The morning call., 1890-06-10
ALIEN LANDLORDS,
A Bill to Prohibit Foreigners
From Holding Land.
The Measure Reported by The House
Committee on Judiciary.
1t Requires All Owners Of American Soil
TO Owe Allegiance 10 the
United States.
Special Dispatches to THE MORNING CALL.

WASHINGTON, June 9.-Representative
Oates from the Committee on Judiciary to-
| day reported to the House bill to prohibit
aliens from acquiring title to or owning
lands within the United States. An elab-
crate report accompanied the bill. In it
the committee says the power of the Gov
eminent to totally exclude aliens from CON-
ing within its jurisdiction, as has been
done in the case of the Chinese, no one
| questions. This sovereign power certainly
| includes the lesser one of defining what
| property rights they may exercise after
they are admitted and during the contnu-
ance of their alien condition.
"YOur committee ascertained," says the
report, with reasonable certainty that
certain noblemen of Europe, principally
Englishmen, have acquired and now own
in the aggregate about 21,O0o,000 acres of
land within the United States We have
not sufficient information to state the
quantity owned by untitled aliens, nor is it
so important, as it is generally held In
smaller bodies. This alien nonresident
ownership will, in the course of time, lead
to a system of landlordism incompatible
with the best interests and free institutions
of the United States. The foundation of
such system is being laid broadly in the
Western States and Territories.
"The avarice and enterprise of European
capitalists, the report continues, "have
caused them to invest many millions in
American railroads and land bonds, covering
perhaps 100000 acres, the greater part
of which, under foreclosure sales, will, most
likely, before many years. become the prop
erty of these foreign bond-holders in ad-
dition to their princely possessions. This
aggressive foreign capital is not confined to
the lands it has purchased, but, overlapping
its boundaries, has caused hundreds of
miles of the public domain to be fenced up
for the grazing of vast herds of cattle and
set at defiance the rights of the honest but
humble setter"
The bin proposes to place these aliens
under the disabilities of civil law as to all
future attempts to acquire lands in this
country. In other words, the report says,
the bill is declaration against absentee
landlordism. 1t declares that all foreign
born persons who have not been naturaliZed
are incapable of taking title to lands any
where within the United States except
lease hold for not exceeding five years. 1t
has no retroactive, but prospective opera
tlon. 1t also contains provision which
will compel alien landowners to cease to
De Sucn, or 10 become cltlZenS OF the United
States within ten years.
This bill, the report says, would prevent
any more abuses like that of Mr.. Scully,
who resides in England and is subject of
the Queen, bat who ewnz 90,Oee acres in
Illinois, occupied by tenants, mostly igno-
| rant foreigners, from whom he receives as
| rent $4,000 yearly, and spends it in Eu-
rope The Schueley estate of about 1000
acres within the city limits of Pittsburg,
from the rents Of which the Schueleys, who
are subjects of the British Queen, draw an
nually not less than $1,000 is another in
stance of alien landlordism in America.
The tenth census shows that the United
States had $4,000 tenant farmers. the
largest number possessed by any nation in
the world. In conclusion, the report says:
With the natural increase in the people,
and the foreigners who flock to our shores
annually, and who, by competition, are re-
ducing the wages Of labor, making the bat
tie for our people harder, is a problem for
the American statesmen to solve. The
multiplication of owners of the soil means
corresponding enlargement of the number
of patriots, and every landowner in this
country should owe allegiance to the
United States,