Speech #620291714

The gentleman is correct in his assertion. It is only another proof that literacy is not a synonym for good citizenship and that a man who is industrious will make a better citizen than a man who has a smattering of knowledge but who is not industrious or of good moral character. But the authors of the bill want ibhe immigrant excluded because he keeps down American wages and lowers the American standard of living. A good many of those who urge this charge never before evinced such a tender solicitude for the wages of the American workingman. and it is to be regretted they did not have time to consult the statistics on the subject from which they would with certainty learn that wages in this country are highest In those places where immigration is heaviest and lowest in localities where immigration is usost sparse. It Is not the honest hardworking illiterate laborer that the American workingman has reason to fear. but the prisonmade products that come from the skilled hands of those who could always pass a literacy test. But it appears that some of the immigrants after working here a certain period return to their own country and thus carry with them a portion of the countrys wealth. Is not this argument directly fatal to the charge that he disturbs wages in America? The truth is that he remains here while work is plentiful and then departs when it is scarce. So. therefore. the head and front of the poor Immigrants offending consists in yielding to an admirable natural sentiment to visit the home of his fathers. Dear. dear. how dreadful I But how about our own precious selfexpatriated plutocrats. who carry out millions they never earned to enable them to live in foreign lands amid more agreeable European society? How about the fortunes with which they dower their daughters to make them eligible in marriage to scions of foreign nobilityfortunes spent in discharging mortgages and repairing the estates of gentlemen who could probably pass a literacy test. but not Invariably a character test? There is this difference between the two classes that go out. When the immigrant returns he carries with him and spreads the grateful story of Americas grandeur and goodness to all who live beneath the flag and causes America to be cherished in the hearts of the worlds millions. When the plutocrat goes abroad. if ever we hear about him. it is generally in making among his new neighbors some obsequious reference in disparagement of America as compared to the land lie then lives in. No. we should not restrict immigration. We need the immigrant here. We can easily assimilate him and there is plenty of room to receive him. The present immigration laws are more tian stringent enough to keep out unworthy applicants for residence. They are a more than sufficient sifting process and will keep out all undesirables If the gatekeepers of the country properly enforce them. If. perchance. a small number of unworthy immigrants have found entrance. it. was owing to the lax enforcement of the laws. the remedy for which is not restriction. It is unjust to attempt to shut off the entire stream of foreign population merely because a small and impure rivulet trickles through. The safety of this country demands that the supply should be drawn from different sources. whereby the various nationalities are blended and a high type of physical strength comblued with Intellectual and moral excellence is obtained. This alone would give us an ideal American citizenship. No country ever did or ever could succeed in this policy of exclusion. This was attempted by China when. lured by the siren cry of " China for the Chinese." she raised prohibition barriers against immigration and severed all voluntary relations with the outside world. From then onward the star of her career steadily waned. A similar fate would befall us if ever. in an evil moment. we should adopt the policy insisted upon by the oriental sagacity of the advocates of this bill. America owes to the immigrant too great a debt to be repudiated by restriction. He has been closely identified with her history in the most perilous as well as the most prosperous periods of her history. The future welfare and supremacy of this country will depend in no small part on her immigrant citizen. and to now close the avenues of the country against his entrance would be in the highest degree ungrateful and unwise.