Waterbury evening Democrat., 1905-12-05

ground of that mans fitness for citi
 consider his moral and social quality
 His standard of living should be such
 that he will not by pressure of com.
 petition lower the standard of living of
 our own wageworkers, for it must
 ever be prime object of our legisla.
 tion to keep high their standard of liy. 1 ing. If the man who seeks to come l here is from the moral and social
 standpoint of such a character as to
 bid fair to add value to the community
 he should be heartily welcomed. We
 cannot afford to pay heed to whether
 he is of one creed or another, of one na. ton or another. We cannot afford to
 consider whether he is Catholic or Prot
 estant Jew or gentle; whether he is
 Englishman or Irishman, Frenchman or German. Japanese. Italian. Scandi-
 navian, Slav or Magyar. What we
 should desire to find out is the indi- 1 vidual quality of the individual man. ] In my judgment, with this end in view. we shall have to prepare through our 1 own agents a far more rigid inspection
 in the countries from which the immi- grants come. It will be great deal better to have fewer immigrants, but l all of the right kind, than great num-
 Der of immigrants, many of whom are 1 as possible we wish to limit the i'm migration to this country to persons l who propose to become citizens of this country, and we can we'll afford to in- i sist upon adequate scrutiny of the i character of those who are thus pro- posed for future citizenship. There should be an increase in the stringency l of the laws to keep out insane. idiotic, 1 epileptic and pauper immigrants, but 1 this is by no means enough. Not mere ly the anarchist. but every man of an- i archistic tendencies, all violent and dis 1 orderly people, all people of bad char acter, the incompetent the lazy, the vicious. the physically unfit, defective or degenerate should be kept out. The | stocks out of which American citizen ship is to be built should be strong and healthy, sound in body. mind and char acter. If it be objected that the 1 government agents would not always | select well, the answer is that they would certainly select better than do | the agents and brokers of foreign l steamship companies, the people who now do whatever selection is done.
 1 The questions arising in connection ] with Chinese immigration stand by themselves. The conditions in China are such that the entire Chinese cooly class-that is, the class of Chinese la borers, skilled and unskilled - legiti- mately come under the head of unde- sirable immigrants to this country be- cause of their numbers, the low wages for which they work and their low standard of living. Not only is it to the interest of this country to keep them out, but the Chinese authorities do not desire that they should be ad- mitted. At present their entrance is prohibited by laws amply adequate to accomplish this purpose. These laws have been, are being and will be thor oughly enforced. The violations of them are so few in number as to be in- finitesimal and can be entirely disre- garded. There is no serious proposal to alter the immigration law as regards the Chinese laborer, skilled or unskill- ed, and there is no excuse for any man feeling or affecting to feel the slightest alarm on the subject
 But in the effort to carry out the pol icy of excluding Chinese laborers, Chi- nese coolies, grave injustice and wrong have been done by this nation to the people of China and therefore ultimate ly to this nation itself. Chinese stu dents, business and professional men of all kinds-not only merchants, but bankers, doctors, manufacturers, pro fessors, travellers and the like-should be encouraged to come here and treat ed on precisely the same footing that we treat students. business men, tray- elers and the like of other nations. Our laws and treatiet should be framed not so as to put these people in the ex- cepted classes, but to state that we will admit all Chinese except Chinese of the cooly class. Chinese skilled or unskilled lsborers. There would not be the least danger that any such pro vision would result in any relaxation of the law about laborers. These will under all conditions be kept out abso- lutely. But it will be more easy to see that both justice and courtesy are shown. as they ought to be shown. to other Chinese if the law or treaty is framed as above suggested. Examina- tions should be completed at the port of departure from China. For this pur- pose there should be provided a more adequate consular service in China than we now have. The appropriations both for the offices of the eonsuls and for the office forces in the consulates should be increased.
 As a people we have talked much of the open door in China. and we expect and quite rightly intend to Insist upon justice being shown us by the Chinese But we cannot expect to receive equity unless we do equity. We cannot ask the Chinese to do to us what we are un- willing to do to them. They would have a perfect right to exclude our laboring men if our lsboring men threatened to come into their country in such mum bers as to jeopandize the well being of the Chinese population, and as. mutstis mutandis. these were the conditions