The Birmingham age-herald., 1923-07-28
SANITY IN IMMIGRATION

Chicago Journal of Commerce) The Southland is awakening to the urgency of sanity In the con- sideration of new immigration laws by the next congress. A ma jority of the industrial states of the North have long been aware of the seriousness of this problem. Perhaps it Is not too much to hope that the two sections will join forces in the next congress and give us Americanization in immi- grafton laws. In the immigration problem the South faces a double dilemma. Not only does the acute labor shortage of the North rob the South of it's natural labor sup ply, but 1t creates labor shortage in the South. Never before in the history of this country has there been so great development of sane thinking in the matter of immigration as has occurred in recent months. Every day there seems to be greater reason to be- lieve that congress will let down the bars on immigration, and yet take initial steps toward the rais- ing of an unassailable wall against the undesirable immigrant who has cheapened labor, brought discredit and disgrace upon 1t, absorbed our substance without giving service or fealty in return, and constituted a genuine menace to American institutions.
 Thus far no great agency has dared to do more than temporize with the situation. Perhaps tenn porizing will be better than doing nothing at all None has dared to propose that we absolutely refuse admission to the nationals of countries that have furnished us with the lowest type of immigrant. There is reason to hope, however, that this sort of immigrant will be so hampered by legislation and re- strictive rules that his numbers will be materially reduced, while real effort is made to induce immigration of the Nordic peoples and to encourage the selection of desirable persons who may be in- vited to accept Americanism.
 In the hundred years ended with 1922. there were admitted to this country almost exactly 35,000,000 immigrants, of whom more than 13,0OO,000 came from countries which, with very rare exceptions, have furnished us none that has contributed anything to this coun- try and almost all who bled 1t of it's substance and undermined its foundations. It will not be sur prising to know that a majority of those 13,000,000 undesirables ar rived in this country in the last ten years of the century under discussion. In the previous ninety years they had been a negligible minority in our immigration; in the past ten years they have been a threatening majority.
 Figures recently collected by the Carnegie Research Bureau show that of foreign born popu- lation of nearly 14,000,000 in 1920, S,500,000 may fairly be rated be- low the average and below a safe minimum in fundamental intelli- gence. The experience of the army in It's personnel survey showed that In the group classi fled as very inferior" were to be found fifteen per cent. of the for eign born persons In army service. These figures cannot be accepted as an indictment of the foreign born by and large, since this country is entirely composed of immigrants In the last analysis and owes all its greatness to pill grims from foreign countries. En- tire justice Is done to the decent and worth while immigrant when we say that 456 per cent. of the "very inferior" persons examined by army officials came from five nations in the South and East Of Europe and one in Asia, which have furnished us practically all the radical ingrates who consti- tute the only important racial problem in this country today.