A German American Attacks “False Americanism,” 1889

A German American Attacks “False Americanism,” 1889

From Rev. A. H. Walburg, The Question of Nationality In Its Relations to the Catholic Church in the United States (1889)

With regard to Americanism we make a distinction. There is a true and a false Americanism. True Americanism consists in the promotion of the peace, the happiness, and the prosperity of the people, and in the advancement of the public good and the general welfare of the country . . . .

. . . And, since the Catholic religion promotes virtue, piety, and morality, true Americanism must desire the growth and spread of the Catholic Church.

False Americanism is a spirit of pride and self-conceit, and looks with contempt upon other nationalities. It is a boasting, arrogant spirit. It glories in the biggest rivers, the tallest trees, the grandest scenery, and considers this country superior to every other country on the face of the globe. It is a pharisaical, hypocritical spirit, putting on the garb of virtue when all is hollowness and rottenness within. It is a spirit of infidelity and materialism. False Americanism is mammon worship. It adores the golden calf and is directed to the accumulation of wealth with an ardor which is unquenchable and with an energy which never tires. The eagerness for wealth is paramount and controls every other feeling. The ideal set before every American youth is money. Money is not only needful, but is the one thing needful. Money is a power everywhere, but here it is the supreme power. Abroad, there is the nobility, the pride of ancestry. This is vanity artificial and empty, yet it is not so degrading as money. Abroad, eminent worth counts for something. But here, we acknowledge only one god, and his name is Mammon.

. . . this is the great evil of false Americanism, the curse of our society. It is demoralizing us. The hunger and the thirst after money consume like a raging fire all warmer sympathies, all better feelings, of our nature. It dwarfs all higher aspirations. What are moral excellence, culture, character, manhood, when money-bags out weigh them all? How can better sentiments be impressed upon the children, when all about them teach them that these are of no value without money? Hence the startling dishonesty in the race for riches. Hence the bribery of officers, the purchase of office, the corruption and jobbery, the general demoralization, that threaten our institutions.

And with its vaunted independence, this spurious Americanism, in its ostentatious display of wealth, stoops to Foreignism, copies European fashions, imports a Parisian cook, and considers itself fortunate to exchange its wealth for the musty title of some needy descendant of the nobility.

In Europe, a man enjoys his competence; but here, no one has enough. No laborer is satisfied with his wages; no millionaire, however colossal his fortune, ceases in his greed for more. From the first dawn of manhood to the evening of old age, the gold fever continues to increase in strength and violence, till death puts an end to the raging malady.

The American nationality, properly so-called, is the Anglo-Saxon or the Anglo-American nationality, the descendants of early settlers who came from England. These can justly claim the honorable distinction of being called the American nationality. We were, in the beginning, substantially an English people. The first settlers in this country, the Pilgrim Fathers, were English. They had a long and bloody struggle to maintain against the Indians and suffered untold privations and hardships in effecting a firm and permanent foothold in this country. Notwithstanding all obstacles, the first colonies improved, and by dint of perseverance, courage, and industry, became very prosperous. They resisted British tyranny and oppression . . . .

Notwithstanding this pre-eminence, and the fact that whatever is honorable in our history and worthy of esteem in our institutions, is owing chiefly to our forefathers, who, it is often said, builded better than they knew, nevertheless the American nationality, when tried by the test of true Americanism will in many respects be found wanting. It is often the hotbed of fanaticism, intolerance, and radical, ultra views on matters of politics and religion. All the vagaries of spiritualism, Mormonism, free-loveism, prohibition, infidelity, and materialism, generally breed in the American nationality. Here, also, we find dissimulation and hypocrisy. While the Irishman will get drunk and engage in an open street fight, and the German drink his beer in a public beer-garden, the American, pretending to be a total abstainer, takes his strong drink secretly and sleeps it off on a sofa or in a club-room. Who are the trusted employes, the public officers, that enjoyed the unlimited confidence of the people, and turned out to be hypocrites, impostors, and betrayers of trusts? As a rule they are not Irish or Germans, but Americans. Who are the devotees at the shrine of mammon? Who compose the syndicates, trusts, corporations, pools, and those huge monopolies that reach their tentacles over the nation, grinding down the poor and fattening in immense wealth? They are not German or Irish, but Americans. Who are the wild and reckless bank speculators, the forgers, the gamblers, and the defaulting officials? They are not Irish or German, but Americans. Read the list of the refugees to Canada and you will find it made up of American names. We meet here also all species of refined wickedness. The educated villain, the expert burglar, the cool, calculating, deliberate criminal, generally belongs to the American nationality. Where the foreigners are corrupt they have in a great measure been corrupted by the example of Americans. A republic that is not based upon morality and religion, where virtue is depressed, is ripe for an ignoble grave.

The Anglo-Saxon nationality has always been in England and in this country the bulwark of Protestantism and the main-stay of the enemies of the faith. It is so puffed up with spiritual pride, so steeped in materialism, that it is callous, and impervious to the spirit and the doctrines of the Catholic religion. It is true there are eminent converts in England and a few in this country; but they have no followers; the bulk of the people are a remote as ever from entering the Church.