The log cabin Democrat., 1922-02-17
American Farm Worker Not Pro-
 tected by Sugar Tariff.
LOW WAGES ARE BEING PAID
"Yankees Not Wanted" Say Field Managers in Colorado and
 Michigan.
By x. E. MILES, Chairman of the Fair Tariff 1 eaouA

" di u rev ISIOl pl Iuc IdTIll IS m OTueT. That has always been true and is now true In Congress in connection with ef- forts to enact the high rates in the Fordney s0-called Permanent Tarifr Bill.
 The farmer as well as the worker however, has come to realize that any benefit he may derive from an exorbi- tant tariff, levied in the name of pro- tection on an article which he pro- duceS is more than offset by the tribute which he must pay on arti- cles which he consumes but does not raise.
 Sugar is a good example of how this works out with reference to the farm CT. The American beet sugar industry prospered under a protective tariff d one cent pound on Cuban raw sugar. The Emergency Tariff Act increased this 60 per cent one of the arguments advanced for this tremendous increase was that the beet sugar industry need ed this protection in order 10 protect the American farm laborer engaged in raising sugar beets.
  there is very little American farm labor in the beet sugar industry as the rec ords of the Department of Labor and the Department of Agriculture show.
 Sugar beets are raised and harvested almost entirely by the cheapest grade obtainable of foreign labor. contracted for by the sugar manufacturers and tn hn
 Field bosses In the beet sugar sec tions have indeed frequently told in vestigatOrs that American labor is not wanted because "a Yankee can't stand the hard work"
 Child Labor in Majority Not only is the larger part of the beet sugar labor this low priced for against but even a larger part are the children of these foreign families
 In Colorado alone, one of the most important beet sugar states, the Ma tional Child Labor Committee found 5000 children between the ages of six and fifteen years, practically all of alien parents regularly engaged in the
 
 From the time the beets are in the ground until they are delivered at the factory the hardest kind of manual la- Dor is required And much of this is done by small children These children spend long, hard hours on their hands and knees weeding and thinning the beets. Then when the beetS are full grown they spend more long, hard hours lifting the heavy roots To their knees and with d wide sweep of a dan gerously sharp knife cut off the tops The Federal Chlldrens Bureau made an intensive study of the Colorado sit uation. Of l or included in this study seyen-tenths were the children of con tract laborers Over one-fourth of them were under ten years old. q small percentage under eight Less than one-fifth were as much sS fourteen years old. Considerably over q half ranged from nine to thirteen. From 60 to S1 per cent, according to the process in which the child was engag- ed, worked nine hours or more day. From one-seyenth to one-thrd. again varying with the process, worked eleven hours or more day The average working day for all processes was usually between nine and ten hours
 Evil Effect on Children
 Postural deformities and malposi- tions were found in 70 per cent of the children examined by the Bureaus
 
 the interference with their educa- ton Among 930 children from nine to sixteen years of age for whom school records were obtained over 40 per cent were from one to seven years below the normal grade for their age.
 The general study of the National Child Labor Committee in Colorado and Michigan indicates that these con dtions hold generally throughout the beet raising sections. A farmer who owns or leases land contracts with the sugar company to furnish a certain number of acres on which beets are 10 be grown. The company agrees to fur nixh the hand labor. The company then contracts with q laborer, usually d work on definite number of acres.
 The number of acres a laborer con tracts to care for Is based largely on the number of children he has. The labor employed In the Colorado beet fields Is practically all foreign la- bor, Mexican, Japanese and Russian. 1 The MexiCans and Japanese, however, l do not work their children as much as do the Russians. The Russian chill dren often begin work as early as four or five years of age.
 Tn Michigan conditions are very sim liar. excepting that the natlonalities of the workers are more diversified. and there are fewer Russians and Mex jeans and no Japanese. They are made up largely of Hungarians, Slavs from the small provinces, Polish and Germans. In Michigan, as in Cobra do, the beet people are exploiting the