Los Angeles herald., 1907-12-28

OOME writer's have expressed astonish
~ ment that the Japanese laborer anf
~ artisan should so eagerly rush t.
the ports Of the Pacific islands. Canada
and California. In such places he !:
scarcely ever treated as an equal. Some
times he is outraged and ill-treated, and
never anything more than tolerated. Ye
still the stream of immigrants pours or
from the Asiatic TO the American shores
of the Peaceful Sea- There is some
thing startling In the persistent way ir
which fertile land, filled with industries
and not at present oyerpopulated, allows
the blood and sinews of it's people to seeh
life and work abroad
A few considerations, however, says the
Manchester Guardian, will make this
mystery clear. Japan's development along
Industrial lines Is one of the most re-
markable features Of her recent progress
In thirty years the Japanese have leaped
from simple arts and handicrafts to the
employment of the most elaborate ma
ehinery. This fact has attracted atten-
tion In that large manufacturing center
of England, Manchester, and the paper
cited recently dispatched one of Its cor
respondents to inquire into the labor con-
ditions in the factories, mills and dock
yards OF Nippon. At once this correspon-
dent, whose Impressions are published in
the paper he Represented, was struck by
the distress and discomfort Of the labor
ing classes whom machinery has put on
the shelf. This writer says:
''The sudden and drastic effect Of the
new system was extremely oppressive to
the old artisan class who, together with
their ancient patrons, went down with
the fall of feudalism, and the process of
the upheaval in society then began has
not yet run it's course. In Japan the
handicraftsman and the local artist sue
cumbed to the era of machinery with a
suddenness unknown to the west. Conse-
quently her Industrial advance has been
marked by q growing element Of disaffec-
tion that now, like smoldering fire, Is at
any moment ready to be famed into
flames. There is probably no country in
the world where industrial disquietude is
more general and menacing than in Japan
today"
This industrial disquietude' is, how
ever, aggravated further by many other
causes. The inhumanity of the whole
Japanese labor system is appalling. Thus
we read:
"Nor is all this disaffection due to The
agitation of those deprived of an accus-
toned competence by the increase of the
factory system; the root of the trouble
lies in the inhumanity of the system IT.
self. Japanese indIstrialism is a soulless
machine in which the worker Is ground
to degree that would not be tolerated in
any country where those that bear the
burden of industry were intelligently and
sufficiently organized to protect them
selves. And woman, being the cheaper
veasel, suffers the nethermost weight of
it ALL During the last twelve months
there has hardly been a week that has
not witnessed some exhibition of united
protest against the injustice of the present
labor conditions. Strikes and other man.
ifestations of discomfort have broken out
in all lines of industry and among all
classes of workers. In some instances,
as in the case of the miners, the outbreak
was so furious as to result in murderous
rioting and wanton destruction Of extern
s!ve property"
The wage system in Japan is oppressive.
Starvation wages are the rule, even in
cotton factories, where one might ex-
pect conditions of labor to have reached
the most modern development" Yet we
are informed by this writer:
Examine the labor conditions in Tokyo,
where the highest wages in the empire
are paid There a cotton-ginner at best