Whether or not such a nationalistic policy may be considered just, and whatever change the future may witness in this regard, the fact remains that not a single nation in the world at present discards or rejects the policy in practice. In the face of such a situation the only alternative for the Japanese in the United States, when they obstinately cling to their own ways of living and thinking, would be to go elsewhere. This conviction of ours should not be confused with the hasty, groundless conjecture that the Japanese are a race utterly impossible of assimilation to American ways by nature and constitution. Most of the careless agitators who put forth statements to this effect start from the wrong end in their reasoning. They assume what ought to be proven, and forthwith proceed to formulate a policy on this assumption. They assume that the Japanese are unassimilable and conclude that, therefore, they should not be given an opportunity to progress. This is analogous to saying that because a child is ignorant he should not be sent to school, forgetting that the very ignorance of the child is due to the fact that he has been denied an education. They fail to see that their conclusion is the very cause of their premises. What we maintain is that when the Japanese shall have proved unassimilable, _after all means for their assimilation have been exhausted_, they should then be persuaded to give up the idea of establishing themselves in America. Meaning of "Assimilation." A great deal of confusion arises from the ambiguity of the term "assimilation." Its interpretations vary from the idea of a most superficial imitation of dress and manners to that of an uncontrollable process of biological resemblance or identity. Those using the term in the former sense, in face of the fact that the Japanese in their midst dress, talk, and live like Americans, consider it indisputable that they are assimilable. Those who use the word in a narrow sense of ethnological similarity, on the contrary, insist with equal conviction that the assimilation of the Japanese is absolutely impossible. Neither is wrong in reasoning, for assimilation, according to the accepted diction, means the process of bringing to a resemblance, conformity or identity--it is a relative term. Hence, in order to determine whether it is possible for the Japanese to become Americanized, it is necessary to find a standard by which the process can safely be gauged. Without this it is wholly absurd to say either that they are or are not assimilable. If the standard be fixed at physical identity with Americans, the Americanization of the Japanese is hopeless--at least for a few generations; but if it be fixed at conformity with American customs and social order, the Japanese have to a certain degree already been assimilated.