Speech #620267108

I will not yield further until I have finished. It is for the reasons enumerated that I would favor almost complete exclusion of foreign immigration. If it were possible to select immigrants in the line of the most enlightened policy. I should favor selecting them from nations that are most likely to blend in with our social system and to appreciate our democratic idealspeople whose history has shown them to be inherently capable of selfgovernment. Personally. I should vastly prefer. as an immigrant. an illiterate from one of these nations to the best educated Hindoo or Turkthis. as a national matter and not on the ground of any personal prejudice. But as one meansof curbing the introduction of more immigrants than our national digestion can assimilate. I shall gladly vote for the literacy test. There is one argument for this test that justifies its application. It is the ignorance of our foreign immigrants that has been chiefly responsible for their exploitation. Those capable of passing a literacy test would be less likely to lie down under the conditions that have been shown to exist in some of our centers of hothouse industry. Another point was raised here about the influence of immigrants on the cost of living. There is no question in the world but what the bad distribution of population. especially the increase in the cities. is largely responsible for the increased cost of food. There are too many people eating and too few people producing food. Inasmuch as a vast proportion of our immigration lodges in the cities. those immigrants certainly have a great influence on the cost of living as found in the prices of food. The tremendous and ultimate importance of the food supply is shown in the history of the ancient city nations which went to pieces from the fact of their being forced to seek food supplies by war. to introduce oppression and slavery that overgrown cities might be fed.