y on, westward expansion was made possible for immigrant workers; today, such workers continue to take necessary jobs which might otherwise have gone begging. There is no evidence to suggest that "Jews or Catholics," the Irish or the Slavs, have lowered America's "moral fiber." Certainly Bell argues that this was not the case at the turn of the century and, more significantly, that these groups of immigrants worked to make American progress and achievement possible. Bell references with respect to the lives of Mike and Mary the fact that immigrants are in demand when expansionary economies exist and out of favor when economic recessions occur. As the 1920s' unfolded, a prolonged period of economic recession followed by depression made new arrivals both unpopular and, economically, unnecessary. This book shed enormous light on the lives of immigrants like the Krachas and the Dobrejacs and on their determination to achieve their own parity and equality in a land often hostile to them. Being "American" did not essentially change in the story; what changes that is significant was a determination to work against those forces that would prevent the assimilation of this family into the economic and social mainstream.In attempting to understand the "American experience," one must first recognize that it is not a single, prototypical experience. For the early colonists, the New World represented a unique opportunity to acquire land and property, to achieve the freedom to worship God in one's own manner, to overcome the limits placed upon social mobility by an aristocratic Old World social system, and freedom to develop one's own potentials as one wished. For the vast number of new immigrants who came to the U.S., these same dreams and values held true.Immigration has always been a topic of controversy in the United States. Many people then believed in the right of man to immigrate from one country to another as one which belongs to him ...
