Americus times-recorder. [volume] (Americus, Ga.) 1891-current, 1912-12-05

nomist, and with accurate data to sup
port all his statements. In the Sum
mary Review" with which his book
opens, Dr.. Hourwich outlines what
he demonstrates in the remainder Of
the volume Many of the facts will be
surprising to the reader. 1t is not
/ generally known, for example, that
there was as much opposition to the
immigration of the early part of the
nineteenth century as there is to that
of today; nor that the immigrants then
coming from Great Britain and Ireland
were not considered either financially,
or otherwise, more desirable than
those coming at the present time from
Southern and Eastern Europe.
The close relationship between in
dustrial prosperity and high immigra-
ton. and between Industrial depression
and reduced immigration has often
been noted. But it remained for DR..
Hourwich to point out the very simple
fact which explains this relationship.
The immigrant comes upon the invita-
ton Of his relative already here. When
times are good this invitation is freely
extended. When times are bad not on
ly is it withheld, but, on the contrary
every reason is shown why this coun-
try is, at such a time, not a desirable
place.
The absence of relationship between
immigration and unemployment is al
so shown. Nothing can be clearer than
DR.. Hourwich's demonstration that III
the absence OF immigrant labor the
opportunity for employment would be
curtailed and, to the extent that en-
ployment exists, the unskilled work
would be done by native labor but on
/ ly at the price that unskilled labor is
worth.
/ 1t will probably be new to most
readers to learn that the average
number of days of employment for
wage-earners declines as immigration
/ increases. And he states the law of
relationship in this concise fashion
Those economic forces which produce
business expansion reduce unemploy-
ment and attract immigration; those
which produce business depression in
crease unemployment and reduce i'm
migration.
An interesting contrast is shown in
the effect of the introduction of ma
chinery upon industrial and upon farm
labor respectively. The introduction
of machinery in the factory has tended
to displace the small proprietor and
substitute the wage-earner; whereas
on the farm it has had precisely the
reverse effect, since the proprietor is
able to dispense with the wage-earner
by the introduction of a mechanical
device. Under these circumstances.
and in view of the disappearance OF
free homestead land, it is not surpris-
ing that the immigrant goes to the city
rather than to the country, and it is a
fact that there is an insistent indus
trial demand from the city and a
strong tendency to draw native Ameri-
can labor away from the farm to en-
gage in manufacturing in the city-a
tendency checked only by the immi-
grants.
The disappearance of native-born
women from mills and factories is
shown to be not due to social pref
udice against working with an immi-
grant, but to the fact that so many
new occupations have opened for wo-
men, that for every native woman of
American parentage who left the mill
or clothing factory, forty women of
the same nativity have found new OPP
enings in other directions; and the
increase in the number of native Amer
lean women in professions is nearly
five times as great as the decrease in
the number of native American factory
girls.
In considering the racial changes in
the bulk Of our immigration, we have
been apt to be unmindful of the fact
that Germany, Sweden and Denmark
have become countries of immigration,
that their own labor supply is found to
be insufficient for their requirements,
and that necessarily, since they call
for men from other lands to help them
do their work, they cannot spare their
own for purposes of emigration.
The fallacy first stated by General
Walker as to immigration preventing
the natural increase of population is
again exposed by showing that there
is no real relationship between immi-
grafton and birth-rate The birth-rate
of the Australian commonwealth,
which has practically no immigration,
has declined as rapidly as that among
Americans of native stock, and in fact
the birth--rate Of all civilized lands,
whether countries of immigration or
emigration, has been showing a steady
Cecline.
The cry that city congestion is due
to immigration is also dealt with and
shown to be unfounded. In fact, bad
! housing conditions were as common
in New York and Boston half a CEN
fury ago as they are today.