The Lafayette gazette. [volume] (Lafayette, La.) 1893-1921, 1898-01-29
RESTRZC-
TON.

The Advocate cannot agree with
its able and distinguished friend,
Senator Caffcry. on the proposition
to restrict foreign immigration.
Snator Caffery makes the point
that it was the foreign immig' ant
who built up this country and made
it what 1t is today; that all of us
are defendants of foreign Immigrants
and that the policy of the fathers
was to etwelcome TO our shores any
son and daughter of toll. :" He
furthermore makes the point that it
is of the essence of Democracy to
admit every honest healthy Cauca-
sian who may seek admission into
the country with view to lettering
his condition in life and enjoying
the liberty and the privileges ac-
corded by our government to all its
citizens. The Advocate quite
agrees that these are all strong points
and technically speaking they are
hawless. One of the main objects of
our goveTnnest, as expressed by its
illustrious founders was to ssprovide
an asylum for the oppressed of all
nations" and this asylum we have
provided for now more than a hun
dred years. With the vast, ifhmit-
able wihs stretching from the Allan
tic to the Pacific and from Canada
to the Gulf to conquer, civilize and
settle, it did not appear even to the
wisest of our foTefatheTs that the
time was so near when our own
people would suffer from a conges-
zion of population, and that the
same conditions would be produced
here at home from which they in
vited the denizens of crowded
Europe to escape by coming here.
New York is in many quarters as
densely populated as is London OF
Berlin, and there are sections of
New Orleans where humanity is as
thickly crowded together as is the
case in Paris or Marseilles. The
great coal fields of Pennsylvania
and the middle West present strug-
gle for existence as fierce and con-
tentious as any in Newcastle, and
the English tongue is language I'M
known in many of the mining camps.
the native miners having been forced
out by cheap alien labor furnished
by the Hungarians, Bohemians,
Slavs and other races, with whom it
was necessary either to secure en-
ployment regardless of price, or
strive. In the great manufacturing
centres of the East the condition,
though Lot quite so desperate, is
similar. Operatives are brought
here from Europe by soulless
and greedy transportation COM
panies under promise of abundant
and remunerative employment as
soon as they land. Arriving, the
immigrant discovers only too late
that he has been duped and necessi-
tv forces him to seek employment,
which he can only secure by cutting
under the prices of those already
employed. Without the means to
return to his native land and con-
fronted by the prospect of starva-
ton should he remain his mind is
easily made up; the alien is en-
ployed at reduced prices and for
every one SO employed a native
operative is thrown out.
This is the story everywhere in
all the industrial centers of the
country and it is this fact which is
the cause Of more strikes, lockouts
and other business disturbances
than all other causes combined.
American labor is everywhere being
crowded to the wall bv imported
paAper labor and the result is bound
20 be distress, social and politica
upheava1s. porul,sm and anarchy.
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