“Other races of immigrants, by contact with our institutions, have been civilized—the negro has only been domesticated.”

—  John R. Commons

pg. 41.
Races and Immigrants in America, 1907

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "Other races of immigrants, by contact with our institutions, have been civilized—the negro has only been domesticated." by John R. Commons?
John R. Commons photo
John R. Commons 26
United States institutional economist and labor historian 1862–1945

Related quotes

Madison Grant photo

“We must also sympathize with the Whites in Kenya Colony in their opposition to a filling of their country with cheap Hindu labor. As Americans we can understand the Negro and recognize his cheerful qualities, but we can have little sympathy with the Hindu whom we have expressly barred from our Pacific Coast. These Hindus, with the Chinese, have ruined the native races of many of the Polynesian Islands. They have been for ages in contact with the highest civilizations, but have failed to benefit by such contact, either physically, intellectually, or morally.”

Madison Grant (1865–1937) American lawyer, eugenicist, and conservationist

The Conquest of a Continent (1933)

“Our communities have been deeply enhanced by immigration”

Jo Cox (1974–2016) UK politician

Devolution and Growth Across Britain (19 June 2015)
Context: Our communities have been deeply enhanced by immigration, be it of Irish Catholics across the constituency or of Muslims from Gujarat in India or from Pakistan, principally from Kashmir. While we celebrate our diversity, what surprises me time and time again as I travel around the constituency is that we are far more united and have far more in common with each other than things that divide us.

George W. Bush photo

“Ours is a nation of immigrants. We're also a nation of law. Unfortunately, the United States has not been in complete control of its borders for decades and, therefore, illegal immigration has been on the rise. We have a responsibility to address these challenges. We have a responsibility to enforce our laws. We have a responsibility to secure our borders. We take this responsibility seriously.”

George W. Bush (1946) 43rd President of the United States

2000s, 2004, Signing of Secure Fence Act of 2006

Theresa May photo

“I have consistently said that immigration has been good for this country,”

Theresa May (1956) Prime Minister of the United Kingdom

Brexit: MPs to have vote by 12 March, says May https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-47348610 BBC News (24 February 2019)
2010s, 2019

“This is a rule of racing: No race has ever been won in the first corner; many have been lost there.”

Garth Stein The Art of Racing in the Rain

Source: The Art of Racing in the Rain

William H. Rehnquist photo

“It has been said that Sweden's loss has been America's gain, and I think this is true. Swedish immigrants and their descendants have contributed a great deal to America and it is worthwhile to remember our Swedish heritage.”

William H. Rehnquist (1924–2005) Chief Justice of the United States

Address at a Swedish Colonial Society luncheon in Philadelphia (9 April 2001).
Books, articles, and speeches

George Borrow photo

“I have always been a friend to hero-worship; it is the only rational one, and has always been in use amongst civilized people.”

George Borrow book Lavengro

Source: Lavengro (1851), Ch. 23

Ben Klassen photo

“It has been the White Race who has been the world builder, the maker of cities and commerce and continents. It is the White Man who is the sole builder of civilizations. It was he who build the Egyptian civilization, the great unsurpassed Roman civilization, the Greek civilization of beauty and culture, and who, after having been dealt a serious blow by a new Semitic religion, wallowed through the Dark Ages, finally extricated himself, and then build the great European civilization.”

Ben Klassen (1918–1993) American engineer, author and politician

Nature's Eternal Religion (1973), Ch. 2, Paragraph 2
Nature's Eternal Religion (1973)

Calvin Coolidge photo

“An occasion such as this which has brought us here can not but direct our consideration to these things. It has been a painful and difficult experience, this by which another race has been recruited to the standard of civilization and enlightenment; for that is really what has been going on; and the episodes of Negro slavery in America, of civil war, and emancipation, and, following that, the rapid advancement of the American colored people both materially and spiritually, must be recognized as parts of a long evolution by which all mankind is gradually being led to higher levels, expanding its understanding of its mission here, approaching nearer and nearer to the realization of its full and perfected destiny.”

Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933) American politician, 30th president of the United States (in office from 1923 to 1929)

1920s, The Progress of a People (1924)

Calvin Coolidge photo

“Ours is a new land. It has had an almost unbelievable task to perform, and has performed it well. We have been called to fit the institutions of ancient civilization to the conditions of a new country. In that task the leaders of the Nation have been supported by a deep devotion to the essentials of freedom. At the bottom of the national character has been a strain of religious earnestness and moral determination which has never failed to give color and quality to our institutions. Because our history shows us these things, we dare make honest appraisal of our shortcomings. We have not failed. We have succeeded. Because we have been privileged to rely upon generations of men and women ready to serve and to sacrifice, we have magnificently succeeded.”

Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933) American politician, 30th president of the United States (in office from 1923 to 1929)

1920s, The Reign of Law (1925)

Related topics