Question:
German immigration to the US without the 1848 revolution?
Answer:
From 1845 to 1854, some 2,900,000 immigrants landed in the United States,
more than had come in the seven previous decades combined. Most of these
immigrants were from Ireland and Germany. Most Americans vaguely familiar
with this fact, when asked about the reasons for the massive increase in
immigration from these countries, will say "well, with the Irish it's
because of the potato famine and with the Germans it's because of the
failure of the 1848 revolutions."
I have recently discovered that in the case of Germany, that explanation
is seriously defective. According to Tyler Anbinder, *Nativism and
Slavery: The Northern Know Nothings and the Politics of the 1850s*, pp.
7-8:
"Although they received less publicity than the Irish, nearly as many
Germans emigrated to the United States during the mid-1800s. In fact,
during the peak year of immigration, 1854, German emigration to the United
States outpaced that from Ireland by two to one. Over-population played
perhaps the most significant role in motivating Germans to emigrate. As
land became more scarce and costly, many farmers chose to leave for the
inexpensive, untaxed land that abounded in the New World. As in Ireland,
industrialization and competition from England made it increasingly
difficult for German artisans to earn a decent living. The growing
unification of the German economy further aggravated the situation, as the
removal of internal tolls and duties hurt artisans from the less
industrially advanced sections of Germany in their efforts to compete with
those from neighboring states (in Württemberg, for example, one in six
weavers went bankrupt between 1840 and 1847). Incidental factors that
contributed to Irish emigration, such as encouragement from earlier
immigrants and cheaper transportation, also induced Germans to leave for
America.
"As was the case with Ireland, German immigration to the United States
grew to unprecedented levels in the decade ending in 1854. But while the
potato famine caused the massive exodus from Ireland, the extraordinary
growth in German immigration in the 1850s is more difficult to explain.
Historians once attributed the increase to the revolutions of 1848.
However, German emigration did not grow significantly from pre-
revolutionary levels until 1852, long after authorities had quelled the
uprisings. Furthermore, the sources of greatest emigration do not
correspond to the areas of revolutionary unrest. Although the failure of
the revolution did induce some well-known German radicals to emigrate, the
preponderance of Germans emigrated for many of the same reasons as their
Irish counterparts. The potato crop also failed in Germany in the late
1840s, and although potatoes did not dominate the German diet, food prices
and poverty rose dramatically as a result. Massive unemployment
exacerbated these problems, reaching an unprecedented 17 percent by the
mid-1850s. Southwestern Germany suffered most from these problems, and,
consequently, most of Germany's emigrants to the United States came from
this region." In short, most German emigration after 1848 (as before it)
was for economic reasons.
So it appears that while either "no German revolution in 1848" or "a more
successful German revolution in 1848" would have very significant
consequences in other respects, they might make relatively little
difference to short-term levels of German immigration to the US.
And after all, wasn't Scandinavian emigration to the US also pretty high in
this period, though the 1848 explanation wouldn't apply to them?
Not sure, but I have a vague recollection that there was significant emigration
from Switzerland as well
If what you're saying is true, the main difference would be the
non-emigration of the "political" Germans -- in particular, the
Socialists and Anarchists who were so influential on the extreme
American Left during the 1870's through 1910's.
Maybe not even that
Would socialists and Anarchists havwe been all that welcome even in a "liberal"
Germany (liberal by 1848 standards that is)? It would have been run by its
propertied middle class, who would have been _very_ uneasy about such
characters.
Not exactly. The 'radicals' of 1848 were not yet the Reds
of the later 1800s. They were more 19th century liberals,
whose insurrection was against the archaic political and
social structure of pre-unification Germany.
Most of the 1848-era 'radicals' assimilated into the US
political landscape as conventional Republicans and
Democrats. The outright Reds emigrated later.
