Naturally, this tendency of conserving strict national integrity is strongest among the oldest and most highly organized States, and weakest among the new and loosely integrated countries. Countries like Japan and England, which have long, proud histories and traditions, and which are highly organized, are more strict about the way they take foreigners into their households. On the other hand, new countries like Australia and the South American republics, which have short histories and few traditions, are more or less liberal in admitting foreigners. This truth has been exemplified by the history of the United States. She has shown a marked laxity in this regard during the colonial and growing periods; but as soon as she achieved a more perfect national unity and consciousness, she began to manifest a strong tendency toward integration, exerting her energy on the one hand upon consolidation of her population and on the other upon excluding "squatters" who would not readily assimilate.
Whether or not such a nationalistic policy may be considered just, and whatever change the future may witness in this regard, the fact remains that not a single nation in the world at present discards or rejects the policy in practice. In the face of such a situation the only alternative for the Japanese in the United States, when they obstinately cling to their own ways of living and thinking, would be to go elsewhere.
This conviction of ours should not be confused with the hasty, groundless conjecture that the Japanese are a race utterly impossible of assimilation to American ways by nature and constitution. Most of the careless agitators who put forth statements to this effect start from the wrong end in their reasoning. They assume what ought to be proven, and forthwith proceed to formulate a policy on this assumption. They assume that the Japanese are unassimilable and conclude that, therefore, they should not be given an opportunity to progress. This is analogous to saying that because a child is ignorant he should not be sent to school, forgetting that the very ignorance of the child is due to the fact that he has been denied an education. They fail to see that their conclusion is the very cause of their premises. What we maintain is that when the Japanese shall have proved unassimilable, _after all means for their assimilation have been exhausted_, they should then be persuaded to give up the idea of establishing themselves in America.