Evening star., 1924-04-20
Capital Sidelights
BY Will y. KENNEDY.

grafton restriction bill marks the
successful issue of quarter of a
century of personal interest in
Asiatic exclusion, as well as the re-
striction OF immigration generally. In
his office today Representative Albert
Johnson of Washington state has dis
played as a trophy a small, crldely ex-
ecuted cartoon printed twenty-five years
ago in the Tacoma News. He was then
editor OF that paper and designed the
cartoon, which, under the caption
THE Human Balance of Trade" rep
resented a scales, on one pan of which
were a horde of coolies being brought
in from Japan to live as poems, and
on the other the same ship on it's re-
turn voyage, carrying American SOL
diers to the Philippines. The legend
beneath this cartoon reads: THE
flower of the United States going out
to fight and die in the Philippines and
the scum of Japan coming in"
In those days the japanese who came
to the United States were actual coolies.
|. Representative Johnson has been at
work on this problem every day since
He and Representative Raker of Cali
fornia have been on the immigration
committee for eleven years and have
done excellent teamwork all that
time. The Asiatic exclusion legisla-
ton was not a campaign issue with
them, as has been charged In fact,
ALI candidates for Congress in their
districts and all presidential candi-
oates as soon as they reached the Pa
cine coast have invariably laid stress
on the exclusion of the orientals.
Ihls legislation to do away with
the gentlemen'S agreement has been
under consideration for years. The
frst proposal of a QUESTIONABLE over
seas for aliens and entrance on a
certificate was in a bill introduced
by Representative Johnson in De
cember. 1920. and passed by the House
the same month. For that bill to
suspend immigration the Senate sub
stituted the quota proposal. The
present measure has the examination
ana certificate plan very carefully
worked out as result of constant
work by the committee since then
about three and half years.
The first suspension of immigra-
tion bill was proposed by the late
Judge Burnett after the armistice,
and II was at one time placed on the
calendar of the House but never act
ed upon by the House itself. The
Burnett bill had so many exemptions
that 1t was difficult to tell what il
would exclude. For example those
fleeing political persecution. "wheth-
er shown by. overt acts or not" That
provision alone would have let in
about one-third OF Europe. as later
Developments have demonstrated
The printed hearings on the immi-
CRATIC bill run into many volumes
and hundT eds of thousands of pagcs.
The tendency of all witnesses was to
discuss Individual cases and to go
into details, SO il is hard even for a
real student of the problem TO read
the hearings.
Out Of the discussion of the Japa-
nese question has come a new, official
government book on the subject. The
immigration committee has author
lied the publication of all of the off
cial documents between the House
committee and the Departments. of
printed in a special volume
The immigration committee has al
ready started work on a deportation
hill designed to take care of those
aliens convicted of violations Of the
narcotic and prohibition laws.
X
All his life representative Royal G.
Johnson Of South Dakota has been
interested in boys camps. Travelling
back and forth to his home in Aber-
deem he makes the trip by automobile
camping along the way with his two
sons
This week he is taking some fifty
Boy Scouts for a five-day camping
trip to the marine headquarters at
are the sons and grandsons of mem
bers of Congress. A feature of the
camp will be lectures on battles of
the world war, with officers who were
with Representative Johnson in these
battles overseas giving the boys a
first-hand account OF those momen-
touS events in history.
The Boy Scouts will have explained
TO them the. French IS gun, aircraft,
automatic rifles and such and such
Instruments of practical warfare.
They Will see the crack marine team
work out on the rifle range for. the
Olympic games.
Later in the summer Representa-
tive johnson will conduct another
camp on the shores of the historic
Potomac
The National Museum will before
long be presented with some of the
hnest exhibits of horns of the prac-
tically extinct Texas longhorns which
are now displayed in the office OF
| Representative Quinn Williams of
Texas One pair of horns measures
Z feet inches from tip to tip and
| the other more than 6 feet. They
came off cattle that ranged on the
| Rio Grande in the SOS, one of them off
| a steer seven years old and another
nine years old.
Representative Williams has ALWAYS
been a stockman and specialized in
| kaAnin0 wi
He is the only member of the Texas
delegation in Congress who is not q
! lawyer
Thirteen is the lucky number for
! Representative Williams. There are
thirteen letters in his name, he rep
resents the thirteenth congressional
| district, was elected on the thirteenth th
| day of the month and beat his com
| bfned opposition by more than 1,30C
votes.
| Representative Henry p. Rainey
whose bushy whitened locks and mag
nificent physique make him a con-
spicuous figure in the House and who
IS one of the most popular chautau-
qua orators in Congress, was the
champion boxer of his college and
can still go a fast bout He was train
ed by the Dole Brothers both OF
whom were lightweight champions
He graduated from the same college
as President Coolidge. Attorney Cen
| eral Stone and Speaker GiIlett. Am
herst College.
! Representative Rainey was an all
around athlete in his college days, and
| when at home. on his farm. just out.
| side of Carrollton, Ill, keeps up ex-
ercise by riding horseback. Represent
ative Rainey has departed from the
usual losing methods of farming and
j adantnd nrnfta hle r,aeth ndS liz raiso.