Speech #620234534

Mr. Chairman.I will answer the gentleman by calling his attention to the finding of the Congressional Immigration Commission. for which he voted six years ago. and the finding of the Senate committee that investigated the high cost of living. The Senate committee reported after a thorough investigation that one of the contributing causes was the tremendous alien influx. There were some on that committee who concluded. and rightly too. that a high protective tariff that masqueraded under the disreputable guise of affording better wages to our workingmen had even as much if not more to do with the skyward soaring of the prices of necessities. But to answer the gentleman in kind. I will read to the House a few uninspired newspaper articles that did not have to be accompanied by any large steamship or other newspaper advertisements. First let me call attention to what the Congressional Immigration Commission found after a most searching investigation. conducted by the ablest and most talented experts of the United States Bureau of Labor that could be obtained. The facts are available. If the gentleman will just turn to his set of 42 volumes of 500 pages each. which was prepared by that official investigating body known as the Immigration Commission. he will get the truth. and it .will make him free of his present delusions. for it was therein proved. to the complete satisfaction of the nine distinguished members of that official body. that "There is an oversupply of unskilled labor in this country. as a whole. due to unrestricted immigration." There caff be no question about that fact having been established. We do not need the testimony of organized labor. which has been driven entirely out of the basic industries like steel. where. according to undeniable facts. much of the labor is in far worse slavery than any black man ever was in the South. It is so recorded in one official report after another by the Bureau of Labor and published as Senate documents.