Now. we have H.R. 12759 before us providing for a straight 2year extension of Public Law 78. I think there are many reasons why this bill should be passed without amendment or without change. In the first place. in a highly industrial State like my State of Michigan. where we have a substantial amount of unemployment in our large Industrial centers from time to time. and where we still use some 8.000 or more of these Mexican contract laborers a year. our farmers have found it absolutely impossible to get reliable. skilled. trained domestic labor to perform many of these socalled stoop labor tasks involving the thinning of sugar beets. the picking of pickles. and the harvesting of cherries. apples. and so forth. from our various orchards and so forth. Of course. the committee is well aware that the Department of Labor will not certify any grower for Mexican contract labor unless all attempts to find domestic labor have been exhausted. Many times. however. our growers have been certified to use domestic labor with the result that the labor is unskilled and the particular crop is damaged. resulting in practically a total loss. or the workers will come out one day and the boys will get an hour or two of work in the sun and the next day they will not show up. or if they are temporarily laid off from the automobile plants. many times right In the middle of the crop season. and the work picks up. the boys are called back to the factories. and there goes that crop for the year. Our farmers. just like the farmers in other parts otthe country that use this Mexican contract labor. have to rely on a steady. guaranteed. skilled source of supply. and there is absolutely no way they can get it except under a continuation of this program. Mr. Chairman.
Identified stereotypes
Generalization that Mexican laborers are reliable and skilled.