United labor bulletin., 1911-02-02
FOREIGN IMMIGRATION
A MENACE TO FREE LABOR.
Continued from Page ~

would make the least desirable citizens.
THE following methods or restricting
immigration have been suggested:
'(a) The exclusion of those unable to
read or write in some language.
"(b) The limitation of the number of
each race arriving each year to certain
percentage of the average of that race
arriving during given period of years.
'(c) The exclusion of unskilled labor
ers unaccompanied by wives or families
''(d) The limitation of the number of
immigrants arriving annually at any
port
''(e) The material increase in the
amount of money required to be in the
possession of the immigrant at the port
of arrival.
"CD The material increase of the head
tax.
"(g) The levy of the head tax so as to
make marked discrimination in favor
of men with families.
"All these methods would be effective
in one way or another in securing re-
strictions in greater or less degree. A
majority of the Commission favor the
reading and writing test as the most
feasible single method of restricting un-
desirable immigration"
The Commission also makes the fol-
lowing points in it's report:
Further general legislation concern
ing the admission of aliens should be
based primarily upon economic or busi-
ness considerations touching the pros
perity and economic well-being of our
people.
The development of business may be
brought about by means which lower the
standard of living of the wage-earners
ALIENS convicted of serious crimes
within period of five years after ad-
mission should be deported
so far as practicable the immigration
laws should be so amended as to be
made applicable to alien seamen.
Amy alien who becomes a public
charge within three years after his ar
rival in this country should be subjected
to deportation"
The Commission also believes that in
order ito protect the immigrant against
exploitation, to discourage sending saw
ings abroad, to encourage permanent res
idence and naturalization, to secure bet
ter distribution of alien immigrants
throughout the country" the States
should enact laws strictly regulating i'm
migrant banks and employment agencies,
and that aliens who attempt to persuade
immigrants not to become American cit
iZens should be made subject to deporta-
ton, and that the Division of Information
should cooperate with the States desir-
ing immigrant settlers.
At the recent st. Louis Convention of
the American Federation of Labor the
President in his report called the atten-
tion of the delegates to the fact that
veritable flood of bills designed to check
immigration had been introduced in the
last session of Congress, and the report
of the Executive Council on the Presi-
dents report expressed the hope that
this flood of bills and the work of the
immigration Commission would result
'in the enactment of legislation which
will protect the workers in this country
from the unfair competition resulting
from indiscriminate immigration"
On behalf of American labor, It is to
be said that the action of the trade
unions in this country on this most deli
cate international question involves a
step that touches the heart OF every man
contemplating it. That step. the advo-
cacy of exclusion, is not prompted by any
foreign brothers. We disayow for
American organized labor the holding OF
any vulgar or unworthy prejudices
against the foreigner. We recognize the
noble possibilities in the poorest OF the
children of the earth who come to us
from European lands. We know that
their civilization is sufficiently near our
own to bring their descendants in one
generation up to the general level of the
best American citizenship. 1t is not on
account of their assumed inferlority. or
through any pusillanimous contempt for
their abject poverty, that, most reluc-
family. the lines have been drawn by
Americas workingmen against the in
discriminate admission of aliens to this
country 1t is simply case of the self
preservation of the American working
classes. Changes are constantly going
on in Europe for the uplift of the men of
labor, and it can well be believed that
each country in Europe is in position to-
day to solve its own labor questions In
the way best for itself. A fact now OBJ
vious to labor in this country Is that
American labor and European labor have
both been made the subject OF a colossal
bunco game played by avaricious ex-
ploiters of the poor The sounding phrase
protection to American labor" has of
recent years been standing insult to
the intelligence of American wage-earn-
ers, with millions upon millions OF new
corners arriving here through promoted
immigration. Considering the opportuni-
ties now existing in Europe for the ad-
vance OF the working classes the net
gains to be made on the whole by Euro
pean immigrants to this country at the
present time are to be questioned The
manifold acute sufferings of immigrants,
their sacrifices to enable them to come
to America, the trials of the ocean voy-
age, the discouragements In seeking
work in the United States-in getting a
foothold In the wage-working ranks, in
the oppression they suffer at the hands
of employers. and in their sickness and
death rate-all these drawbacks serve to
counterbalance much of whatever sue
cess may at last come to them. OF the
30 to 40 per cent of the immigrants who
return to Europe, an enormous number,
go back, by the evidence of the Commis-
sion, defeated, disheartened. ruined.
It is not necessary here to dilate on
many of the nhuman features of immi
grafton, statements as to which have
been so hotly disputed in the many arti-
cles published in American periodicals
in recent years. Suffice 1t to say that
the Immigration Commissions Report in
its summary gives reason to believe that
the most sensational charges against