New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1896-03-17
TO RESTRICT IMMIGRATION.
SENATOR LODGE PROPOSES AN EDUCA
TIONAL QUALIFICATION.


EACH IMMIGRANT TO PASS AN EXAMINATION TO
PROVE HIS ABILITY TO READ AND WRITE
SOME LANGUAGE-A NOVEL TEST.
[BY TELEGRAPH TO THE TRIBuNEl
Washington, March Ex-senator Lodge
lvened very dull session of the Senate to-
day by delivering interesting and scholarly
speech a bill of his own recently introduced
to place some further checks and restrictions
on the flood of immigration from foreign coun-
tries. Mr. Lodges bill requires that every alien
hereafter landing in the ports of the United
States shall be able to read and write the Ian
guage of his native country. The test to ascer-
tain the intelligence of candidates for citizen
ship in this great Republic is to be applied
follows;
The inspection officers shall be furnished
with copies of the Constitution Of the United
States, printed on numbered uniform paste
board slips each containing five lines of said
Constitution in the various languages of the
immigrants in double small plea type. These
slips shall be kept in boxes made for that pur-
pose and 80 constructed as to conceal the slips
from view. each box to contain slips OF but one
language and the immigrant may designate
the language in which ne prefers the test snail
be made Each Immigrant shall be required to
and afterward write out in full view of the i'm
migration officers the five lines printed thereon.
Each slip shall be returned to the box imme-
diately after the test is finished. and the con-
tents Of the box shall be shaken up by an in
spection officer before another drawing is made.
The immigrant falling to read and write out
the slip thus drawn by him shall not be adj
mitted but he shall be returned to the coun-
try from which he came at the expense or the
steamship or railroad company which brought
him. as now provided by law. The inspection
officers shall keep in each box at all times Il
full number of said printed pasteboard Sips
and in the of each excluded immigrant
shall keep a certified memorandum OF the num-
Der of the slip which the said immigrant failed
to read or copy out in writing
MR.. LODGES ARGUMENT
IN support Of this ingenious piece of re-
str,ctive legislation Mr.. Lodge said in part:
There be doubt that there Is very y; raic
desire on the part of the American people 10 rts'c
Snrther and much more extensively than has YET
been dome Of obanns this further restriction
have been widely discussed OF late yea ,,sn u ~
Congress The frs, the imposition OF cap
tation tax on all mmigranis IN et GS If the
tax made sufficiently heavy But aIthUu aga he
clusion by tax w9ud De omntee dd not feel
mat The time had Vet come for its application The
second scheme was 10 gestTcd ~ mmsrTans This
plan has been much advocated and II IL were poss
largely to the number of consuls In order to 90
30 ii would doubt be e1ect1ve ana Deie.C' Ia.
as the %as unpractica that the
chinery could not be provgSo foragn overnments
and that it could not be properly ana justly I'll
ire third method was TO exclude all immigrants
who could neither read write and this Is INC
p %sIch which IS smS %Ss ad S this 81 Bin %
committee have shGwn by h geat care the
immisTants Who Would be affected by the rae:
sst ,s: v iHu Bear most 5ss hsy
Russians Poles. Hungarians. Greeks ana AsrasiIs
and yeTy snty OF or 9Ss
French Ia other words the races most snecte 20
s fs sn oountT has begun within the last twenty years
and swsd rapidly to psope havs
hitherto assimiated and which are most alien 70 tne
5,s Seay hand sf the nnGps q. from the United
dom and OF those races which are most c,oseiy re-
lat ss tss people
American colonies and bull, up the Gf iss
The statistics prepared by the sommtt tee Nv "r
Their that the Immigrants exS1 ib Dy part in con-
gested masses in our great cities. me! Iu,r II
large proportion OF the % S he have been
made that the immigrants who woud De- , Sut os
by the 10 tSs eSunry and come most quickly
private or public charity for support The classes
now excluded by law,he criminals the diseased tn
paupers and the contract laborers-are iurisH6 S
chiefly by the races as u ose aitr'e ,hs I'M
migrants who come the country for bIlei sea =
and return 10 their native ianu; ihn init
them the money they have earned IN me HIliH H,
States There is no more hurtful and undesTaaoie
class Of from gS b p0n a el show
the races furnishing the largest number OF prns Oh
passage have also the greatest proportion Oh '''''e
There is no one thing which does 80 much to bring
md IN
can wage-earner as the unlimited introduction OF
cheap foreign labor through unrestricted imm gaS
Character OF our immigration has been ACCOMPANIES
by sa Of trained
some occupation or pursuit has fallen on, WINE tie
n ,Ss1 s who are totally unsked has risen in
recent inauguration to enormous sny Of the
American wage-earner. and does more thar any
thing else toward lowering his wages ana iorclne
With the general assent OF both political parties. 10
meet this crying ey come yeaIs aeE aw That
Legislation excellent in intention but has proved
but ts aas n Of several the
relief which can s9me 59 ns nrsnt labor
must be by general laws restricting the total amour
Of and france e IN Of tSs mga
ton which furnish the low. unskilied ana 'sn0ra"
The injury OF unrestricted immigration to Amer
can wages and American standards Of hyns Is Is snl
Recently plain and Z 0aS to the DUALITY
our citizenship is far worse While the people ~no
for 30 years have been migrating TO america nave
Continued to furnish large numbers OF !mme az,
% the United States. other races OF pStay ill., in
ferent race-origin with whom the Englsh-Speahis
people have never hitherto been assima'f, , o.
brought in contact have suddenly begun 10 liIIhl-
srate ~ The United States in large numbers Rus-
slams Hungarians Poles Bohemiansi n ,snm ~
Creeks and Asiatics. whose nihisaa.ao 40 ~
America was almost unknown twenty years ago
have during the last twenty years po ,hev IN N
eoual the Immigration OF those races KINDRED ~
blood or speech or both. by whom the ohltcu
States has hitherto been built up and the American
people formed 49,, a...s
This momentous fact is the one when cohLro On.
us to-day. and, II continued. II carries WIN IL LUZ,
ure consequences far deeper than any otntr eN IN
OF our times. 1t involves in word no.niilS ,e,a
than the possibility of great and perlious change