ELLIS ISLAND
We offer grateful thanks and appreciation to Mr. Dennis Hearn for sharing
the following thoughts and information about Ellis Island. Although he is not a
Freemason, Mr. Hearn has certainly brought us a vivid account of the influence
of Freemasonry at Ellis Island. Mr. Hearn is an executive with the Statue of
Liberty--Ellis Island Project.
ELLIS ISLAND The Golden Door
It is not a name that one normally associates with the Ancient and Accepted
Order of Freemasons. Yet in the last few months, after repeated visits to the
island, I have come to see this historic immigration facility as one of the most
"Masonic" structures on the planet.
It is not a feeling that can be easily explained. Free Masonry after all, was
a respected institution in America long before Ellis was built-long before this
country even was a country (The Free Masons have been in existence for longer
than many of the world's nations for that matter). And while I'm sure there were
Masons among those who passed through her halls, it's unlikely that there were
more than a handful. The immigrants who were processed on Ellis came primarily
from Central and Eastern Europe and were for the most part farmers and laborers
too poor to afford any passage other than steerage. Most of them probably didn't
even know who the Masons were, much less the part that the Ancient Order had
played in erecting the magnificent Lady whose strong, benevolent gaze they
passed beneath as they entered the harbor.
Yet the feeling persists--the sense that the very existence of this
remarkable landmark is somehow related to the precepts of Masonry.
Little of the island's early history would suggest such a viewpoint. When the
Dutch founded their settlement on Manhattan, Ellis was a three acre mud flat,
barely breaking the surface of the water at high tide. Together with Bedloe's
and several others in the harbor, it formed what the Dutch called the Oyster
islands and though the colonists felt it important enough to buy from the
Indians in 1630, they never found a use for it. The island went through a number
of name changes during the next century and a half, particularly after the
British assumed control of the area, but it wasn't until a businessman named
Samuel Ellis built a tavern there--around 1785--that the island got the name it
would keep. Nine years later, the State of New York secured the island as part
of its harbor defenses against a war with Britain and France that fortunately
didn't materialize. The appreciation of her strategic position became apparent
again in 1808 however, and this time New York State employed condemnation
procedures to purchase the island from the tavern owner's heirs. Immediately
after, the state ceded the property to the federal government for $10,000. She
was fortified again, and while war did come--in 1812--Ellis was once more only a
spectator.
In 1834, an interstate agreement declared both Bedloes (now Liberty) and
Ellis Islands to be part of New York State, even though both are on the New
Jersey side of the shipping channel, and nearly three decades later, with the
advent of the Civil War, the fortress on Ellis was replaced by a powder
magazine.
Once again the little island seemed destined for a life of obscurity, often
called, but never chosen. America, however, was about to undergo what would
become known by immigration historians as "The Second Wave", and the
participation of Ellis Island had already been ordained-inadvertently--by an
argument almost a century earlier.
When the framers of the Constitution adjourned in 1787, most were not happy
with the results. The majority had strongly opposed the continued existence of
slavery in the new republic. But the proponents of slavery joined with the
antifederalist forces who feared a strong central government and forced a
compromise. Part of that compromise was a clause which stated that the federal
government would not interfere with the immigration policies of the states until
1808. This served two purposes. For the anti-federalists, it was one more area
in which states rights were preserved and to the pro-slavery group it meant that
the "forced immigration" of black Africans would continue for another twenty
years. The abolitionists regarded it as the lesser of evils-slavery was no
longer as economically attractive as it had been and in fact was dying out in
the colonies--and two decades, it was assumed would be sufficient for it to pass
from the scene.
Just five years after the Constitution was ratified however, in 1793, Eli
Whitney introduced his new cotton-gin, and the slave based economy of the
southern states took off. There were other factors involved of course, but the
upshot was that there would be no real federal immigration law until after the
Civil War. Nor did there seem to be much need. In the half century between 1820
and 1875, barely 9 million immigrants had arrived and federal intervention
simply hadn't seemed necessary.
These 9 million were the so-called "First Wave" which reached its peak during
the Irish Famine (1845-1850) and consisted primarily of Northern and Western
Europeans from the Scandinavian countries, England, Ireland, and Germany. There
had been difficulties--most notably with the Irish who were the targets of
strong anti-Catholic sentiments--but it was a largely homogeneous group of
nationalities. The only exceptions at the time were the roughly 300,000 Chinese,
and when Congress finally got involved in 1882, it was simply to declare that
unfortunate group ineligible for citizenship. Unbelievably, that piece of
legislation remained law until 1943!
The period following the Civil War however, coincided with a dramatic shift
in the immigration pattern. The new arrivals were from Southern and Eastern
Europe, and their numbers were increasing rapidly. So rapidly in fact, that the
state run facilities were proving unable to handle them. Thus, in 1891, the
federal government assumed full responsibility for immigration matters by
creating the Bureau of Immigration under the direction of the Department of the
Treasury.
It was then that a remarkable thing happened. Faced with a new and culturally
"different" group of immigrants, we might have been expected to close the door.
These newcomers after all were Italian Catholics, Russian Orthodox, and Polish
Jews. They were Greeks, Slovaks, Hungarians and Lithuanians. Their customs,
their faiths and often their bloodlines were markedly different. We had already
passed the Chinese Exclusion Act. The easiest route would have been to extend
it. Yet that didn't happen. Instead, Congress appropriated $75,000 for the
construction of a federal immigration facility. The site they selected was Ellis
Island.
Certainly there were considerations other than pure altruism involved in that
decision. The explosive growth of the industrial revolution had reached full
flower in the United States, and the country needed labor. Or perhaps we simply
never expected the numbers that the next two decades would bring. Whatever the
combination of factors, the result has proven to be one of the most remarkable
chapters in human history. And part of it would be made possible by the
construction of New York's mass transit system.
The process of enlarging and stabilizing the island's surface area was
accomplished by hauling rock, earth, and rubble from the excavation of New
York's subways out to the site and combining it with the ballast from incoming
ships. By the time the station opened in 1892, the island had been doubled in
size.
Over a million and a half immigrants were processed in that first facility
before it was destroyed by fire in 1897. Congress immediately approved funds for
a new station, and the first major government architectural contract ever let to
a private company was awarded to the Broadway firm of Boring & Tilton. The
result was an enormous, 1.5 million dollar complex which included a second
island (created with more landfill) and the massive French renaissance-style
structure which stands today. Constructed of brick laid in Flemish bond with
limestone trim, the new fireproof facility was designed to handle up to 5000
immigrants a day. It opened on December 17, 1900. Within months of its opening,
the new station was bulging at the seams, and work was immediately begun to
expand the facility. That work would continue almost uninterrupted for the next
twenty years. Not only was America widening the door, she was trying to assure
that all who entered gained a seat at the table.
Theodore Roosevelt would throw the weight of the Presidency behind ending
corruption and graft on the island, Fiorello LaGuardia (who began his career of
public service as an interpreter at the facility) would spend years railing
against inconsistencies in immigration policy, and Commissioners like William
Williams, Robert Watchorn, and Edward Corsi would dedicate their administrations
to creating a more humane atmosphere for the immigrant.
Over forty immigrant aid societies would labor at Ellis, providing everything
from Christmas and Passover celebrations to new clothing and occupational
therapy. Concern for the immigrant would prompt additional hospital facilities,
enlarged dormitories, improved lighting and ventilation, landscaped playgrounds
and large open-air porches.
Armies of men and women would labor on the island translating, providing
medical care and treatment, lodging, food, counseling, religious services, and
even entertainment. Staggering quantities of milk, meat, and produce would be
consumed as the island's bakery, power house, and laundry struggled to feed a
thousand people at a sitting, and shower 8000 a day. All of it was free and all
of it awaited anyone with the courage to make the journey. Such courage was
abundant: On one day--April 17, 1907--the staff on Ellis processed 11,747
immigrants. The total that year; a staggering 1,004,756 new Americans.
In all, more than 17 million people would come through the immigration
facilities in New York's harbor in just three decades. Most arrived with
literally nothing more than what they carried on their backs. The majority could
not speak English and nearly all were--in the eyes of those already
here--"different". Yet they would become the ancestors of nearly half of the
Americans alive today.
This is not to say that there were not antiimmigration forces at work. There
were, and by the 1920's, they had gained enough strength to seal the island's
fate. A series of quota restrictions were enacted, followed by legislation
mandating inspection at U.S. Consuls in the Country of Origin. By 1924 it was
essentially over. But these battles were fought in the context of economic
protectionism and the political fears that followed the First World War and the
rise of Bolshevism. The knowledge that our actions are so often determined by
such fears is the most triumphant reality of Ellis Island. Our own Civil War
demonstrates how easily we might have succumbed to division along ethnic,
economic, or religious lines.
Now, as thousands from Cuba, Central America and Southeast Asia flee the
tyranny of their homelands, we are opening our door to the "third wave". It is
in this convergence of historical streams that the real message of Ellis Island
lies, and it is here that the Masonic nature of this monument reveals itself.
The Freemasons among our Founding Fathers brought to their work the ancient
Masonic Landmarks of Truth and Brotherly love, and they fashioned a constitution
which, by the depth and strength of its conviction, imbedded those principles in
the conscience of a nation. While we as a people have not always lived up to
them, neither have we been able to ignore them.
Time and again, when challenged by the events of history, we have returned to
the "self evident" truths of our inception. Time and again we have
re-examined--sometimes painfully--our direction. It would be wrong to regard
those reassessments as signs of failure. They are proof rather, that we seek to
build our world upon the highest principles, and that we will not accept
anything short of our goal.
That which was once no more than a sandbar was built up stone by stone to
become an island. Upon it, we constructed a great edifice to welcome all who
sought shelter. The building itself required brick, but the purpose behind its
construction demanded building blocks of a different sort. Had she been made of
brick alone, Ellis might have remained the powder magazine she once was. But by
cementing those bricks with compassion and tolerance, we have laid the
cornerstone of an even greater structure.
By forcing us to examine our underlying beliefs, by compelling us to confront
our own fears and weaknesses, and by bringing their own strengths to our cause,
those who came through Ellis have enabled us to build the strongest, most
diverse, and most democratic republic in the history of the world.
The old building is being restored now--as a monument. Many of us are
inscribing the name of an ancestor there--not unlike the marks of a Master
Mason. For us, those names will say that the work done here was good. And they
will say something else. To others, yet unborn, they will say: "To you who stand
before the names of your fathers, we bequeath the task of completing the world
they sought to build. There is much work yet to be done, but here, on this spot,
we have examined the foundation. We have tested our beliefs, and they were not
found wanting".
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