The Hawaiian gazette. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu, Hawaii]) 1865-1918, 1900-07-24
THEY DON'T
WANT WORK
HiIo Full of Loafing
Japanese.
A DANGEROUS NUISANCE
Board Of Health and Police Called
on TO Enforce Vagrancy
Law.

HILO. Hawaii, July I-The tribune
says: Dislike of work does not seem to
he n human characteristic confined to the
haolc; the Asiatic IS afflicted with
similar bacillus in its chronic form. Since
the abolition OF the contract system for
plantation laborers on these Islands there
have been several outbreaks of the dis
ease at various times and places, and
the plantations quite generally along the
coast are now feeling the effect of 1t, and
some of them are meeting with no IN
considerable difficulty in carrying on their
necessary work, through the frequent va
cations, varying anywhere from a day to
a week. which now one gang, and now,
another, insist on taking. In some cases
large numbers of laborers leave the plan
tation entirely, and gradually drilt into
Hilo. the Asiatic quarter of which they
are already crowding to overlooking How
these people live nobody knows; probably
in the same manner that the riff-raf of
all races do. They are stouts, pimps, gam
blers, sneak thieves, bummers and dead
beats. 1t is well known that it has never
been the better class of Japan peasantry
and town folk who have been shipped
use of the bigger cities, and especially OF
the seaport towns. OF late this has been
more especially the case. Once freed
from the contracts here they are partiGu
larly inclined to earn their bread by
some other means than the sweat of their
brow.
Ii has come to be n serious question
whether IIlo is to be allowed to become
the headquarters of mis- element, which
is at the least undesirable, and except
when steadily employed a nuisance and
even danger. They are fired from
the plantations when they won't work.
They should be routed out of Hllo unless
they can prove that they have some le-
Ultimate legal means of support. They
will not make the highway Their home
long. e they are barred from all other
resting place, and they will probably pre-
fer even the unwelcome labor of the sugar
plantation at fair wages to breaking rock
for the State at no wages at all.
Their presence in Hilo under present
conditions is Objectionable for another
reason. They crowd The Japanese hotels
and houses until they remind one of the
Kinau on one of George Beckley's favor
lite trips. In this respect they break thc
sanitary laws of the Islands and endan-
gen the heath of the commun ty-a mat
ter that could be easy remedied by the
Board of Health. and the superfluous Japs
hustled out and made to seek home and
labor outside of town.
AS long as the Board of Health and the
police force merely ignore this state of
affairs. or conniVe at it. we may expect
a steady stream of idle and worthless
Asiatics journeying from the plantations
and taking up their abode with their city
cousins. God knows that the country's
only excuse for having this whole Japan
csc incubus upon the country is the plea
that they are the only available and com
petent plantation laborers to be secured
n sufficient quantities; If they are to be
allowed and even encouraged by incompe
tent Or careless officials and executive de-
partments, to be not laborers, but loahng
vagabonds, the future of the Islands Is
not bright
We do not believe that this use of their
industrial freedom is looked upon with
favor or encouraged by the prominent
men among the Japanese here, by the i'm
migration companies, or by the officials of
the Japanese Government New Japan
Is, however. becoming a very democratic
nation. The demagogue, who, as in most
other countries. should be wearing stri-
ped suits. earns an easy living by playing
upon the credulity of his fellows and tell
ing them fairy stories, seeds which drop
ped into the rich soil of ignorance, bear
much fruit while the wiser counsels of
the men of knowledge, worth and posi-
ton. who but a few years ago were look
ed up to with respect and followed W. tn
humility. arc ignored. 1t is this tendency
toward demagoguery of the Japanese
common people that will prove most dan
gerous to the Islands Its beginning here
should be depressed with a strong hand,
and the Government should show, the