nties whose percentage of illiteracy is above
the average it appears (see Map 4, page 30) that in all but three, the
percentage of foreign-born persons is large, and that among counties where
the foreign born are few, there are, outside the Eighteen Counties, only
six for which the percentage of illiteracy is greater than 4.2, and three
of these are included in the counties which border upon them.

It will be noted that in this region the number of foreign-born persons is
very small. The percentage for the State is 12.5, whereas in the Eighteen
Counties it is only 2.3. No less than 53 counties out of the 70 outside of
the Eighteen Counties, have a foreign population of more than 2.3 per
cent.

In this region, therefore, where there is so high a percentage of
illiteracy, of illegitimacy, and of deaths from preventable disease, the
people are more nearly pure Americans than in the rest of the State. They
compare unfavorably with the people of counties where a large proportion
are foreigners. It is true that the cause does not lie in the origin of
the population. But the fact that these things are true in the most
American parts of Ohio, where we should naturally expect to find the best
situation, greatly emphasizes the significance of the conditions
disclosed.

It is an additional indictment against those who are responsible that in
Mahoning County more than 28 per cent and in Cuyahoga County more than 33
per cent of the population in 1910 were foreign born, yet in these
counties, containing the large cities of Youngstown and Cleveland, the
moral and social conditions are better than in the Eighteen Counties--a
rural section inhabited by our purest American stock.

Such statistical data as are here presented are but as smoke indicating
fire. They do not overstate the urgency of the appeal from the unfortunate
over-churched and under-ministered communities of this section. Here gross
superstition exercises strong control over the thought and action of a
large proportion of the people. Syphilitic and other venereal diseases are
common and increasing over whole counties, while in some communities
nearly every family is afflicted with inherited or infectious disease.
Many cases of incest are known, inbreeding is rife. Imbeciles,
feeble-minded, and delinquents are numerous, politics is corrupt, the
selling of votes is common, petty crimes abound, the schools have been
badly managed and poorly attended. Cases of rape, assaul