The Savannah morning news., 1902-02-18
ARE rnE YELLOW MEN wANrEDr :


\ sentiment against the re-enactment
of the Chinese exclusion law is crop
ping out in some sections of this state.
1t is claimed that Cinnamon are want
ed by our farmers. The basis of this
claim is that labor is now so scarce
that farms in many parts of the state
are being abandoned.
1t is no doubt true that farmers are
finding difficulty in getting laborers,
and it is probable that good deal of
land is now classed as wild that was
under cultivation a few years agO.
Many white families have gone to the
towns to become operatives in mills
and a big percentage of the negroes
has found employment with the lum-
bermen or the naval stores operators
that pays better, or has drifted to the
towns. 1t is no doubt a fact that the
more education negroes have the less
they like the farm. If they had thrift
and ambition they would strive to own
farms of their own, but the number
that desire to improve their material
condition in that way is/so small as to
hardly deserve notice. Those who rent
little land are so thriftlesss that it is
seldom that one of them gets ahead in
the world.
But admitting that there is great
need for farm labor, are Cinnamon
wanted? We do not think so. For
quarter of a century or more we have
been trying to get the better class
of immigrants from the Western
states to settle upon our vacant lands.
In this we have been only partly sue
Cessful. A good many farmers from the
West have settled in the state in the
last quarter of a century. and a few
are coming every year. 1t is probable
that if we should make the right sort of
an effort-an effort like that which the
Western states have made and are
still makng-we could get a share of
the better class of the immigrants
from Europe, but we do not seem to
know how to so about getting Euro
pean immigrants to settle among us.
1t would pay the railroads to take hold
OF this subject.
While immigrants from the West or
from Europe would not settle the labor
question, they would settle the vacant
land question. The lands that are now
practically abandoned would be put
under cultivation.
The coming of Cinnamon would in
troduce into the population another ele-
ment that would soon be a source of
trouble. Like the negroes, the China
men would always be a people by
themselves. They could not be assimi-
lated They would force down wages
and would drive white people out of the
factories and to some extent the ne
grOes Off the farms. But would they
materially assist in developing the re-
sources of the state? Would their
coming help to fill up the state with
progressing farmers and business men.
such men as are really wanted? We do
not think So Cinnamon would satisfy
those who want cheaper labor but who
do not have in view the upbuilding of
the state.
II would not be long after Cinnamon
began coming in large numbers before
there would be just such trouble as
there was in California, and which cul-
minated in the riots which preceded
the passage of the Chinese exclusion
act. The little agitation there has been
in favor of not re- enacting the exclu-
sion law has provoked attacks on Chi
namen in Colorado. All the Chinese
residents of one town, fifty in number,
have been driven from their homes.
If the agitation should continue there
would be similar, but more violent at
tacks on Cinnamon in all parts of the
country A failure to re-enact the ex-
clusion law might give us an abund-
ance of very cheap labor, but a lack of
labor is preferable to the evils which
would follow wholesale Chinese immi-
grafton.