Great Falls tribune. [volume] (Great Falls, Mont.) 1921-current, 1922-12-08
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L based on racial percentages
may be open to criticism. We
think it is. But we are of the opin-
ion that it is much better than
unrestricted immigration, and II
it is to be amended or changed we
hope that such changes will OPP
crate to further restrict the num-
Der of foreigners coming to this
country. The labor unions are OPP
posed to free immigration mainly
because they wish to restrict the
supply of labor in order to increase
the price Of labor in accord with
the law of supply and demand. The
large labor employing corpora
tions want to let the bars down
against immigration for similar
They want to depress the
price of labor by increasing the
supply. We are opposed to any
increase i'll immigration and in
favor of further restriction with
out regard to the industrial Or
political phases of the subject.
The thing that appeals to us is the
fact that we have now far too
large a proportion of aliens in II
population. They are not being
Americanized as fast as they used
to be. In all our big cities they
congregate in masses in certain
quarters of the city like colonies.
They do not mix with the native
population. Even the second gem
Grafton educated in IL schools
live, marry and die among their
own countryn1en. They preserve
their racial characteristics and
their racial traditions. They are
.hyphenated citizens. They seek to
introduce foreign questions into
American politics. A member of
the American congress in some of
our constituencies where the by
vote is heavy finds that
his attitude toward the Irish ques-
tiony the politics of Germany, or
Italy, or Russia is more important
than his attitude toward purely
American questions when it comes
to securing votes. We have too
many aliens in our electorate who
swore that they had renowned al
liegiance to some foreign power,
and yet who think and act as
though they were still citizens Of
their native land or the native
land of their parents. That is why
we favor shutting off the stream
Of alien immigrants for a generation
or two until we can digest the mass
of alien blood we have already re
ceived into our electorate.
Industrial and economic argu-
fall flat in the face of this
issue of preserving our American
ism. It may be true that we are
from a shortage of skilled
labor or of common labor as GER
tain commercial and manufacturing
organizations say. But we had
better suffer the economic
loss involved in such shortage than
to risk racial deterioration by abb
sorbing more aliens than we can
digest. The percentage system is
not ideal, but it is surely better
than unrestricted immigration. If
the law il to be amended we would
like to see some stringent investl-
CATION into the moral characteris-
tics of would be immigrants added
to the percentage restrictions.
Such Investigations should be con-
Quoted abroad by our consular Off
GERS before the immigrant sails for
our shores. We have some nomi.
nal regulations now Of that char
acter, but they do not amount TO
much and are poorly enforced. We
seek to strain out the criminals,
the insane, and the physically de-
fective among would be imrni-
grants, but moral characteristics
are mostly ignored. IF we could
have our way, permission to come
to this country and share the priv
ileges of the republic would be re-
garded as a prize, a reward of mer-
it, and something that could only
be obtained by those able and will
ing to show that they were willing
to adopt American ideals and rem
der useful service to the republic.
the feature of consular ex-
to the present percent
age plan would further restrict
immigration and improve the law.
to Send