the

republic which was the dream of our colonial and revolutionary forefathers. The suburbs may, indeed, be a satellite to the metropolitan centers, a parasite on the metropolitan economy, but here, at least the citizen in a quasi-urban way of life may make a few friends, feel that сор knows his name, and feel that he is free to call upon his elected representative for help in some daily problems. But the suburban escape is no escape. The problems are metropolitan. Nothing that contains 50 million people can be very exclusive. The water, the sewage, the traffic, the jobs, the taxes, and the people move back and forth across local government boundaries. More people move out, the open spaces are developed, the parks and beaches are crowded with "those city people," the suburbs become slurbs, and local government is powerless. The sense of alienation, of political impotence, grows, and accentuates the decline of community.

Third, there is the deficiency of public and community resources. We live in a metropolitan and in a national economy. No single local government, however anxious it might be to face up to and solve its pressing local problems, can afford to do so with local tax powers. To raise local taxes significantly would merely drive business and people elsewhere. In a slow motion, partial, escape from this dilemma we have seen nearly half of the cost of education, much of the cost of highways, much of the cost of welfare and some of the cost of health shifted to the State and National budgets. But far too slowly, and far too little. Our traditional localism in politics, rural domination of State and National Legislatures, and some justifiable distrust of big government have impeded our willingness to take the bold steps necessary to foot the bill in the only places where the funds can be raised. If State and National Governments could carry all of the minimum standard costs of the four major functions of local government, education, highways, welfare and health, then we might have some real local autonomy, real local choice in the remaining local functions.

Fourth and finally, among these obstacles, are our own failures as professional and community leaders to conceive of solutions to these problems and obstacles in any very satisfactory way, pursuant to any sound scientific analysis of their causes, or consistent with what is vital in our cultural, ethical, and religious traditions. We have been too busy grappling with today's pressing problems, and our own inadequate and segmental solutions, to try to envisage the larger solutions required. The teachers want higher salaries and better buildings as if these would solve any but the teachers problems. The social workers want more relief, higher benefits, and freedom from political influence by social Darwinians as if these would solve the problems of their clients. The city planners want more money, and more power, so that they can tear down more housing of the poor, build more shopping centers, and zone more rigorously, as if this would benefit any but the rich. Each in short, has failed to set forth the whole problem of human development for the underutilized, each has viewed only the contributions which his own profession or interest could make. We have significantly failed to behave as social scientists; we have even failed as utopians.

In conclusion I would like to throw out some avenues of exploration in two areas which seem the most urgent for urban life today. The first area is the problem of the inhabitants of the central city slum.

Like all earlier migrants to the city they need help. They came seeking a fuller participation in American life, like all earlier migrants. Their assimilation can be delayed or expedited by a full generation. A reasonably complete program for them would include at least:

1. Education expenditures equivalent to or greater than the highest in suburban areas, with considerable emphasis on the talented, and on vocational training. Reinforcement by allowance payments, prizes in cash and kind, and the like might help. 2. A community centered school program that reached adults by offering health services, vocational and guidance and training, legal aid, and family casework service from the school.

3. An urban extension service offering training, organizational assistance, liaison service to municipal government and universities, and other services to neighborhood groups engaged in community improvement programs of all sorts.

4. Programs of supplementary fathers under any name, Wider Horizons, Peace Corps, Big Brother, PAL, through church, scout, settlement house, or other groups.

5. Fair employment and fair housing practices in fact. 6. Local full employment in fact, and if this is unattainable, then guaranteed employment for youth at socially essential public service work.

I appreciate that this is a limited or partial program. But it is broader than any now in existence, and no profession can really claim that it is training people for such a program.

The second major problem area is the increasing gap between urban and suburban people. Perhaps we can reduce this gap by a joint search for the solution to some common problems. I submit that central city people and suburban people have a common problem in developing instruments of government, instruments of neighborhood or community action, which will abate the sense of alienation and of political impotence, and will generate the sense of community and democratic power. Our metropolitan government proposals to date

fail to meet these tests.

The second common problem of metropolitan populations of both cultures is the development of skills for an increasingly complex civilization. The flight to the suburbs may produce a higher standard of education for the children of the better-off families, but the suburbs cannot support colleges and universities and the suburbs must live with inadequate or adequate products of the elementary and secondary schools of central cities. The development of higher education and vocational training are metropolitan problems of the first order. Only if we eliminate the present disproportionate allocation of funds for education can we expect to have good customers, good employees, and simple things like safe streets. In addition, one might question whether the education provided by all high-income suburban educational systems is, in fact, good preparation for children who must live their adult lives with another half they never met.

Third, we come to the common problem faced by all citizens of the metropolitan area: the problem of resources for the public services and facilities which our society requires. Central city and suburb alike find themselves discriminated against in the taxes they pay to higher levels of government and the benefits they receive from them.

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They find themselves deprived alike by inadequate local tax resources to provide the public services that they require. This remains one of the most pressing problems on the agenda of metropolitan areas.

Fourth, in the building of a satisfactory urban environment there are a host of problems which affect central city and suburb alike; transportation, both highways and transit, sewerage, water, open space, recreation facilities, industrial location and development, and housing are but a few. Most people will accept the fact that these are problems which cannot be solved in either area, and must be handled as metropolitan wholes.

Until we can use some of these common needs to build common understanding between the two cultures, our society is in the peril of great divisions. The city is not dead. It continues to be a vast magnet attracting millions to its economic, cultural, and social opportunities. Our cultural tradition has always derided urban life and reveres the simple yeomen of the soil, the life of nature. But the people have known better, they have always flocked to cities and continue to do so. With the absolute closing of the rural frontier, and the unprecedented extension of opportunity on the urban frontier, we may expect that migration to continue. Only now we have built so successfully, so productively, that we may be in danger of forgetting the places whence we come, and our brothers, there behind us, coming.

CHAPTER IV

NEWCOMERS TO THE CITY

The migrant in this study has been defined as the person who changes residence. This is the U.S. census definition, and the term is not to be confused with immigration which is migration from outside the geographic boundaries of the United States.

Another characteristic of the migrant is mobility. This is the movement of population geographically or the movement of a person or group up and down the social scale (social mobility). Migration always involves mobility, but mobility does not always involve migration.

According to definitions adopted for use in the 1950 census, the urban population comprises all persons living in (1) places of 2,500 inhabitants or more incorporated as cities, boroughs, and villages, (2) incorporated towns of 2,500 inhabitants or more except in New England, New York, and Wisconsin where "towns" are simply minor civil divisions of counties, (3) the densely settled urban fringe, including both incorporated and unincorporated areas, around cities of 50,000 or more, and (4) unincorporated places of 2,500 inhabitants or more outside any urban fringe. The remaining population is classified as rural.

As used in this study, a metropolitan area contains at least one city of 50,000 inhabitants or more plus the country or contiguous counties economically integrated with the central city. This area may be further divided into communities in which people may satisfy their primary needs for goods and services, where they may have a high degree of common interests, and engage in a large number of activities on a community basis. A neighborhood differs from a community in the sense that it is smaller and does not offer as complete service as does the community. A sense of belonging is, of course, present in neighborhoods.

It is quite possible that newcomers to urban centers may be classified, under certain State and local laws, as transients. In most places where such an application is made, a transient is defined as a person who has been in the county or State borders less than 12 months. The tramp is defined as a "mobile nonworker."

It is apparent that not all migrants to the city fall into the category of persons with low educational achievements. Many migrants are as well educated or better educated than old residents in the city. However, the majority of migrants possess a lower level of education. Invariably, the result of migration from areas with low levels of education will tend to lower the level of education in the area of destination.

Many of the newcomers to the city, experiencing the relative freedom of urban life for the first time, do not often possess stable patterns of thought and action that characterize the behavior of the "older"

more stable residents. They find that their old patterns of behavior do not succeed in the new environment. Family disorganization is high and problems persist. These problems may result in juvenile delinquency, broken marriages, and increases in the number of families supported mainly by women. These conditions pose fundamental questions for the educational authorities who are trying to plan and develop educational programs and services for these people."

Migrants in many urban communities suffer from a type of community schizophrenia. They are in demand in the industrial sectors of the community where their labor is essential to the productive process which support the economy. In other sectors, they are regarded as "problems." This is not a new attitude. The Greeks called it xenophobia, "fear of strangers." From an educational point of view, the question may be asked-what can the school do in helping old and new residents find a community of interests that will promote good citizenship in the community?

The East Coast Migrant Conference, meeting in Washington during May of 1954, sought to answer this question by proposing "that long-range programs be planned to provide adult migrants with knowledge about the health, education, and welfare of themselves and their families." This proposal was based upon the fundamental belief in the sovereign virtues of education as a cardinal item in the American credo. The concept that education is inherently an "open-ended" process which can never be definitely completed as long as life lasts is an extension of this philosophy. Regardless of where one's schooling terminated on the educational ladder, there still remains an unused capacity for mental, moral, and spiritual growth. The need and capacity for education not only remains, but increases as the individual

matures.

The development of a comprehensive program of adult education for migrants requires insight into the needs of this group of adults in our society. It requires knowledge of the means of satisfying these needs, the energy to translate insight and knowledge into actual opportunities for creative education, and the vision which makes it possible to perceive the overarching idea one is trying to serve as clearly as the limited, short-term objective of a particular course. Without this insight and understanding, the development of a program becomes a mechanistic determination of details which may fall short of the desired goals.

ROLE OF MIGRATION IN THE BUILDING OF AMERICA

Migration has been an essential part of American life since the beginning of the Nation, a lure for the adventurers, an opportunity for the ambitious, and a challenge to the daring.

Successive waves of colonial immigration, coupled with a natural increase in the settled population, soon began to exert a pressure which forced the frontier westward. The Beards have painted a graphic picture of this westward surge of pioneers which went on unabated well into the 19th century:

The rolling tide of migration that swept across the mountains and down the valleys, spreading out through the forests and over the prairies, advanced in successive waves. In the vanguard was the man with the rifle, grim, silent, and fearless***.