No. the question submitted by the gentleman from Massachusetts. as I understood. was that there was a provision in the old law that the consul was to have something to do with the inspection of the immigrants. whereas I said it was simply to swear to the manifest. and he has found that the officer of a vessel must also swear to its inspectioh. but it is not different from my idea. The consul under the old law has nothing to do with the immigrants that come to the country. therefore it is a new proprosition. The gentleman states that this is in the interest of economy and is simply a business proposition. When asked by the gentleman from New York if the consul could make the necessary medical examination of the immigrants who are about to sail. his reply was that the consul could get as good doctors over there as they could on this side. Why. Mr. Chairman. this country does not wish to trust the foreign inspection of the immigrants coining to this country. We want the inspection of our own physicians. upon whom we can absolutely rely. I cast no disparagement on those physicians in foreign lands. but we know we can trust our own people. I ask the gentleman to consider what would be the expense to this country of having these immigrants examined by the consul abroad and the staff that he would be obliged to have around him. He would be obliged to have a doctor. Then he would need also an expert in criminology. such as we have on this side. At each port of departure there would need to be a complete staff. such as we have at our leading ports. in order to examine these immigrants. * Now. wherein lies the difference in expense? At our ports we have steamers arriving at a single port almost daily from all the different countries. If such an examination were attempted at the foreign port. it would be necessary to have these expensive arrangements where probably there would be a sailing only once a week.
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