The labor journal. [volume] (Everett, Wash.) 1909-1976, 1910-05-06

The Asiatic problem which confronts
the Write race on the North American
continent, and particularly that part
of it bordering on the Pacific, has many
view points. Ernest Crawford, writing
in the American Federationist for the
current month"; has caught some of
them and through his facile pen en-
deavored to communicate them to his
readers. The article referred to which
we republish will be of great interest
to our readers.
Stretching twelve hundred miles from
the region of San Francisco to the
shores of Prince Rupert, and spreading
from the Pacific to the Rockies, the
map represents the largest untaken
area available to the sons of men. This
area knows no racial differences in in
stitutions and skin, though an imagi
nary line divides the democracies of
the United States and Canada. 1t is
in this region that the common man
finds his last chance; it is the land of
the monogramic homestead, high wages,
men at work on the soil, women toiling
in the home, the scene of the square
deal for every square fellow.
But through these cities of the Puget
Sound region, there fit the Chinese and
the Japs; through the streets of Vic
toria move the white turbaned fellow
citizens of British people from Bombay
and Burmah; down along the shores of
the Kootenay the yellow man is pick
ing fruit, and up the banks of the
Fraser river the lynx eyed Orientals are
pulling their salmon nets. Japanese
gentlemen move into the residential
districts of Seattle and their excellent
manners make them socially tolerable: /:
but japanese workers from the rice
fields move into the Seattle factories
and the low wages which they accept
make them a menace to the homes and
heads of the white men. Chinese bust
ness men announce on store window
in Victoria that they have imported a
stock of native remedies as a substitute
for the patented stock which infests
America, and their statement is a
source of amusement to the passing
pedestrian willing to recognize the
truth; but Chinese river boatsmen seek
the jobs of the longshoremen on the
docks of Vancouver and there follows
a riot in behalf of the high wage sys-
tenn. The white man eyed the yellow
with pleasant curosity until the latter
threatened his stomach: then he wanted
to employ the big stick to insure a
rapid and thorough solution of the
Oriental as a problem.
Thus in San Francisco, Seattle, Ia.
coma, Victoria, Vancouver eastward to
J Revelstoke, southwark to Nelson of the
mining camps, and northward to Char,
lotte Islands, the Yank is meeting the
} turban and the pigtail, the long, lear
Hindu and the little Jap. A Chinamar
trying to walk with dignity curtailed
} by Yankee shirt inside his trousers
a Jap acting as dray Wits a basket
load on each end of shoulder pole; q
} long, lean Hindu seeking to do credit
to his shoveling job on the Canadian
Pacific railroad without disarrangina
his turban-these are the daily Incl
dents, on the Pacific Coast which con
stitute an illustrated notification of tn,
fact that the oriental problem has ar
J rived and is pressing eastward.
Man moves along the line of least
resistance to the cheapest bread basket
The goal, is the fertile wheat land,
OF the earth.
There are some vacant spots il
northern United States and northwest
Canada. Toward these points the whit,
men of Europeon cities, the expanding
farmers of the United States, and tn,
saffron skinned orientals are tending
Population is like teakettle and il
bubbling Japan and boiling India tn
excess of persons is forcing the caldrol
/ into conflict with the outside world
4 One nighbor does not like the rain wa
ter of another's caves dripping on hi
land during the spring gras seeding
! and after the same fashion Canada am
the United States do not intend To
I the victims of the overflowing orienta
q teakettle.
Thus the yellow skins appear t
I blight the eyes of the white men on tn
( plains and prairies of the West. TIL