Speech #620021334

Mr. Chairman. If they want to protect the American laborer. why is it they did not make the Immigrant Bureau selfsustaining by placing a head tax of not less than $10 per head upon every alien entering into the United States? Would that not be better than taxing the laboring people of this country $2.000.000 per annum to meet a deficit in this department? They have been so eager to bring this " pauper labor." as they so pertly term it. into this country that they have actually failed to make it pay its own expenses. and they tax the industrial toiler to maintain a department established for taking bread and meat out of the mouths of his wife and children. I ask them again. Why have they failed to build a tariff wall around the brain. the muscle. the intelligence and the patriotism of the Americanborn industrial toiler. who loves his flag next to his child. who worships freedom next to his God. and who. when his country Is imperiled by an attack from without. leaves his toil. leaves his wife. leaves his child. and shoulders his gun to fight the battles of his country while their tariff barons are being treated for the gout at Carlsbad or are cruising in their palatial yachts upon the silvery waters of the Mediterranean Sea? By their love for the American toiler they have made It possible by combinations between American industries and the steamship companies for this "pauper labor" to land on our shores at from $8 to $60 cheaper than in any country in the world. Talk about protecting the American industries from the "pauper labor " in Europe when they are using the same sort of labor here that the foreign manufacturer is using there [applause on the Denmocratic side]. and to prove this I submit a report from the Census Bureau showing the foreign popula. tion of the States in which these manufacturing industries were founded and fostered: Table of foreign born. etc. [Census 1900. Vol. I.] Percentage White Total for- of popu0 latiofo-. Foreign poulation egn or Total pop- or horn oreigu and ofor- eign born for- u ilation.eg br (exxxi). parentage eignborn and of for(p. 698). parentage. eignborn parentage. Massachusetts ........ 846.324 897. 386 1.743.710 2.805.346 62.1 Rhode Island ........ 134.519 140.292 274.811 428.556 64.1 Connecticut .......... 238.210 282. 245 520.455 908.420 57.3 New York ........... 1.900.425 2. 415.845 4.316.270 7.268.894 59.3 New Jersey .......... 431.831 556.291 988.125 1.883.669 52.4 Pennsylvania ........ 985.250 1.430.028 2.415.278 6.302.115 38.3 It will be seen by the table which I submit that Massachusetts has 1.743.710 persons foreign born or of foreignborn parentage out of 2.805.346 total population. having therefore 62.1 per cent of people who are foreign born or of foreignborn parentage. Rhode Island. in like manner. has 64.1 per cent of its population foreign born or of foreignborn parentage. Connecticut has 57.3 per cent of foreign born or of foreignborn parentage. New York has 59.3 per cent of its people foreign born or of foreignborn parentage. New Jersey has 52.4 per cent of its population foreign born or of foreignborn parentage. thus disclosing in the completest manner the extent to which this use of foreign labor has driven out the American. I Duns Review. 2 Bureau of Labor. This table illustrates the policy of the Republicans toward the American wage earner.