p. 10 | Cosmopolitan Citizenship in America

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Jul 7, 1910

Cosmopolitan Citizenship in America

A Mr. E. R. Johnstone, in making a somewhat exhaustive study of the cosmopolitan citizenship of our country, mentions a condition he found in the city of Cleveland, which, no doubt, is but a sample of many others. He says: “If you want to realize what the apostle meant when he spoke of “barbarian, Scythian, bond and free,” go out Broadway, and count the nationalities by reading the signboards,” said a Cleveland citizen with whom I was speaking. So I went. In one block (taking both sides of the street) I found the following nationalities represented by shops (meat, vegetables, groceries, bakeries), stores (dry goods, hardware, electrical supplies, drugs, etc.), and factories: Russian, German, French, Danish, Finnish, Norwegian, Swedish, Turkish, Grecian, Sicilian, Calabrian, Magyar, Austrian, Armenian, Egyptian, Rumanian, Tunisian, Bohemian, Syrian, Hawaiian, Welsh, Bornese, Chinese, Spanish, East Indian, Javanese, Japanese, Korean, Tahitian, Filipino,—thirty in all, congregated along a frontage of six hundred feet. Probably there were other blocks that would have shown a census equally diverse. I made it my business to go into a score of these places of business. I did not find one in which English was not spoken, nor one in which the costumes worn were different from those we are accustomed to see, save in the laundry of the Chinaman and the fancy goods stores kept by the East Indians.”