Subject Areas |
History and Social Studies
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U.S. History - Civics and U.S. Government |
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U.S. History - Immigration/Migration |
Literature and Language Arts
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Poetry |
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Time Required |
| 4-5 Class Periods |
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Skills |
| primary document analysis
critical thinking
expository writing
Internet skills
research
collaboration
reading literary texts
literary interpretation
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Date Posted |
| 4/12/2002 |
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The Statue of Liberty: Bringing the 'New Colossus' to America
E Pluribus Unum
--"From many, one"
"Your sonnet
gives its subject a raison d'etre." --The poet James Russell Lowell in a letter
to Emma Lazarus, 17 December 1883, Letters to Emma Lazarus in the Columbia
University Library, ed. Ralph L. Rusk (New York: New York Public Library,
1949)74.
Introduction
Even if they have never heard
of the nineteenth-century poet and activist Emma Lazarus, most Americans will
probably recognize these lines from her sonnet "The
New Colossus": Give me your tired, your poor Your
huddled masses yearning to breathe free.
Since 1902, when the poem
was engraved on a bronze plaque
at the base of the Statue of Liberty, "The
New Colossus" has helped to shape our sense of the statue as a symbol of hope
for millions of immigrants.
Yet Lazarus's poem was written almost twenty
years previously, in conjunction with an auction held in 1883 to raise funds for
a pedestal. The Centennial celebration of 1876, for which the statue had been
originally intended, had come and gone, and while the French had kept their end
of the bargain by completing the statue itself, the Americans had still not fulfilled
their commitment to erect a pedestal. In this lesson, students learn about the
effort to convince a skeptical American public to contribute to the effort to
erect a pedestal and to bring the Statue of Liberty to New York.
With
its focus on events surrounding America's Centennial, this lesson thus provides
excellent capstone activities for students in grades 6-8 who are studying U.S.
history through 1877. It also provides guided explorations of primary historical
materials for students at the 6-8 or more advanced levels who are learning about
Gilded Age
society or about immigration issues in the late nineteenth century. The first
three activities--in which students compare nineteenth-century and modern ideas
about the statue and its symbolic meanings, analyze primary historical documents,
and discuss Emma Lazarus's sonnet--may be taught together or separately. The fourth
activity, in which students write letters to imaginary groups of nineteenth-century
readers to explain the meaning of the Statue of Liberty, is best taught in conjunction
with at least one of the preceding activities. Learning Objectives
In this lesson, students will - Discuss the meaning
of symbols associated with the statue
- Compare
Bartholdi's original vision of the statue to its meaning for Americans today
- Learn how the American public in the 1870s and 1880s was persuaded
to contribute to a pedestal fund for the Statue of Liberty
- Analyze two
primary historical documents: a political cartoon and a magazine article on the
fundraising effort, both from 1885
- Read and analyze Emma Lazarus' sonnet,
"The New Colossus"
- Learn about public attitudes toward immigration in
the last decades of the nineteenth century
- Write a persuasive letter to
a specific nineteenth-century audience to gain support for bringing the statue
to America.
Guiding Question:
How was a skeptical American
public persuaded to support bringing the Statue of Liberty to the United States? Preparing
to Teach this Lesson- Teachers can find a detailed
account of the statue's origins on The National
Park Service website, a link from the EDSITEment resource The
Internet Public Library. There is another excellent and well-written essay
on the history of the statue available through the American
Park Network, also a link on The Internet Public
Library.
- A student-oriented introduction to the history of
the statue's arrival in America is available from America's
Library, a link on the EDSITEment-reviewed American
Memory. From the same source, they can also read an essay on the Gilded
Age, which will give students some background on the period they will be studying
in this lesson.
- Historical
Background (for your convenience, the following account synthesizes the disparate
narratives available on the web resources listed above): Since 1902, when
Emma Lazarus's famous sonnet was engraved on a bronze
plaque at the base of the Statue of Liberty, "The
New Colossus" has helped to shape our sense of the statue as a symbol of hope
for millions of immigrants. Yet in 1883, when she wrote the poem, that symbolic
meaning reflected what was still a novel and uncommon perspective. Sculptor Frederic
Auguste Bartholdi had conceived of "Liberty Enlightening the World" as an emblem
of solidarity between the people of France and the U.S. and a sign of their mutual
desire for liberty. Written in 1883 for an art auction "In Aid of the Bartholdi
Pedestal Fund," Lazarus's poem was part of a larger effort to persuade an often
skeptical or indifferent public to contribute funds for the American commitment
to build the pedestal for the statue. Because Lazarus, a well-known and well-connected
poet in New York, was interested in issues of immigration and justice, these subjects
naturally enough found their way into the poem. Whether accidental or intentional,
the emphasis in "The
New Colossus" on immigration expresses a prescient view: today the Statue
of Liberty continues to greet new immigrants and embodies opportunity and freedom
for those seeking a better life in America.
At the time Lazarus wrote
her poem, however, prospects for Lady Liberty's own arrival in the U.S. did not
look bright. Despite the country's unprecedented economic growth during its so-called
Gilded Age
(1878-1889), the statue's supporters struggled to raise funds. No money at all
had been raised by 1876, America's Centennial and the date originally planned
for the statue's inauguration. In New York City, wealthy patrons of the arts were
reluctant to support the venture, and the middle classes felt that contributing
to the statue was the responsibility of the rich; others wondered whether the
money might not be better spent in aid of the poor. Elsewhere in the country,
few were inclined to donate money for a large French sculpture in New York. By
means of benefit theatrical events, art exhibitions and auctions (such as the
occasion for which Lazarus' poem was written), and even prize fights, funds were
slowly gathered. But too slowly: by 1885, it was clear that these efforts had
been inadequate. The breakthrough and turning point came when a Hungarian immigrant
named Joseph Pulitzer used the power of his newspaper, The World, to rouse,
persuade, cajole, browbeat, and in some cases even shame the public into donating
to the pedestal fund. It was an enormous success. The pedestal was built, the
statue assembled, and the dedication made on October 29, 1886.
-
To find information on the issue of immigration and urban growth in late-nineteenth-century
America, consult the EDSITEment resource American
Memory, which features a lesson
on immigration (with information
for the teacher). You can learn more about Ellis
Island from the National Park
Service, a link on the EDSITEment resource The
Internet Public Library. From the Smithsonian American Art Museum site, an
online exhibit Metropolitan
Lives: The Ashcan Artists and Their New York; see especially "Immigration:
Ethnic Neighborhoods and Urban Types."
Suggested Activities
1.
America's Centennial and the Pedestal Fund - As a warm-up exercise,
and to establish the meaning of the statue for Americans today, ask students to
brainstorm what they already know about the Statue of Liberty. With those ideas
displayed on the board, share with your students the meanings of some of the more
specialized symbols built into the Statue of Liberty (the crown, the torch, the
sandals, and so on). Students can explore those symbolic meanings themselves through
an interactive activity on The
National Park Service website (a link from the EDSITEment resource The
Internet Public Library). Alternatively, you can download the information
from the site, and share it in the form of a handout or an overhead. You can also
ask students to read a student-oriented essay on the history of the statue, available
from America's
Library, a link on the EDSITEment-reviewed American
Memory.
- Share with your students the key concepts of the
historical background, summarized above. Discuss the vision
of Frederic Bartholdi and the American fundraising effort with your class. Point
out that the issue of immigration was not part of the statue's symbolic meaning
for most people in the 1870s and 1880s.
2. The Response of
the American Public to the Statue of Liberty: Analyzing Primary Historical Documents -
Download all necessary primary documents and student worksheets ahead of time
and prepare the necessary number of handouts. Students can work individually or
in small groups to complete their analysis of these primary source documents.
Please note bracketed directions for finding materials in the online archival
collections.
- Download and adapt to your own needs the "Written Document
Analysis Worksheet," one of the several worksheets
for analyzing primary source documents available on the EDSITEment-reviewed
website, The Digital
Classroom National Archives and Records Administration. Have students complete
a different worksheet for each of the two documents below.
- Document
#1: On the EDSITEment resource American Memory, students can read about one
fundraiser in which small replicas of the statue were sold for a dollar. [To find
this resource, search by title for "The Great Statue of Liberty and the Pedestal
Fund"; the article comes from Manufacturer and builder, Volume 17, Issue
6, June 1885].
- *Document #2: From the Making
of America project (a link on American Memory)
comes a more challenging but also brief essay entitled "Editor's
Easy Chair," Harper's New Monthly Magazine, vol. 70, no. 417 (February 1885):
pp. 483-484. Although students may need some help understanding this essay,
its second section is invaluable for what it reveals about the fundraising effort.
[To find the relevant text, you will need to click on the link provided above
and go to page 483; the "Editor's Easy Chair" feature begins just after the end
of "East Angels," by Constance Fenimore Woolson. The most relevant portion of
"Editor's Easy Chair" is the second section, which begins the bottom right column
of page 483. Printing this document is a bit tricky: first, go to the "view as"
dropdown menu in the upper left corner of the screen (not your Internet browser's
"view" menu, but the menu that is part of the website); choose "view as PDF" and
generate the optical text image as a PDF file; print that file. (To use PDF, you
will need the Adobe Acrobat viewer, which is available from Adobe
at no charge).]
3. Reading Emma Lazarus's Sonnet,
"The New Colossus" - Distribute copies of the text of New
Colossus from Academy of American
Poets; there is also a copy of "New
Colossus" at the EDSITEment-reviewed American
Studies at the University of Virginia.
- Before reading the
poem, share with your students a little background on Emma Lazarus, drawing from
the information provided in the Introduction (above), as well as from a
short essay on Lazarus and her sonnet from American
Studies at the University of Virginia. More extensive resources are available
in "Women of Valor: Emma
Lazarus, "an exhibit from the Jewish Women's
Archive, a link on the EDSITEment-reviewed Internet
Public Library.
- Read and discuss the poem. What comparison
does Lazarus make between the American statue and the famous Colossus of the ancient
world? How is this new statue different? What did people in 1883 think of the
statue and how was Emma Lazarus asking them to change? Why should her poem persuade
a person to donate money to bring the statue to America?
- To the extent that it will help students
understand the historical context of Lazarus's sentiments and prepare them for
the writing exercises below, discuss the issue of immigration during the last
few decades of the nineteenth century. For relevant web resources on immigration,
see the sources listed in the last bulleted item in Preparing
to Teach the Lesson, above. Use these resources to find information on the
following key terms and concepts for a discussion of immigration in the last few
decades of the nineteenth century:
*Rapid growth of cities
and increasing need for new laborers * 25 million immigrants to U.S. in the
50 years after the Civil War * Poor housing in cities and city services unable
to keep pace * In 1881, violent pogroms against Jews in Russia, and against
Armenians in the Ottoman Empire (Turkey) between 1890s and 1920 * Other reasons
for leaving include poverty and hope for a better life * Chinese workers attacked
in San Francisco in the 1870s because of a perception that they were taking jobs
from Americans * In 1882, Chinese Exclusion Act bars Chinese immigrants
* Nativists and nativisim * The idea of assimilation and the notion of U.S.
as a "melting pot"
4. Persuading the American
Public: Writing a Letter
Assign, or allow students to choose, one
of the following writing scenarios. Add to, subtract from, or otherwise adapt
the text of each assignment according to your students' needs and level of preparation:
- Scenario 1: The year is 1885, and Joseph Pulitzer has not yet
begun his successful campaign to fund the pedestal for Bartholdi's statue. Hoping
to garner support for the pedestal fund, you write a letter for a newsletter on
the arts that will be read by many of New York's wealthiest patrons. Your friend,
Emma Lazarus, has shared with you a sonnet she wrote on the subject, and has given
you permission to paraphrase or quote freely from her poem. Thus far, however,
wealthy New Yorkers have been reluctant to donate to the pedestal fund. Privately,
many of these people have shared with you (for you are yourself one of these wealthy
patrons) some of their concerns:
- "I don't understand the symbolism of this
statue. It seems to me a mishmash of conflicting symbols. What holds it all together?
Why is there a crown? A torch?" - "Why on earth is the statue to be facing
out over the ocean? Shouldn't it face towards land, where the people of New York
can enjoy it?" - "What will this do for the city of New York? Wouldn't my
money be better invested in another museum, or a university?"
- Scenario
2: The year is 1876, and not a penny has yet been raised in the U.S. to support
the statue. You are a hardworking, middle-class citizen of Kansas City, Missouri,
who by chance met up with Bartholdi on his 1871 trip across America (you can read
about this trip in the American
Park Network essay). His vision of the statue and of the American nation impressed
you, and you want to share it with others in your city. So you decide to write
a letter to your local paper, addressing all the citizens of Kansas City. In recent
days, however, articles and letters to the paper have expressed the following
sentiments:
-"Why should we support a statue in New York City? What has this
got to do with Kansas City?" -"The money would be better spent to support
all the poor people crowded into New York slums." -"Let the rich pay for
it. New York has plenty of wealth and they should pay for the statue."
-
Scenario 3: The year is 1883, and the Chinese Exclusion Act has just passed.
You are a writer living in San Francisco and you have been concerned about the
fate of new immigrants to this country since the 1870s when you witnessed attacks
on Chinese workers by citizens who thought that they were "stealing American jobs."
The local newspaper invites you to write a short piece on the national effort
to fund the statue of Liberty. So you travel East, and attend a benefit art auction
where a poem by Emma Lazarus is read. You find the ideas in the poem very striking,
and decide to work them in to a short newspaper article that will: 1) describe
Bartholdi's "Liberty Enlightening the World" for readers who may be unfamiliar
with the project; 2) explain Emma Lazarus' position to an audience who may have
rather less favorable views of immigration. Since you are commissioned as a "travel
writer" and not an ordinary journalist, you are encouraged to write in a personal
style and insert whatever commentary you think might be of interest to your San
Francisco audience.
Extending the Lesson
Writing assignment: E Pluribus Unum
Assign students to small
groups, each of which contains at least one representative from each of the three
audiences described above. Tell students that their group is a "blue ribbon panel"
selected by the President to draft a statement that will be read at the inauguration
of the Statue of Liberty in 1886. Their statement should be entitled E Pluribus
Unum, and it should be addressed to everyone living in the U.S., rich and
poor, urban and rural, citizen and noncitizen, of every race, gender, religion,
geographical region, and country of origin. The statement should explain the meaning
of the statue and why it is an important symbol for all Americans.
Related
EDSITEment Lesson Plans
"The
Statue of Liberty: the Meaning and Use of a National Symbol" (grades 3-5)
"I'm Gonna
Sit Right Down and Write Someone a Letter" (grades 3-5)
Selected
EDSITEment Websites
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