observed: «It is perhaps the design of bishops or at least Vicars generalin the dio- Providence. .the duty of French-Canadians ceses where the French predominated. and Franco-Athericans is to conformto it by jealously warding, tjieir languageand tra- But it alsowas a plea for the Pranco- ditions.»1" Thisobservation, MIMI was American.ptarish,relTarsing ecitelea bi)*the. Franco-American Bishop de press, con- Go6sbriand's arguments of 1869 andadding

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rather than remain tin; new ones as to theneedief theFtanco-Amer:- cans left the, Church icalis for clergy of their own stock. It noted der unsympathetic Irish pastors.But with and the rise that when priests unsympathe* totheir tra- the waning of the immigration ditions were placed over them,they be- of the American ProtectiveAssociation, the in the Ameri- come discontented,insubordinate, uncon- views of tho asgim lative party trollable; and their hearts are left open to can hierarchy prey fled atRome. In a letter the worst influrices ofilieres; wpile when of April 26, 18?6, to theApo-stolic Delegate, they were given \ priests ox their. ownnatime Archbishop' FiancescoSatolli,who had ality; they made the faithiflower.Bishop .ita- shownn'ttle sympathy to the Danielson chit argued that their language and customs bels," Cardinal Ledochowski clasified earlier were a usefuldire, which should be built up 'yeOm Propaganda's ruling of ten years fol- rather than torn down, againstProtestantism, 'eon national parishes by laying down the indifferentism, atheism, materialism, public lowing principles: scliools, and «the easy comfortable life or 1. GlIndrenbNriin America of for- feverish pursuit,,of fortune whichhave lost eign parents whose language is notEng- thousands of souls to the Faith in theUnited tish are not obliged,when coming of States.>> Since the Holy Ghost hadgiven thy ge,to,tecotriv. members of the parish gift of tongues t6 the apostles and not tothe of which their parelts--fire part;but nations, he iniuoilthat the priest should they have the -right to enter a parish learn the langpage of the people, notthe where tlw language of the country or people that of tlAt priest.English might be English is used. the language of the Church inthe linked q'k 2. Catholics not born in Americabut who know English have the right to be- Staits in the future, but there was no need 'church in which Franco-.Ameri- come members ofIthe to rush matters while half the English is used$R4 cannot be forced to cans could not speakEnglish and consider- submit° to the jurisdiction of the pastor able immigration from Canadacontinued. of the church established for the useof Using Rameau de St. Pere'sobservation on theirnationality.'" their birthrate, IR\ argued thattheir rapid in- crease would soonmake Catholkcism domi- The dream of a New Quebecin New England nant in several states, and thattheir loyalty cherished by some extremepatriotes, was to -*Tug would be ofadvantage. Making doomed by .this attitude ofRome, by the and by the much"oftheir profoundly Catholicspirit, end of large-scale immigration, their apostolic zeal, and their energeticeffort growing Americanism of theFranco-Ameri- to establish Catholic schools,he renewed his cans, who were notcontent to be merely plea tkat they should havepriests who knew 'transplanted ,Freitch-canadiansand became their ringuage and their customsand were increasingly integrated into Americanlife. sympathetic to their way oflife. These priests should be French-Canadians as far aspossible, At the turn of the century there were the assimilative for «if the Canadians do nothave priests of gloomy forebodings that their own race at the head of theirparishes, tide would sweep away the greatnetwork of the im- in the end defiance *Will. befound among .Franco-American parishes built by them; hence a source of endlesstrouble for migrants in the previousforty-odd years. Canadian ecclesiastical superiors and subordinates.)o The old French priests, often more than American-minded, took adim view of continued,,Irish op- The merit of this last view wascertainly survivance in the face of borne out.by the subsequentDanielson and position:"Their attitude was probably accu- Brookfield incidents in whichForanco-Ameri- rately reflected in FatherConesime Triganne's

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interpretation of the prophecies ofSt. Ma- faith'in the futureof their race, pride in the tadi), about the p pes, when thequestion of French name,» could saVe the Fravo-Ameri- a successor to LeXIII was discussed: cans.12

19infs ens, that will be an Italian: the e This faith and pride haverem , Itatians are ardent 114 full of fire; religib though as de Nevers partially forew, the depopulate,that will be an Irishman, Franco- American has become distinct from the ruin of religion: there will beonly the French-Canadian. They hive enabledthe holy water and the collection;f /os hundred-odd parishes of 1900to become florum, that will be a French-Canadian, 178 today." the of flowers: I IP The French parish basre- mained the bulwark of the Franco-Ameri- can's remarkable resistance to completecul- Jules-Paul Tardivel, who had been born tuial fusion-in the Americanmass, while the in the United' Slates but hadreturned to Franco-Aniqican record in industry,govern-. Canada to become the ultramontanejournal- ment, and diilitary service Ii5g- refutedthe ist of Quebec, imiled thatassimilation and nineteenth-century.nativises dire foreboOlgS apostasy., were virtually synonymous among that the estatilishmeillifof nationalparishes`k the Franco-Americans, in refutingBrune- meant the ens' of the Republic. Frictions tiere's'glowing picture in theRevue.firpeux there have been, stillare, and presalabl4 Mori* of American Catholicism. ' Ed= will be in the futute[but the Frinco-Ame0 mak de Nevers; a sociologically-minded can has become as typical of New Englandas Canadian historian, held that onlyfaith and the Yankee and the Irishman, and hasnotably pride, «faith in the religion of theirfathers, enriched it religiously as wellas otherwise.

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Note

Robert Lord, John F. Sexton,Edward 1'. Har- 1. J. C. Farlardeau, «Paroisses de France etde 8. Nouvelle France an XVIleme Siecle,»Cahiers rington,History of the Archdiocese of Boston, (New York, 1944), I, 687-688. de la Facu Ito ides SciencesSociales de Laval 1604-1943 (Quebec, 1943), II, 7; H. Miner,Saint-Denis: A French CanadianAor'sli '(Chicago, 1937); 9, Ibid.,1, 704. J. C. Farlardeau, «The-Parish as anInstitution- al Type,»Canadian Journal of Economics and 10./bid., 1, 737. Political Science,XV, 3 (August-, 1949), 353- 367. 11. .Ibid.,II, 104-105.

llosaphat fienoit,L'Ame Franco-Americaine 12.Shea,op. cit.,III, 154. (Montreal, 1935), 93-114. 13. Lord,et al., op. cit., I1,107. 3.J. F. Audet,Histoire de la Congregation Cana- dienne de Winooski au Vermon't(Montreal, 14.Ibid.,II, 148. Debuts de la Colonie 1906), 35; M, L. Bonier, 5, 1841. Woonsocket, R. 1. 15. Bishop Fenwick's Journal, November France-Amaricainede Robert H. Lord (Framingham, 1920), 79; A. Belisle,Livre 1 am indebted to the Reverend correspondence con- d'Or des Franco-Americains deWorcester, for copies of the bishop's cerning this matter. Mass.(Worcester, 1920), 15; W. H. Paradis, French-CanadianInfluenceInManchester, Francais et les Unpublished M. A. Thesis, 16.E. Chartier, «Les Canadiens N. H., Before 1891, Bulletin des recherches St. Mary's Seminary, Baltimore,19420; R. gveques de Boston,» F. Rpy, FraYro .historiques, XXXIX,1 (January, 1933), 12-13. J. Lawton, J. H. Burgess, H. in the copy Americans of the State of Maine(Lewiston, In both this printed version and J. B. from the Montreal DiocesanArchives in the 1915), 31;. cited in M. L. Hansen and Fenwick's letter of of theCanaklin and Ameri- Boston Diocesan Archives, Brebner;Mingling November 5, 1841, toBouchette is adressed can People's(New Haven,1940):124; F. Gati- to «A. S. M. Bouchette.»This initial is cor- neau,HistoiredesFranco-Americains de rectly given as «R.» in Fenwick'sjournal for Southbridge(Framingham, 1919), 3. the same date. 1'. Albert,Histoire du Madawaska(Quebec, 4. Bourget-Fenwick, December 1, 1841;Archives 1920), 243-248. 17. of the Diocese of Boston,Fenwick's Journal, February 8, 1842. 5. J. G. Shea,History of the Catholic Church in the United States(New York, 1888), II, 442. 18.Chartier,op.cit.,14; A. A. B., -Fenwick's Journal, October 21, 1843. 6. Rapport de Parchiviste de laprovince de (Quebec, 1931), 242, cited Quebec, 1929-30 H, 276; E. Hamon,Les Cane- in Abbe Georges' Robitaille,«L'Expansion 19.Lord,op! cit., diensFrancaisdelaNouvelle-Angleteire religieuse des Canadiens Francais auxEtats- of the Unis,» in G. LanctOt,Les Canadians Francais (Quebec, 1891), 183-184; Archives at leurs Voisins du SOd(Montreal, 1941), 249. Diocese of Burlington. Audet,op. cie,36. 7.Shea,op.cit.,41, 641-642. See also Abbe Iva,n- 20.. hoe Caron, «Msgr. Plessis et leseveques catho- op. cit.,184 -185, gives.the text. liques desgials-Unis,»Transactions of Ole 21.Hamon, Royal Society of Canada,. XXIII(Ottavia, 1934), 132. 22.Ibid.,186. t

251

23. Ibid., 186-187; Lord,op. cit., II, 571. II. Morisseau-, «Les Oblates deMarie-Immacu- lee dans la Nouvelle-Angleterre,» Le Travail 24. /eur Lord, op. cit., 1, 698, (Worcester), May 26, 1949.

25. Audet, op, cit., 41. 46. Ibid., 46.

26. Hamon, op. cit., 59. 47. Hamon, op. cit., 168. 27. Audet, op. cit., 39-40. 48. Belisle, op.cit., 25-27; Histoire de Ia Presse Frynco-Americaine et des Canadiens-Francais A.Ibid., 40, 42. aux Etats-Unis (Worcester, 1911), 66-67. 29. Hanlon, op. cit., 174. 49. L. de Goesbriand, Les Canadiens des Etats- Unis, 3. 30. D. M. A. Magnan, Histoire de Iarace franpaise aux Etats-Unis (Pads, 1912), 256. 50. Belisle, Presse, 61-62. 31. Ibid., 256. 51. Hanlon, op. cit., 172 -176. A 32. Mélanges Religieux (Montreal), August22, 52. Ibid., 170. 1851; cited in Hansen and Brebner,op. cit., 128. 53. Ibid., 205; Belisle, Presse, 62. 33. Lord, op. cit 11, 533; Belisle,op. cit., 19. 54. Belisle, Livre, 21; Lord, op. cit., II, 202.

34. Lord, ibid. 55. Hanlon, op. cit., 227.

35. Ibid., 11, 534; Belisle, op, cit., 19. 56. Hansen and Brebner, op. cit., 168-215. 36. Lord, op. cit., II, 571-572. 57. Magnan, op. cit., 269-272, 284.

37. Lord, op. cit., 11, 534-535; Belisle,op. cit., 19- 58. Hanlon, op. cit., 179.-421.) 21, 25-27. 59. Ibid., 173, 273-275. 38. Paradis, op. cit., 48. A. Kennedy, Quebec to Neyv England (Boston, 39. Belisle, op. cit., 20. 1948). 43-51, 117-118; Hamon,op. cit., 327- 331. 40. J. R. Jackson,History ofLittleton, New Hampshire (Cambridge, 1905), 11, 335-336. . 61. Magnan, Notre "erne de Lourdes de Fall River, Massachusetts (Quebec, 1925), 34-56. 41. Lord, op. cit., II, 542. t. 62. Paradis, op. cit., 49-53; A. Verrette, Messire 42. Lori, op. cit., 11, 421-422. Chevalier (Manchester, 1929), Paroisse de Ste. Marie'(Manchester, 1931). 43. Theodore Maynard, The Story of American Catholicism (New York, 1940,-300. 63. Morriseau, op. cit., 28.

44. Lord, op. cit., 11, 423; Archives of the Diocese 64. Hamon, op. cit., 314, 405; Robitaille,op. cit., of Burlington, Goesbriand's Diary,copy at St. 257. Michael's College, Winooski. 65.Hamon, op. cit., 45. 376-377; Albert, op. cit., As delegate of Bishop John McCloskey ofAl- 423. bany, Goesbriand blessed thecornerstone of the Oblate parish in Plattsburg in May,1854. 66. Hamm), op. cit., 468-471.

?57 252 ( 67. Ray A. Killington, The Protestant Crusade 90. Amaron, op. cit., 3-4. (New York, 1938), 439-431. 91. /bid.166-69, 56, 93-97. 68. Ibid., 193. 92. Ibid., ix. 69. Ibid., 345. 93. Ibid., 143.. 70. Ibid., 302. 94. Duclos, op. cit., 11, 221-223. 71. Ibid., 327. 952T. Abel Protestant Home Missions to Catho- 72. Lord, op. cit., 11, 163, 534; Belisle, Livre, 20. lic Im ants (New York, 1935), 104-105.

73. Killington, op. cit., 245; 258 n. 28. 96. Baptist Home Missionary Monthly, October, 1886, 241. 74. R. P. Duclos, Hiitoire du Protestantisre Fran- k cais au Canada at aux'tats -Vnis (Wareal, 97. Ibid., April, 1889, 9,June, 1894; December, -11.d.), II, 211. 1897, 410.

75. Ibid., 11,-215. 98. Lord, op. cit., III, 126-129.

76. Ibid., Baptist Home Mission Monthly, May, 99. Hamon, op. cit., 317-320; ,,Magnan, Notre 1878; April, 1879.1 am indebted to Mrs. Iris Dame, 61-73; H. Dubuque, Histoire et Statis- Saunders Podea for the references to thisA- tique des Canado-Americains du Conner cut lication. (Worcester, 1899), 32-54; M.,Tetrault, Le Role de la presse dans I 'evolution du people franco-americaine de la Nouvelle-Angleterre 77. C. E. Amaron, Your Heritage: or New England Threatened (Springfield, 1891), 76-77. (Madeilles, 1935), 101-105, 113-114; J. P. Tardivel, La Situation religieuse auxEtats- 78. Belisle, Presse 8-91, 113-115. Unis (Montreal, 1900), 290-293. -1' 79,, Hamon, op. cll., 70. 100. Lord, op. cit., III, 165.

80.. Belisle, Livre, 48. 101. Hamon, op. cit., 320.

8 L Thirteenth Antic:1,9Y Report ( Boston, 1882), 3ff. 402. Lord, op. cit., 111, 166.

82. Ibid., 28-31, 9-91. 163. Hamon, op. cit., 87, 122-124. (Mon- 83 ''Lord, op. cit., III, 101ff.. 104. AL Rumilly, Mgr. Lafleche at son temps "Friedl, 1,938), 294. 84.,fauclos, op. cit., 197. V 105. Hamon, op. cit., 134. 85. Amaron, op.tit., 77. 106., Amaron, op.cit., vii. 86. Ibid., op. cit., 105-107. 107. Reprinted in Revue Franco-Amoricaine,I 87. F.Gatineau, Historique des Conventions (Quebec, 1908), 482-488. Generales (Woonsocket, 1927), 248, 108. Tetrault, op. cit., 103-104. 88. Ainaron, op. cit., 2-4. 109. Tardivel, op. cit., 205, n. 7. 89. F. Parkman, Our Common Schools (Boston, 0 1890).

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10. IL elin,Notre-Dame-de-Sept Douleurs 112. E. de Nevers,L'Avenir du people canadien- d'Adams, Massachusetts(Montreal, 1916), francais(Paris, 1 896), 116. 227-228. 113. A. Robert,L'Inviolabillte dela paroisse 111. Tardivel, op. cit.,227. franco-americaine(Manchester, I 948).

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a 't 254 We may not have much 'scholarly work onFranco-American religious problems in this century, but what we do have is the well-informedand Judicious journalism of Jacques Ducharme. The chaff ter on religion in.his bookThe Shadows of the Trees (Hai- per & Bros.; New York, 1943), givesthe flavor of the parish life of the Franco-American community In the first half of the twentieth century. iralsodeals with the most Impor- tant (Sentinellel affair in Rhode Island involvingthe issue-of language and religion. The resolution of that issue foreshadowed today's wideshhed divorce oflanguage from reli- gious identification for persons of French-Canadian and Acadiandescent. Ducharme writes fluently and he is well-informed and careful, but it-would seemthat theie journal-. istic sketches cannot lead to balanced scholarly accounts of thereligious incidents at is- 4 vethat research has not yet been done and published.

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THE SHADOWS OF THE TREES Religion and Language w

by k Jacques Elucharme re

In a society evolvi g slowly after fq,ur president of it: Yob do not have thatorgani- years of civil war, imi,France-Americans zation in the states.>> were heartily welcomby the other Catho- lics of New-England. The Church alsowas ill e

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under their jurisdiction, but it is_unfortunate -rectory. leered at as «Old Knobstick,»he it is thatcompromises couldnot have been refused to4 retract his words, and died, Leached before bitterneA was engenclirred. said, of grief. Often legal measures were calledr before peace could be restored. The Danielsonville affair was simplythe refusal of the Franco-Americans tocontrib-, These incidents hal+ become landmarks, ute ,to the construction of aschool where in Franco-American annals: theFlint affair, French would not be taught.Tie Corporation assimi- - theDanielsonville affair; the Corporation Sole case of Maine was an attempt at lation of the Franco-Americans bynaming Sole case, the North Brookfield, and Woon- soeket incidents, and the Sentinelle affair. English-speaking priests to French-speaking The last named is the most rcent, and is still parishes. As the Bishop was the solehead of a soile issue, asthose involved are alixe and the diocesan corporation, he couldadminister -cannot easily forget. diocesan funds as he saw fit. Recourse was had to the legislature, without avail,but the The problem of the maintenance of for- Franco-Americans gained their point when it formed the majority eign-languageparishes seems unimportant was realized that they tooutsiders,'but to the foreign-language of the Catholics in Maine. minority it" is a life-and-death matter.4te- the St. ligioninits teachings Is largely abstract. The North Brookfield affair and Even though the Francd-Americaps eventu- Anne's incident resembled the Maine case in Woon- ally mastered Englishwell- enough to live broad outline, but at St. Anne's in without embarrassment, listening to a ser- ocket,the parishioners maintained a sortof mon inthe newly acquired language was 4it-down strike until a priest who could quite another thing. When their-absence speak French was named as headof the from church was criticized, they replied parish. Most of these incidents werelocal, simply that they Aid not ilnderstandthe and so did not have therepercussions of the priest,, and what was the use of going to «Sentinelle.» There was little publicity ac- church. when one did not understandwhat corded them, although the English press was fulminate against was being said?Anyone rho has attended a watchful for any excuse to service in a language he does notunderstand the Franco-Americans. $)'can -appreciate this point. I do, remembering seemingly endless sermons in Lithuanian and The Sentinelle affair was quite another dish of tea, not p much because of theprin.: German. 6, ciples involved as because of the personalities * * * and the resulting publicity.

Of the half dozen disputes mentioned, It was in -1924 that tilt Bishopof Pro- high only the Sentinelle affair seems toliar had dence outlined the need for diocesan a, lasting effect on theFranco- Ans. schools, especially in Providence. Amillion The Flint affair revolved aroundthe refusal dollars was the sum fixed fortheir cOnstruc- Island had of Father Bedard, pastor inFall River, to en- lion. As the Catholics of Rhode five courage the strikers 0 -1883in their unwill- *centribtited almost a half million in the ingness to return to work. *A strikerhas no7 privious"years,.there was some murmuring at sight to prevent another froiptakilig his this proposal, but as thedonations were to be voluntary the protests were few. place,* he said, ..thereby incurringthe ani- . Thosity of theIrish., -who desecrated his

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Money was slow, in forthcoming,how- head of the diocese. Daigenault, itmust be ever, and the Bishop annoutnced that he remembered, was a lawyer. would have to assess the pariShesaccording to their resources, Then all hell brokeloose, The Sentinellists were' bested from something in the, the nature of a civilwar. start, because the sFranco-Americanswere Brother was against brother, friendagainst divided on the question. Manysympathized friend. It was said. that thediocesan author- secretly, but opposing the Bishop .opetay ities were attempting complete assimilation was another matter. put as the Bishopwas of the Franco-Americans. The newspaper La attacked on two fronts, two decisionswere Sentinelle was foundedtocarry on the / necessary to defeat the Sentinellists. In the battle. Rhode Island courts, the Bishopwas upheld as having to right to tax parishes for diocesan The real beginning of the quarrelis still Works. The second decisionagainst th! Sen- obscure. Some say that, ElitegeDaigneault tinellists was to havemore weight. hoped to obtain a judgeship, andwas using this occasion asa steppingstotie. Some Say For they had madean appeal to Rome, that tile leaaers of French societiessaw in requesting the Pope to stay thellishop's the quarrel a chanceto consolidate their, hand. Their reqUest, however, construedin positions. Others claim that itwas simply the light of a revolt against ecclesiastical the old distrust between Irishand Frenoh authority, was doomed to failure, and the coining to the surface. refusal of Rome carried with it the dread sentence of excommunication along with Many were vitally interested,as may be suppression bf the newspaper. Officiallythe seen by the fact that fifty thousand dollars case'ofthe Sentinelle was closed, but its were subscribed for the foundation of La, effect on the morale of the Franco-Ameri- Sentinelle. J. Albert Foisywas called frAn cans wasjust beginning. Canada to be editor. In time money was raised for the high Foisy and hissuccessors found ample schools, although the drive would languish grist for their mill. Understandingthat the whenever workers 'came intoa Franco-Amer- proposed diocesan schools wouldnot teach ican palish. It seamed fora brief space that French as a major subject,they reasoned everyone had an ax to grind, and the editori- that the Franco-American parishesshould als in La Sentinelle were anything butre- not be asked to crtribute: A fewFranco- served. EpithetS flew, especially when Foisy American parisheseven went so far as to- set went ovej to La Tribune, and Daigneault up parish councils, entrusted with the ad- became editor of La Sentinelle. ministration of parish funds, but in thelong run these were of no avail:It Was the old In the last analysii, more harip than story of local ,control of parishfunds. good was done to the Franco-Americans, for theii adversaries learned that theycould be in Rhode Island, however,there wasal- divided on important issues. The affair liter- ready central controlof,church ftmds, and ally tolled the knell of Franco-American in- here the Sentinellists thought of a solution. fluence in Rhode Island. z They knew that even tually thematter would be decided legally, so pointedout that the oSome funny things happened,3-4ecom- Bishop could be considered in thelight of a tnented one participant. <4 can remember private individual, apart fromhis status as going with my father to a banquet. When he

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«That's true. I had forgotten.», saw aSentinel listthere,he walked out, People of one parish taking me with hum uncle had skill- wouldn't talk with those. of another.Some I had to smile, for my direct answer, be- businesses were -affected, and when itall fully evaded giving me any blew over, both of the French newspapers yond stating the policyof the Church that my ecclesiastical matters. He musthave sensed had disappeared. les nice to say for he added: father was a Knight of St. Gregoryand was thatIwas notsatisfied, buried Tit his uniform, but think of ailthose that Franco- who must have been bitter againsthim be- «Your- have to remember religious attitude cause of that. He wasestranged from a good Americans inherittheir they from the French. Faith isgoverned by the number of his friends, simply because settled in t Were against him onthis one question.» intelligence. Then, Canada was time of LouisXIV; when Gallicanismx-' but I spoke with okl,ers, men whohad not isted. France belonged'to the Churcl of its hierchy. seen eye to eye the church authorities, persisted in self-government Sentinellists openly or Thatiswhy the French-Canadisand men who had be,m of n- quietly. They all/deplored the affair,Gut Franco-Americans desire some sor that the old resentment still ex- trot over theirclergy. M the sys did not could se England, a cla was in- isted. -r;-, exist here in New . evitable.» My' last source of information was my uncle, who ispastor atSt. Joseph'Sin «Which explains La Sentinelle,» 1 said. .Worcester. «If you want to, put it that way.» Now my uncle-.is a diplomptic person, and itis difficult to iet a ,pronouncement qitesikm. ',told him from him on any such uncle pointed what I wanted and he said: On another occasion, my out : I'll tell you. In any discussionbetween Frapco- American the. Bishbp and those under;hisjurisdictioik «The Members of the to the Bishop.YOti clergy are senerallymodels of -self-efface- one must give reason minded, in must remember that he actsfor the general nYeitt. They Are not politically theecciesiaitIrM sensethat is, they are not good. Nyou say, some may beoffended, question, ambitiousand they anticipate norenown there always a minority in any .r confine but the general good is whatmatters.» outsidetheir owd diocese. They their efforts to their parish,generally. There with a pen- «Well, what about the Seutinelle?» are exct_tions, pf coutse,priests chant foliterature,gifted musically, born orators, but the-rankand file cot the Franco- He shrugged: (1 p. AmericAn clergy is noted for.itsmodesty, if 4 «I didn't follow it very closely.I had just I maynay' call It that.» beef) transferred to Worcester,and had quite becoming in- «What would yoti sty tHertactionof the enough to do here without tiled° pastor would. vblved outside. You must rememberit was parishionerstowards at that timethaI the new church was btiilt.» nOrmally'be?>;

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«I'm not speaking for myself?» «Well, what aboutthetendency of Franco-Americans to -adoptnew sects, like «No. But you must havehad some im- that 'of Father Chihiquy, pressions from and Jehovah's Wit- your parishioners.» ,nesSes?» it«Y,es.Well, to-them, Monsieur le cure is «I think the explanationof that lies in a personage. He may be calledupon jo arbi- the intense trate disputes, as individuality of the Fran an adviser in temporal -af- American, who is after fairs, a friend in timeltof all a Frenclimail,.Yei need. On the other know.. that the Frenclunkli hand, the Franco-American is?fee*con- looks upon his tent-with aulhoriti pastor as a man, also, and wp king as he feels that reserves a right to he (pn be indVit)of it any time- he criticizp him persOnally.You can trace the wants. The ch whole attitude of the elong to this or that' Franco-Americans to- SUIT1111 group has the intense parochialism an. irresistible appeal for of the Frenchpeas- many Franco Americans, but eventually ants wit!) came to Canada.The the outside world, greater -number of themreturnlo the fold. everything outside his parish,was ftSreign. You can call it intellectual Central authority. pride, if you-want. was not bothered with.- It is the source of his The loyal leaden charm, just as it is the political and relisious, source of all )1i is griefs.» were The only ones hat mattered.». 4, - «Couldn't it, be novelty «You mentim d Qallicanisin'onCe, that draws them when away temporarily from the faith?» we were talking abt the Sentinelle:»- «Perhaps, butthat would make the' AYes, butyou mustn't take 'it -too_liter- ally. I mentioned 'it Franco-Americans seempretty lightheaded. as a tendency of. the No,' it's the desire for,freedom of thought Franco-Americans, and theresult of it is the that leads them,astray.» 'desire for parishcontrol of perish finances, - - and not the central control as it.exists in the «What do yoti _think iirthe, future-4as United States.» far \ as the tranco-Americansare concerned?» «There's the question of assimilation. I «It's hard tosay. Experience has shown always thought the Churchencouraged us that faith and languageare almost sYnon- r `ymous. Tlie rise «What do you mean?» or fall of the clergy is the rise or fait of the whole nationality.'The 11; grouping into parishesas a sort of social en= the efeMtic a few marriage -in the early tity shows that theFranco-Americans in- tween- the French and stinctively recognize their Indians. I don' pastors their ," er reiuemherreading any leaders. Societies cannot' enjoy comment on it.» 5;.,,,,turt the same.- prestige. They are dependenton goodwill, whereaS the clergy partakes «The Oticy of the of the continuity Church is for the Chureli,rtceiving their but not by force, As for the-marriages authority from an unkoken -line of ,bishops. Thatlast fact of French with 'Indians,it was better to alone means something.*. countenance thethan to forbid them. The latter would only have encouragedthe me- It was tice.» a day in May, and we were at the faMily home in Wendell.Here my uncle could relax from his dignity, justas my father and ;

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aunts and uncles couldbend to the soil or returned to O look to the sky. The family had of the rranco- ancestors, and my . As you see, the story the way of life of their of the Jesuits his priestly- duties American cleriy is not like that uncle joined them when carried the cross at permitted. Here, on the, hilltop,he could of the heroic days who they threaded un- forget momentarily theformalities of his the bow of their canoes as lilac in nown streamsand lakes. The missionaries calling-,allthat. mattered was the the bloom, the buds on apple trees, a new'bird in NewEngland trod humbly, their task organization family in the house nailed to theMaple tree. preaching of the Word and the the Franco- of groups intoparishes. There were the Stich things as the problems of emigres, the Americans, and the relation oftheir. clergy councils with the wealthier seemed tar away and drives to raise enough moneyto buy land to these problems, when the parish alien. Perhaps it was just as we. and to build a church. Then, was well begun,-there was thought of the teach, and always When Sundays C117 my unclewould be school, and finding nuns to the vestments of his maintenance of the oldtraditionthe word _in his church, robed in ThiS was the beginning office. He would mount thepulpit to address of God in French. fteir labors. his Bien ehers freres,thereby performing his and the enall duties instinctively in the tonguehe had forest of. discussions we had Itis not surprising that a learned .as a child. All the in the valleys of unimportant compared steeples should have arisen had together were land of religious with this simple manifestationof survival. New England, always a fervor, to blend with thelandscape. In the For. my part,' I also wouldbe in church else - Je vous where: listening to our pastorexpound the quiet one can hear -a murmur . salue Marie . .. orMes bier; ehers freres .. faith. The tongue would bethe same as that of my uncle, and I alsowould be continuing the great tradition.

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266 A 26.2 Franco-Americans are indebted to Edward Billings Ham for writing English-lan- guage histories of two of their major institutions, the national societies and the Franco press. In the following article, first published in theNew England Quarterly of June, 1939, Ham allots praise and criticism to the various societies with a seemingly evenhand. How even-handed lib really was, Is difficult to ascertain in the absence of otherscholarly assessments. The objective history of the past forty years of theFranco national soci- eties Is still waiting to be written. In retrospect, however, we know that am was cor- rect in evaluating the opportunities for,Alevelopment open to"La Societee ssomp- tionthey have indeed greatly expanded over the past four decades.

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AP 1 267

. FRENCH NATIONALSOCIETIES IN NEWENGLAND

by Edwaid Billing. (lam

Authoritative research concerning'most furtherance of French Catholicinterests, minority groups in the United,. States-has cultural advancement, and ction of the long been sadly lacking. Spice New`Eligland's French language.` Mere tecita the pur- large Franco-American population isno ex- poses falls short, ho*every.e.Nan ansivel to ception to this neglect, the present sketch' three inescal at_t_r_le-questimiS:,how .effectively is designed to outlineone of the little known are the societies realizing their aims .today, aspects of their struggle topreserve some 'how seriouslyare the leaders continuing to semblance of racial integrity. Their vigorous- uphold these objectives, arid how hopefully lyorganized resistance to assimilationi may ther. orgalizations view their future? scarcely understood outside theirown groups, These questions manifestly invite appraisal except in the obvious sense that all foreign- of a variety of Specific factors:cbaracteristics language minorities resort to essentiallyan- of lidininistsation; proportional .a'ortde- alogous methods. French culturepatterns in yore& by the societies to Frenchctiretraits New Englandare,of course, reinforced latiguarY on the one hand and toecon- above all by close proximity to Quebec,and omic solidarity on the otlw; methods by also by tied of family tradition, religion,and which the societies are seeking to retardac- buguage, by parochial education in schools culturation; means of support andsources of and "colleges, by Aish-American hostility, oppositioil; handicaps imposed b the dimin- and newspapers and societies devotedto ishing social visibility of the Facco-Ameri- preservation of the French 'heritage. None i can communities and by' the increasing °di- these agencies is so little knOwn to the Angl versity of their individdal interests; and-pos- Saxon community as that', of the_mutual_ sible disparities between ib-called American benefit:societies, which claim upwards ofa cuiVre patterns andspecial norms fostered hundred thousand New England members, by the societies.,,. *Redly interested in French survival.No Frpnch account of these organizations is im- `The history of Fienelanadian nation- partial, and no- English accounteven exists. al societies goes tack to the political troubles A rapid survey is thereforedesirableregard- which led Ludger Duverlayto found the ing the character of the Canadian French firsstSociete St-Jean-BapilVe in834 at national societies and their contributionto Montreal. Fourteen .yearslater, the first New England life. society in the United States ivas established at Malone, New fork, Re be followed in The fo oses 'of all these socktie§ rapid succession during the next few decades are entiallthe saine:` mutual benefit 4-1.4byover four hundred similar fraternal, br insurance, maintenance of the lodgeisystein,' mutual benefit organizations. Many of these

263 40, xtr AP'

,1 and many more which would be more stableand more co- local (toils have disappeared, function with con- ha e been absorbed bythe present-day ra- hesive, and which would tinuity.- In Canada the Societedes Artisans 1 societies There are, however,still tio Canadiens-Francais and theUnion Saint- nut serousSocietes St- Jean - Baptiste in New others, Joseph du Canada for example,already con- England, each independent' of the It was minor sy,,ns of mutual stituted modelf of long,standing. some operating therefore natural to combine manylocal "1'1 rimarily social benefit, some existing f I New England into purposes, and allmodelled in varying degree mutual benefit societies in organizations of wider rangeand of greater upon the originalorganization inMontreal.2 strength. Thus in 1889 fourCercles Jacques- united to form what The more spectacular accomplishments Cartier in Rhode Island is now the SocieteJacques-Cartier. Similarly, 41of the Societe St-Jean-Baptiste de Montreal Canado-Americaine arose in modest aspi- the Association will suffice to indicate the very Societes Saint-Jean- New England. 1896 from a grouping of rations of its local imitators in and in -1900 the main society estab- Baptiste in New Hampshire; In the financial field, the ld'Anteriquere- Caisse Nationale Union Saint-Jean-Baptiste lished over thirty years ago a sulted from a parallel movementinitiated by d 'anomie, a Caisse deRemboursernent, Saint-Jean-Baptiste of Holyoke, and more re- the Societe Societe Nationale de Fiducie, French conven- Nous. The Massachusettl. The Acadian cently a Ligue de l'Achat de chez Waltham, MassachUsetts, society has constantly aidedFrench educa- tion of 1902 at provided t4enecessaryimpetus for the es- tion, financially and otherwise,in various at oi Canada; it continues to publish tablishment' of the Societe l'Assomption parts" Fitchburg, in the following year.Somewhat quantitiets of literaturein behalf of all aspects the origin of the of the Prench cause; itsOeuvre du Livre et different, however, was ForestiersFranco-Americains, du Disque franfais isdistributing over fifty Ordredes it has founded in resistance to' some pressurefOr thousand books and records each year; catholic concerts, linguistic assimilation. In 1901 the organized many lecture courses, member to correspondence and by Order off' Foresteri forbade any and broadcasts; by French-Canadian conven- visits it maintains closerelatioiewith other represent it at the Canada and tion in Springfield, anaction which led to. Societes Saint-Jean-Baptiste in then em- cooperates in various manywithdrawals in fttor of the in Nevr-rngland; ,j,t Four of the Catho- Aryonic French benefitsocieties.3 specific ways to the advantage Foresters of America doted lic Church; and its St,John's Day pageants years later the the exclusive useof English in all o have become classicin the Province of their French- Saint-Jean-Baptiste de activities, thereby alienating Quebec. The Societe speaking lodges and leading tothe formation eight thousand - Montreal today counts. sothe Franco-Americains in 1.906; constitute 'a powerful of the Forestiers active members, who into the Association of intelligent na- this society was merged force for the furtherance Canado-Americaine in December,1938. tionalism in French Canada. At present there arfour national soci- Between 1865 and 1901the French - England, while * depended on eties with main offices' in ew Canadian, in the United States three more, operatingfrom Canada, have frequent conventions ofnatiotial scope to substantialfranco-American membership. unify their interests and toprotect their of the New racial tradition in this country.TheepheA2' By far the largest and strongest meetings made in- England societies is theUnion Saint-Jean- eral character of these d'Amerique,4 wish headquarters in creasingly apparent the needfor, agencies Baptiste 4V

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Adult Juvenile Total Social members 241 Beneficiary Members. 16,375 ;,-7681 19,34 Insurance in force S 10,634,973 $ 1;544,250 S 12,179 ,223 Average per policy $649.46 $557.90

TABLE II- ter Lodges Members New Hampshire 73 6,948 Massachusetts 70 3,554 Rhode Island 25 2,279 Connecticut 18 810 Maine 8 669 Michigan 8 298 Vermont 8 150 Province of Quebec 92 4,676 Totals 302 19,384 Total insurance benefits paidsince 1896--S 5,360,820.78: Life insurance policies issuedfrom S100 to $ 5,000.

Woonsocket, Rhode Island, anda member- some 21,000 and 6,000 members in the ship exceeding 56,000. Nextin numbers is New England states. theAssociationCanado-Americaine with nearli, 20,000 members,the Societe Jacques- Since the activities of the different Cartier with 1,300, all in so- Rhode gland, and cieties are sufficiently alike towarrant limi- the Societe Acadienned'Amerique tation of detail in this about 1,000, in Massachusetts survey, study here may and Maine. well be centered primarilyupon one of them, Rumors circulate constantlyconcerning pos- namely, the Association Canado-Americaine. 'AeNit)le fusions, particularly of the two smaller The ACA not only is accurately typicalof the groups, into some larg Franco-American or national society, but also, while itis smaller Acadian organization; it fact, members of the than the USJBA, it functions in inarea more USJBA entertain. theope of eventually conduciie to French ethnic uniting all New.England survival, and it roups into mingle recognizes more tangibly the needfor Cana- nationalsociety.Absorption of salaried dian cooperation in resisting assimilation.5 officers is, however,a serious obstacle. The Except for the Societe I'Assomption Acadian __ciete l'Assomplion, in its although relation to peculiarities of th0.cadian French founded at Fitchburg, hashad its main office survival, other societies. wiff be in Moncton, New Brunswick, mentioned since 1913; its here only incidentally; but thegeneralities New England membership is inthe vicinity which are valid for oneare essentially applic- of 5,000, inostlk in MaineindMassachusetts. able to all. Two Canadian ofganizations, thepowerful Societe des Artisans Canadiens-Francais and The above tablesmay summarize the theAlliance. Nationale, have !respectively material strength and geographicaldivisions

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somewhat modest, of the ACA (as ofMarch, 1939).6 of $23,500,000, seem they should be set against the manyeconom- Franco-Americans have Theessentialfeatures of thesoci- ic difficulties which require only brief had since their firstextensive infiltration ety's formal administration In this con- comment, as itis perfectly typical of the from Canada eighty years ago. that token, inc\... nection, it is also pertinent torecall the in-' American lodge system. By Franco-American in sup- dentally, the Franco-Americanmutual oci- tense loyalty of the antlits school. eties have already yielded aslight point to the porting his parish civilization within habits of the majority . established itself which they exist. Restrictionof membership By 1906 the ACA had in New Hampshire,Rhode !Stand, Michigan, to French-speakingCatholics, however, re- it did not. mains for the present a solidbarrier to assim- Connecticut, and Quebec, but 1914 orMassachusetts7 ilation. Members are recruitedin the main by enter Maine until until as recently as 1925.The relative strength localfield-workers. Officers of theACA, convention, include of the ACA in NewIlakpshire ani1 Quebec elected at a quadrennial organized Fr.anctii-,. (M. Adolphe Robert since1936), gives value to numerous a president American visits in Canadaand to relations fourvice-presidents,chaplain,secretary, advisers, and gen- between Canadian andAmerican members. treasurer, legal and medical negligible competition eral directors, Theexecutive board, known Despite the almost the affairs of the which the ACA can offer thestrong Canadian as the Halite-Cour, manages Province of Quebec, in Manchester, mutual societies in the society from a central office effectively confirm the New Hampshire. Individualchapters elect its activities there various geo- fact that the Franco-Americansurvival must the delegates who represent from across the graphical districts at theconvention. All the be constantly nourished criticized from time to border. This policy of theACA may of course societies are violently discriminatory group time by Franco-Americanswho consider be criticized. as aiding votes than for attitudes, but the criticismis relevant only if officials more zealous for admitted conflict of duty. While politicalconsciousness ii un- such a policy aggravates cultural elements. avoidably .rife-,itis no more conspicuous be noted only here than elsewhere, and need is divided aniong the evident defects in allsuch enter- The work of the ACA as one of religions prises. A less frequentthough more impor- insurance, education, social and dep ores the recognition ac- activities, emergency aids, andFranco-Cana- .taut criticism in the national dian research. Underthe administration of corded to women members is perhaps in a better societies; the vali ity ofthis comment is en- M. Robert, the ACA Well-known fact that the position than other NewEngland national hanced by the against assimi- women of allminority groups yield most societies to work realistically lation and at the same time toseek cultural slowly to assimilativeforces. . compatibility with its Anglo-Saxonenviron- England societies, ment. The avowedobjective of the ACA, as Like "most of the New «proteger le foyer fa- impressive pdvaires during of all such societies, is the ACA has made de l'economie, the past three decades:its present assets of milial, encourager la pratique contribuer a fortifier une oetivrequi, tout en over $3,0010,000 are the result, of steady in- (even since 1929)frOm se prodamantcatholiquell'abord, veutaussi creases each year survivance comme groupe barely 0$55,000 in 1913. Ifthese figures, or assurernotre distinct 'et eviler par la 'laChute dans l'in- even those of-theJJSJBA, with its total assets of $6,600,000 and its totalinsurance policies signifiance.'>>8.. 267

The details of the insuranceactivities of USJBA are receiving the society arehot important incidental appropria- to the.Present tions for educationalpurposes from the study. Itis, however, important,although difficult, :to know French Ministry of ForeignAffairs, as well the proportional value as from the provincialgovernment in Quebec. which directors attachtotheir financial It was not until 1924 activities. In thaLtheACA estab- many quartets, the tendencyis lisheda Su de l'Ecolierl'or to regard the nationalsocieties more and scholarships more as mere business available to childIen ofmembers. Acute k concerns. Numerous financial need, the candidatgs -- individual lodges school record, rarely have meetings.which and the desire for ttract members other. than distribution by statescon- the officers. In-._ stitute the basis for award.A scholarship d ference to .Frenchinterests is priSbably not confined to the may be renewed at thediscretion of the subordinaL branches Hatrte-four of the society, ' alone preoccupation with and on the average the purely business the tenure is forwfour future of a Society is likely or five years;-in a few- to manifest itself instances, however, in the main officeas well') Leaders who over $2,000 has been are awarded to singleindividuals. Some $42,000 pessimistic or cynicalare often less concerned has been allottedto over 100 students ,tof over the survival (either linguisticor ethnic) than their official preparatory schOot and collegestanding; the statements would imply. forty-seven boursiers for The tendencyto stress merely the insurance 1937-1938 received abour$100 each.Recipients are not obliged features .will doubtlessacquire more and to attend French-languageinstitutions. In more adherents as the likelihoodof extensive .illata additiOn to itsprogram of scholarships, the group-acculturation increases.In fact, there are very few Fraiaco-Americans ACA has From timeto time added various unrealistic other educational enough to believe in works in New England; . :any possibility of ex- witnessnumerous subscriptions tensive linguistic survivalin New England; forthe many of the leaders have Franco-American Collegede l'Assoinption in come to think of Worcester, contributionsto the Cercie des the language merely asa temporary, although EtudianftsFranco-AniericainsdeBoston, powerful, asset to theirtraditions, and they organization of the are more hopeful that the children's annual Con- Franco-American cours de Francais at Fall River. element will maintain itseconomic and social identity even if Frenchceases to be spoken. ( F rthe present, however, Functioning sin4e 1915,the CaOse de there are still l'Ecolier of the USJBA ,nu ous offiCials whoare unstinting in yields more informa- their work for French tion concerning the effectof such education- religious, linguistic, al subsidies in French and cultural betterment.One can therefore New England. Boursiers are chosen by competitive'examinationand only conclude that thecharacter of all the with reference, societies is still to'geographic distribution,to very much in the-balance, attend schools and partisans of the or colleges, preferably bilin- survival can merely hope gual, in New England to elect officers capable or Canada. Normally of continuing such the appointee is about policies .as those of the thirteen or fourteen ACA under- itspres- years Old, and receives ent regime. an average annual allotment of about $165($1 84 in 1937-3.8).; the average tenure hasbeen for'six *years. For lit is undoubtedly in thefield of educa- more advanced study, eitherlocal or abroad, tion that, the' nationalsocieties are doing protiges infrqculiers(average yearly allch- their most effective worktqward enlightened / ment about $125;average tenure three years) cultural differentiation. Notwithout signifi- are chosen On .thie basis ,of cance is the fict that both theACA and the finailcial need without competitiveexamination.- Nearly 4 272 4 268

schob ships. have held both titration. If the national society 300 students, of whom a few ranks of the received Qyer accompliSh their purpose, the bourses and prOtections, Shave be more adequat- $160,000 since the foundationof the sock- survival propagandists will , successive Franco-Amer- ety's Caisse de I'Ecolier. ly Oinforced among ican generations. While inthe eyes of Anglo- quixotic, 'it Even more than the NewEngland soci- Americans this effort is merely be counted as only part eties, itis the less wealthy AcadianStciete must for the present l'Assomption *which has been mostactive of an extensive resistanceto racial absorption educationally. Frankly recognizingthe un- in New England. educationalfacilitiel., usuallyinadequate frank re- this society has, since itsbk In this connection, the very among AC/0181K already helpfully in- ginning, made a Caisse Ecoliereits first con- cords of the USJBA are formative. It has been possiblefor the writer sideration.' 0 Since 1904 it has grIalited nearly three-quarters of the $200,000 to. about 350 boysin classical to conclude that over rchools. In gen- society's scholasticbeneficiariesretain at colleges and girls in convent with the work of eral, the subventions are opento members least 'a formal sympathy 'the o anization.Perhaps ten per cent may between "18 and 20, to children(between 11 of the of members, and to orphans'spon- now garded as active partisans and 1 survival. It also appearsevident that sored by priests or othermembers." Each Freng about half of the formerboursiers have fully year from ten totwenty-five new proteges expectatiot-them- RS- are chosen, whocontinue to receive aid until met the society's Scholars. All the societiesattach special im- the end of their coursf. .Preliminary sorting portance to the priests amongtheir ex-recip- of candidates is madein terms of geographic aptitudetests; the final se- ients of grants-in-aid;the Societe l'Assomp- distribution and that the thirty- lections °are drawn by lot.This methocris in- tioli in particular considers disparities in five or so priests amongits former proteges tended to adjust pronounced contributing, extensively to Acadian sur- the instruction availablein different Acadian are l'Assomption has also vival. This emphasisdoes not however, de- localities. The Societe of the naiional societies been 'able to loan over amillion and a half tract from the efforts in behalf of the layprofessions. dollarsfortheconstruction of French the memorial churchat churche's(e.g., ACA and USJBA PrA schools, convents, and hospitals. The fact teat both Gran& subsidize some students inEnglish-language judge the res4lts institutions must be regarded asat least a It is still too soon to forces of ethnic as- educational 'enterprises, par- partial concession to the of these several rarity of strictly ticularly in thecase" of the ACA, whose similation, even despite the .young' to have Franco-Aptericano schools and(---colleges in scholarship holders are too long been stAuted appreciably to the 'maintenance New England. It has of ,course cot that education tends to Obviously thenational' common knowledge of. French tradition. itablity, and with it chltural dif- societies are well awareof the. increasing lessen social ferentiation;' the French societies areaccold- difficulties of fostering race patriotismamong, UniteAtates. ingly setting themselves adelicate probrem Franco,Ainericans born in the of their schol- Although they aregenerallyerfgarded as more for the future administration than other minority, arshiptUnils. In any event, however, their tenacious of-race ttaits provide 'a valudble cor- generations more Lind 'moire re- present policy should groups, the condition which the show, of course, the same, rection to a well-known mole from Canada president of the ACA himselfdescribes with N familiartendencies toward' eventualaccul;

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surprising vigor: «Les chosen de l'espiiittie timony to indicate the desire formore and nous interessent guere, et nous smiunes an more social mobility, particularly in second point de vue intellectuel, d'une legerete andsubsequentgenerations of Franco- concevable et d'une paresse incorrigible.* 12 AmeriCans?

Itis in the social and religious fields In view of This gloomy picture, thepos- that the national societies are most deficient. itive achievement of the national societies is.. Here, also, they suffer from the disapproval only the morelicommendable. The ACA, for so often felt for the lodge system as a whole. instance, has been able to provide important To be sure, die lodge system effectstax ex- emergency aid for many of its members; emption and proportionately lower insurance notably atter the 1936 floods.and after the rates; it should also provide French societies collapse of the huge Amoskeag textile mills with a practical rallying point for bestirring in Manchester. In Manchester, the ACA isre- members in behalf of the survival and other sponsible for a Societe des Conferences:_a causes. Unfortunately, despite all the effortg' Societe itOpeirttes, and a radio lieure !ran- of the main office, the programs of chapter raise, all intelligenq designed:to counteract meetings cararely be both pertinent to the thefalling., away from French traditions. society's ab ctives and interesting to the These activities reflect awareness of the need generality of ranco-Annicans. Theaverage for .recaptnringeultural contact with France, member is- althing but intellectually re- concerning which the average Franco- Ameri- sourceful, and his soon bored by unrelieved can is woefully, ignorant anti indifferent. 74 patriotism.Itis erefore inevitable that ACA has given occasional commissions to meetings are seldom given over to Franco- Franco-Americanartists,makes frequent American problems or even to entertainment, contributions to the Franco- Ajtericaitpress, Musical or otherwise, of it French character. has been a conSpieuous par ant, in the Many meetings are wasted in social trivalities French language congresses na4a, and having nothing to .do with the ptirposes of has provided substantial aidsto numerous the organization; M. Robertlas not hesitated, Catluilic parishes. even ityaddressing the Quebec Congress'of 1937, to deplore the «terre a terre dans le, 'Of more interest in ther' ligious`tio1d, quel se trainelamentahleinent le cercle however, is the hostiljty of the church during Further reasons for this situation are not the -earlieryears: in 1889 the Baltimore hard to find: the widespread apathy toward Catholic congress denounced all national racial survival among the Franco-Americans, societies %a the ground that .as such, [they) their .relative- temperamental version to .have no reason for existence in the Church. ganized social life of any. sort," the social in this country.* Church authorities,espe- mediocrity which many of them afieribe to\ cially if of Irish descent, have often continued their national societies. Concerning this last \to look at them askance, but.the 'tendency is factor, it is again M. Robert who has spoken now toward, more sensible cooperation. Re- the most candidly: ((peons en sont Venus cognizing, at least ostensiWyNhe position of concevoir que16S c'est bon 'pout- the clergy' in Canada, New England bishop's le vulgum petits, mats West pas .chic areadoptinga sympathetic attitude toward pour un honinit d'affaires ou un professionel Franco-Americans and their .organizations. d'y adherer. Si, par hasard, en faitipartie, ',One is tempted to wonder, nevertheless, if on coudescendl'avuueronals avec cettere.; this ciroustan-ce is not related to therecog- serve quela participation se limite an paie- .nized fat that active hostility encourages [tient:des. contributions. 15 What better tes- rather than retards Franco-Apieati resis-. A-

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'tance to assimilation. many ways for years. Atthe Springfield con- vention of 1901, fbr instance, competition With little or no cooperation from the bf the English-language organizations was bulk of their meWibers, the directors of the already a primary source of anxiety...Orators ACA have made a praiseworthy record in were declaiming eventhen about therindif- terms of Franco-American studies.For the ference of the-French to their own groups: .tudent Of French New England, the society's «Lepansaxonismebeneficieradenoire ,most' valuable asset is the Ilibliotheque Lain- apathie. Nous regardefrons s'accomPlir cet .ber,t, located in the attractive AC.A. building exode avec tine impassibilite qui ne sera, pa in Manchester. This excellentetitlectioni 6 is &rang& mettle par le tile d'agonie de nos richer in Franco-Canadiana than any other in,. propres societei qui se meurentd'inanition :MAW bon Canadien se sentograndir de the country, yet itis rarely consultf&by , Franco-American,readers. In additiMi to the six bon pouces, mesureanglaise, thaw foisi Canado-Arneficain, monthly. review of finan- .qu'itif de ses collegues d'une society pansax-= ces and other activities,the ,ACA has. pub- okte citielconque l'appellebrother.»,18 A lished ,Les Franco -A . steints par eux- "eashre of the problem today may be seen, mOmes, a series of2 ygotrItlost aspects for cxat the rolls of the «pansaxonist» of the N ngland'suiNivil; 'this is an Knights of 'Columbus, , who count some ten FrAch New England 4 ,able rec rdf Franco-A-mericAP) a es he-. 'thousand members in ween '32 an4 1936,'Tt4.'the ACA .SOciete, While a fair number of these belong to des COutirencel is due'tle useftil.chronicle one orilwo Frepch-lauguagesocieties as well, of.laAnt-jean-BaMste,..ManChester,Neiv mat 'be emphasized that in of the Hampshire (MAnchester, 1938). 14 theolirail French-speaking pulatidn is sity not in- Moltvement Sentinellisie -en Nrvell:Angile- terested in any Pr net), society. Not only are fnglish-languagesocietiesbenefiting tv terre, (Montreal, 1'936),E.-J. -CfaignaUlt, a the forMer president of the ACA, has published Apra French membership,but even in the ail extensively and faithfullydlturnented ' 08.1BAconcessionst* English are already 'account of the pitiful Affaireau phode- present' The Stouts et rEglements (page 6) Island); Two voluthes, rehiting tO'franco- specify Freuck as the only language permitted will «excepte, toutefois; dans _lescentres franco- . American literary activities and history,' shortly be PublisheAtby Robert,, . - ' 1'11;6-kilns on les inembres ne pourraient . raisonnablement pig leraire; dans ce cas l'usage de l'anglais est permis.» Aeording TI 1,enational societies are supported, almost; ee(clusivePy by ipenibershipdues .and' the Union of January;, 934, thirty-six con- Michigan, Neworkand Ver- -I by their insurakcedepar4ntents.Oceasional sells in Illinois, gifts are reCeived, such as' theappropriations mont were no longez funeticiningin French'. frbni Cat'pda aud France, bitt donationssuch\ aS the$151,000Labreaktielega4 to the' From the foregoing paragraphs it should ACA are-extremely rare. On. tlieothtrhand, not be difficult to envisage thehandicaps im- opPOsition to' the societie's.hasal*ays.been. posed on.the national societies by thedimin- present: in particular, ihe passiveGppositidn v ishingsocial visibility of the Francd-Americati pdffftlation.. In' some respEcts the work of 4, of A'b!ne nipiety ix cent gtheltIeW England' French popula0on hiMre non-atembrs.. ,these:ortanizations, despite their etforts,- isj -.alkd political' in- really leading toward thejfrecise identityof . Inter=sociely. dissen4 ns Whiclinuttes for even- triguing have also4-etard41-the growth of* cultural enviro'nfilents atom), lodges r . these Organizations.Siniiiarly, the Jangu.age tual assimilatioir, The failure issue hashandicapped the Frenelimieleties in in thisconntry.lo.. Perpetuate transplanted 4 ,r

kr S. .:: ., .... a 275 . . 1% 271

leisure activities bears out thesame. conciit! An attempt to answer the threeclues- sion.Itislilso true that in this country lions raised at the outset of thisstudy is now Franco-Americans are not necessarilyinter- relevant : ested in other; Franco-Americansmerely for racial reason's. The enlightenedcultural pro- (I) The national' societies, withan en- gram of the main office of the. ACA rollment- amounting to scarcely a ninth comes an indispensable part of itsvery strug- of the New England French population are far from complacent about their gle for an ethnic raison d'etre.. In this sense, the attempt of the nationalsocieties to re-` material accomylishment to date. Even econcile preservation of racial among, members they have hadlittle integrity with success in maintaining the strong emo- ligbodAmerican citizenshilfbecomes, inpart, tiottal.fixations which marked the loyalty an act of sheer self-defence ;and by thiS token, of earlier generations of French-Cana- it is impossiblenow td -doubt the realism of dian culture patterns. They have achieved leaders .who are often regardedby Anglo- a measure of inter-society solidarity,as Americans only as visionary propagandists. showiy the membership of many indi- viduain two or more French fraternal This survey sitOtikl Alto beconcluded groups. The societies ray already ,take without' a word juMifiable_pride in their record of aidto on the conflict, if such there 4 be, between the aims of the Frenchnational Catholicism, to French educationto societies and American culture French journalism, to social cohesion, patterns. On and to economic security thisissueiissimilationists usually disagree among their with partisans of people. a double culture in New (2) While many of the leaders .have lost England. But if the'sincerity ofthe Franco- % interestin aiwthing, but the material Americans is conceded, as it must be, there. progress of the 'societies, numerous of- 1 is no place for debate. Assimilationistshope' ficials a& still striving earnestly and real- to see opposing cultural elements ically for the betterment orroup -synthe- . re- sized; the Franco-American leadersare in 1 lOUS in terms of an American citizen- complete accord withe vctly this view," s ensiched by compatible French cul- and this despite, or'becauof, the refusal Of turtraits. Franco-Americans to regard themselvesas in- (35 le national societies are justified in. vieWing their economic future with vaders in New England:«nOus. ne 'sommes . oplialisk their phsune race adveitice, nous sommesune progres, especially since° race t onSiituante.»2° It is no longer 1929, seems to guarantee continued bus- pos- iness s6blilty. The record of theSociete sible, for example, 4 . to accept MacDonald's l'A*somption has in this respect been attribution to FrUco-Americans of «zealdus particularlyimpressive, primarilybe- and systematic measures to keepthemselves, cause of the wide scattering of its pres- Art.»21 Sociisoationhas 'been due less ent and prospective members. Upwards illto Fianco-AMErcair prejudices,- albeit con- of foriy thousand" Acadians,are to be .siderable, than to theirsrvile acceptance of found in NeW England, but tillselement superior- inferior group. statusimposed by has no important geographic cohesion economic differAces and by inglo-Ameri: except in northernmost Maine and in can eihnOcentrism. The national are parts of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia. On .the .other hand; tii'e Societ6 working for'no specialnorms other thana somption is without any serious 'rival in- bilingdal culture, santiluch observaticesso t. its field, and manydplitg tuccursalei in may preserve respect foritcestral tradition in the same. degree of freedom the Maritime Provincesare actively es- enjoyed by tablished on property 'of their other American *ups. own: Coosequently, if the .societanfurther. ;, 276

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should contribute break down, iddifference, among.the aid of other agencies, they although reduced, linguistic Acadians themselves, itwill remaingut to arperniAnent, impbitant organization for thefurther survival in localities nearer to theProvince of ante of their racialIntegrity. Quebec. Litit regardlessbfrihe fate- of the language, the' societieswill' doubtless con- business Outside the ,TinanCial field, thenational tinue to- function, not meielx as a societies may be adding a modicumof Longer concerns, but asmeritorious'agNits of a dif- Franco- American ...groupwith ;lifeto the French languagein the three ferentiated southern New Esigland states,and with the sound standards of Americancitizenship.

6 C' 4

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Notes .

/ I As of April, 1939. Plbr information and sue- 10. Cf.A.-J. Lexe.i.,Les &rendes Lignes de I"stoke gestions generously given, the writer wishesto de la Societe I 'Assomption(Quebec, 1- 933), dank the followiq officers of the different 179. Societies: MM. N.-P. Comeau, Jelin Ggsselin, .1 Pierre LeBlanc, A.-J. LegO, L.-B. Lasier, C.41. 1 1: Compare Articles247ff. of the Soiety'sf .. Martel, W.-J. Mathieu, AdOlphe Robert,Al- by-laws. phonse delaRochelle,C.-E. Savoie, Elie Vezina, and the Abbe P.-L. Jalbert. To thislist 12. Deuxieme Congres deqa Languefrappaite au *old be added the names of MM. Wilfred- Canada, Compte RenthitQuebec,193.8),428. Beaulieu, J.-T. Benoit, and Alexandre Goulet. . .. 1 3. Ibid., 430. Itway also -be noted that the So- 2.For typiCal details, see theManchester Avettir , ciete I'Assomption has muchgreatej pror- , Nati nal(Juite25, 1938), 3724 and 29-36. -i- A tion of profitably activesuccutsalesin te .. 6 N Maritime Proyinces than in any New Engld 3, it Felix.Gatineau, Historique des Convennsti o state: ge4rales des -Canadiens-Francaisaux frlats:- °A.Inis,,18E*-1901(Woonsocket; 1927), 359- 14. Cf.,for example, E. L. Anderson, _360, 390, and 399-400. cans(Cambridge, 1937Y, 147-148. .., qZ , 4.In -refeEring. to the Union Saint-Jean--Baptiste , .15..Les Frento-Ainericainqs peintspar eux-memes, , d'Amerique, andthe Msocialion .Canado- 7 ,.."' ; Adolphe Robert, editor,(Matreal, 1936), 1.24. ,rt4 A me r ica i n e subsewiently ins this essly,',,thef,. :' -abbreviations USJBA and ACA sill a iis&r,. , J6 DescribediuModern Language Notes,LII iTspectively."F. - . , (1937), 542-544. i, .' A . t' e. 5.The official posution of the USJBA' should, .17.Concerningthisinterminablecontroversy howevii, be° cited:(5 Sans "doutel sa sphere about he right of the Bishop of ProViience .- d'attionest to restreinte, ' mais es'- Corigres -- aid. English-language institutions with molity ,ganeraux sont encore d'avisque le-' champ- collected in French polishes,cf.E.-R. d - franco-am4iiptig-estassez .vste etassez , m-dtts,New England ,Ouarterly; C (1-937), inipertant pour occuper ttous lesmoments et ;, 601-665. kabsorber energies.» s I . k . 1 '18._Gatineau,VonVenVons generayg, . The societ's total admitted assets,'as.of be- 3901391j cf.also.i,.B. LussieriniOranco-Americains 4." c.embcr 31, 1'938, amoditted to-$3,159,160.92; . .. .,,ipeintelor eux-memes, 201-205. ,the ylluatioh ratio was115.79%. t .: . 19. .groanco:Ainerigan, sition is eicellently er0 17.the ^-liCA hap been-Obviously .4$ Aaridicapped in - d by. J.-T. Benoit,L'Ame franco,ameriL this case by the earlief activities of the USJBA; (Maitre:11,1935), 63. ,which" at present cotinlinure thttu 23,000 me fibers in Massachbselts a'.1 20. milk Roy, in 14?Tri.ivalOur,April 29, less favorable, however; than nOrtherNew 1937. ° England to lasting French surViii,41. 3 Is , . 21. Quarterly Journal .of EcoNdMics;XII(1898) 8. 1,A":Rqberitlissoti?tfichCanado-Am. 276. This 'Article is in otht Aspects a'very (pamphlet; Manchester, 1430), pat* 8. . coMpetetit survey of the Fraiic9-Atiteticans- tit before theturn of the century,'' Seeto Tr:oval/10r;Worcesteirpassim. , ° 1,L4

. r .1 4, I a. 4 \ 4" 278-

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