The Wheeling daily intelligencer. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1865-1903, 1899-07-27
INDUSTRIAL COMMISSION


Probing Into Immigration Ahairs.
Testimony Of Chief Of Boarding In.
spectora, Roman Dobler. Former
Wheeling Man.
NEW YORK, July 26.-At' to-day's
session Of the subcommittee of the
United States industrial commission,
Roman Dobler, chief Of the boarding
inspectors Of immigration at the barge
ofice, testified that his experience was
that clerks coming to the United
states in the second cabin with $40 or
$50 were the 6rst to become public
charges. The witness prepared n table
showing the comparative arrivals Of
passengers in the first and second cab
ms and the steerage. On such lines as
the North German Lloyd. Cunard,
American. Anchor. and White Star
lines, the number OF saloon passengers
almost equnled the arrivals in the
steerage. In vessels from Medlterra-
mean ports, however, the steerage pns-
sengers greatly exceeded the other
classes. Mormons. he said always
came on vessels OF the Anchor line
from Glasgow in the second cabin. His
figures showed that while 2,oSs pnssen-
gers came from Italian ports in the
steerage only twenty-five came as cab
in passengers.
Mr.. Dobler said many persons came
in the second cabin in order to avoid
the rigid scrutiny at the barge office.
He believed many of the new arrivals
had been coached as to their answers
to questions put to them here.
DR.. Lorenzo ulIo. legal adviser of the
immigration bureau, said there was
great difficulty in enforcing the laws,
owing to the many contradictions
found in the statutes relative to immi-
grafton. A case In point was the law
regarding criminals coming to this
country whom the law requires shall be
returned to the nation to which they
belong and the port from which they
cames Sometimes the criminal was an
oriental and came from Bremen. He
thought the law should say such per-
sons should simply not be permitted to
land and the steamship companies left
to do with them as they believed best.
Witness said that in none of the Inn
migration laws was there an express
provision for the deportation OF CON
tract laborers. The laws of 1891 did SO
by Implication, and 1t was under this
act that the department was working.
The witness said he favored amend
ing the law regarding contract labor
ers so as to include any agreement to
come here to work. not rigldly a con-
tract. He would also give persons
brought here by the steamship compan-
les contrary to the immigration laws
cause OF action against the owners OF
the vessel that brought them.
IF 1t is advisable" he said, ito, re-
strict contract laborers from coming
here the law must be amended. The
law as It stands does not restrict"
Mrs. Virginia Sucker the chief ma
tron at the, barge office, testified re-
garding the treatment Of enclente wo-
men arriving here. OF 1,44l women ar
irving during this month in that con-
dItion, fifty-two were married at the
barge office. twenty-eight were admit
ted on appeal, and the others were
found to be married women.
Mrs. stuckier said that there was an
average of one marriage a day at the
landing bureau. Thirty-one women ar
rived who had been unfaithful to their
husbands, but except in three cases
they were permitted to land.
Mrs. Sucker thought the laws
should include an act prohibiting the
landing Of girls brought here for i'm
moral purposes. There was no such
prohibition in the present laws.