Western Kansas world. [volume] (WaKeeney, Kan.) 1885-current, 1886-02-27

lent in work for every dollar paid them.
Moreover, they built railroads, cultivated
orchards and vineyards and did the me-
NAL work in many large enterprises,
which, besides their work, gave work to
white men also. Had the cheap peon
labor not been obtainable, the better sort
of skilled labor.
WOULD NOT HAVE BEEN FOUND
in California for the whites. There is
such overwhelming testimony in favor
of these propositions, that no one should
for moment attempt to deny them as
facts. That they have been denied, is
probably due to that narrowness which
fears to admit any damaging statement
lest it weaken the anti Chinese side.
It will be noticed that the argument
up to this point has been series Of facts.
The remainder is deductions from these
facts, and it is in these deductions that
the fallacy of their application to the
Chinese question appears. The deduc-
ton is, that as tie slme influences pre-
dominate in California to-day as have
predominated in the past, there will be
more work and better wages in Califor-
mia by allowing the Cinnamon unrestrict-
ed immigration, than if they are shut
out and the field left open to the whites
alone. The fallacy consists, first, in the
assumption that the state is in the same
condition now as in the early days when
Chinese labor was necessary; and,
second, that the quality and
amount of Chinese labor is now, and
will remain, the same in the future as in
the past. The state is no longer in the
initial stage of its growth. There are
railroads interesting its entire length,
SO that practically the whole range of it
open to the settler. Its orange groves,
vineyards and orchards are so numerous,
that in many parts may be heard the
caution of over production in further
planting. Its territory is sufficiently
settled to afford such home market for
its manufactures, that manufacturers
can feel assured of fair profit after
paying white mems rates for their labor,
and the day has gone by when the indus
trial future Of the state
WAS UNCERTAIN,
and the industries so feeble that they
must have cheap labor to enable them to
compete successfully with the east.
The main proposition. however, lies in
the fact that those advancing this argu-
ment assume that the Chinese will be
content to take always the poems share
of new enterprises, and leave the skilled
labor to their white competitors. Sena-
tor Miller as early as 1880, says: cat
first, nearly all who came were mere Ia
borers of the lowest order, men who only
sought labor under the direction of SUI
periors The American was then the SUI
perior who directed their labor; but now
there are thousands of Chinese proprie-
tors and laborers in California who direct
the labors of their fellows as skillfully
and successfully as ever the Americans
were able to do These have entered
into competition with American employ
ers, and thus not only furnish labor for
their countrymen, but force the Ameri-
can proprietors to employ labor of the
same grade, Many Americans have ,e-
fused and do refuse to give employment
to the Chinese, but it is found that this
practice of self denial for the common
good is at the cost of fortunes, and it has
no appreciate effect Oh Chinese immi-
grafton. 1t only serves to multiply Chi
nese proprietors, and the Chinese con-
tinue to pour in as before"
This statement gives the keynote to
the situation. It shows at once that the
future use OF Chinese labor is not to be
judged by the results of it's use in the
past. If the Chinese remained a peon
class only, there would be little danger
in allowing their unrestricted immigra-
ton. For Chinese labor, like all other
labor, is governed by the law of supply
and demand. And if their labor were
confined to this class they would solve
the evil themselves by stopping their i'm
migration when the class became full in
which they could find work, and no more
work was to be obtained.
But the trouble is that they have in
them
THE CAPACITY FOR RISING
as fast as or faster than white man in
the line of their employment. As soon
as they get an understanding of the
work they push into the places at first
occupied by white men. A careful analy-
sis of the cry raised in California by
white labor will show that much moro of
it comes from the fact that Chinese are
employed in place of skilled white labor
than of unskilled. It is the gradual
monopolization of such places as those
of machine manipulators in mills, of the
overseers and other better grade posi-
tions on ranches and of foremen's places
in factories that has excited the working
mems alarm. Just in so far as these
better places are monopolized by the
Chinese, in SO far is the proportion of
the work that goes to the white men
from enterprises dependent on Chinese
labor 1essened; and this economic argu-
of the prof. Chinese people diminished
further in weight.
1t is not claimed that, as yet the cheap
labor can be entirely dispensed with.
But the fact remains that, in the boot
and shoe trade, the cigar and tobacco
trade, in the manufacture of underwear
and rough clothing, in the proprietorship
aud management of small farms and
vegetable gardens, and in the higher
work of farms and mills, the competition
of Chinese with skilled white labor has
already assumed proportions too glaring