The Washington times. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1902-1939, 1907-02-15
Fair Play for the South.

Southern Senator'S charge that the
conference report on the immigra-
ton bill includes some new Iegisla-
ton calculated TO prevent States,
through their immigration commits
sioners, drumming up immigration
from Europe. The South needs and
earnestly wants such immigration.
Its industrial and its social condi-
tions alike justify the belief that
if a share of the present flood of
immigration could be diverted TO the
South the results would be good.
Moreover. while the South is asking
for this immigration, there is in
creasing feeling in the North, which
now gets practically the entire in
tiuX, that the North doesn't need so
much.
Some Southern States have under
taken, through immigration bu.
reaus, to encourage immigration
The Department of Commerce and
Labor has held that this, when
zone by a State, does not violate the
immigration law. The rewritten
statute which the cOnferees have
prepared is said to contain provi-
Sions that would stop this effort of
the Southern communities, making
it violation of Federal law. If this
is true, then the Southern Senator's
are entirely justified in their fight
against the conference report. They
should insist that such provisions
be eliminated, and if they stand
firm they will get what they want.
The South Is entitled to fair play.
For forty years the great stream of
immigration has poured into the
North and West. When the South
lay PROSTATE after the war the
North had all the inducements to
offer incOmers. Moreover, the inn
mcnse land grants which had been
given 10 railroads in the Northwest
constituted the greatest possible in
ducement to immigrants. The South
had neither public lands nor rail
road lands. It's railroads were not
rich enough to do what those of the
North did, reach out for the immi-
grafton; and if they had been they
could not have succeeded in the eff
fort while Southern agriculture and
industry were alike paraIyzed.
But the New South faces new con-
ditions. 1t has industry, activity,
money, an appreciation Of its own
possibilities. 1t is asking for r
share in the immigration. Why
should the North, which has grown
rich and populous and dominating
during the period when it has had
all the immigration, now deny the
South the privilege of like benefits
when the South at last is ready to
utilize them?
1t will not do to say that the
South will get its share of immi-
grants when il is economically ready
for them. The stream of immigra-
ton has moved for generations in a
channel now cut wide and deep. The
steamship lines, the railroads, the
ports of entry. all favor the North.
The immigrants who have come in
the past are now scattered through
out the North, telling their relatives
TO come TO that section.
The South can get a share only
by great and persistent effort. 1t is
probably true that the South, until
this time, could not have bid sue
cessfully against the North for i'm
migrants. Cheap lands, better
wages, more diversified industries.
all favored the North, but today the
South is in condition to make n
strong bid for the favor of new
Corners. 1t wants them; it needs
them; il has work for them to do.
II is as well entitled to a share of
them as the North for forty years
has been entitled to all of them.
Nor is it sufficient answer to say
that the Southern plan is practical