Evening Star Newspaper, June 25, 1933, Page 64

—— e —— s0 maneuver as to get a controling in- terest. The poor, having only vague jdeas as to what will promote their in- terests, may permit themselves to be out- maneuvered. There is no question on which the interests of rich and poor are 8o diametrically opposed as on the question of cheap labor. The rich want it. Cham- bers of commerce pass resolutions asking for it. Manufacturers’ associations work effectually to block all plans for the elimination of cheap labor. Strange as it may seem, a great many wage workers fall into the trap and vote for the same things, or for the candidates who sup- port policies for glutting the labor mar- ket with cheap labor. Still more strange ijs the fact that many reformers, who profess great sympathy for the poor and antipathy for the rich, walk blindly into the trap and support policies which glut the labor market, reduce wages, increase unemployment and widen the gap be- tween rich and poor. Ours is a market economy. Under this economic system, whatever increases the supply of labor on the labor market will depress wages and increase unemploy- ment and poverty. Whatever decreases the supply of labor on the labor market will raise wages, decrease unemployment and improve the conditions of the working classes. There is no way of im- proving the market for anything except to increase the demand for it or decrease the supply of it. That is as true of labor as of wheat, cotton, books or pictures. Immigration of manual workers in- creases the supply of manual workers in this country. No matter what other re- forms are instituted in behalf of manual workers, they will benefit immigrant workers rather than our own so long as immigrants are free to come. They are still free to come from the Western Hemisphere and from the Philippines. Congress has not extended the quota law to these parts of the earth. They who want cheap labor have successfully blocked all efforts in that direction. Some of these objectors have demanded pro- tection for themselves in the interest of an American standard of living, and then demanded the privilege of hiring cheap labor from other countries in order to break down the American stand- ard of living. WHAT reason has any American manual worker to expect that he will gain any advantage from the re- turn of good times? If he lives on the Pacific Coast, there will be a million Filipino laborers ready and eager to come and take the jobs as soon as there are jobs to be had. They will work for less than the American expects, and they will fill the beet fields, the orchards, the vineyards and the barber shops; they will become bellboys in the hotels, por- ters on Pullman cars, butlers in wealthy families. And the Americans whom they have displaced will be left to crowd in wherever they can, and depress wages everywhere. The American worker who lives in the Southwest will have to meet the com- petition of Mexican peons. There will be millions ready and eager to come whenever there are jobs enough. They will work for less than the American ex- pects; they will become section men on the railroads; they will fill the truck farms, orchards and cotton fields of Texas, Arizona and California, and even the steel mills of Gary and Pitts- burgh. They will depress the price of cotton even to American farmers. The Americans who are completely displaced will have to crowd in wherever they can and depress wages in other parts of the country. If the American laborer lives in the Southeast, he will have to compete with West Indian Negroes. These are eager to come, and they will fill the sugar plantations, the orchards and the truck farms, leaving the Americans who are displaced to find. work wherever they can, to move northward and depress wages wherever they go. The island of Haiti is one of the most overcrowded parts of the world. The whole island is ready to swarm. It alone can send us enough laborers to glut the labor mar- ket of the southeastern section of the United States, If the American worker lves in the Northeast he must meet the competition of the French Canadians. ¥These inter- esting people have a birth rate in excess of the ability of their province to support them. They must swarm. They are willing that this country should reliexe THE SUNDAY STAR, WASHINGTON, D. C, JUNE 25 1933. e ———— them of their problem of unemployment, which is chronic. They will come in large numbers are soon as we can pro- vide them with jobs. In providing them with jobs, we shall be depriving some of our own people of an opportunity to earn a living. THE prospects are not bright for the American manual laborer. He has not much to which to look forward to- compensate him for the hardships of the present. That is, he will not have if he continues to vote for anti-restrictionists in Congress. If he continues to vote for anti-restrictionists who succeed in block- ing all attempts to restrict immigration from the Western Hemisphere and the Philippines, he will be voting for low wages or unemployment for himself. When he finds that these millions of cheap immigrant laborers are depressing his wages or causing his continued un- employment, he will have the consola- tion, if it is a consolation, of knowing that he is getting precisely what he voted for. It is not too late to remedy this situ- ation. Before good times return, before a rising tide of immigration sets in to fill the new jobs when they exist, the quota system of controlling immigration can be extended to the Western Hemi- sphere, and Filipinos can be excluded as other Asiatic immigrants are now ex- cluded. If this is done, the American working man will have something to look forward to. As employment in- creases, he will gain something to help compensate him for these lean years. By American workers we mean all those who are now here. Whether they were born abroad or have lived here for seven generations, the fact that they are here and a part of our people makes them American workers. Restriction of immigration from the Philippines and the Western Hemisphere is as much in the interest of our foreign born as of our native born workers. Yet Congress has not lifted its finger to ward off the menace of cheap labor from these sources. There have been many patriotic Congressmen who have struggled long and hard for this kind of restriction. Their efforts have been successfully blocked by those who are interested in cheap labor, which means poverty for the masses. It is said that “we” need plenty of cheap immigrant labor. Who are “we?” Certainly American wage workers do not need more cheap immigrant laborers to compete with themselves, lower their wages and take their jobs. “We” who “need” immigrant labor are the employ- ing classes and not the employed classes. If a vote were taken on the Pacific Coast on the question of restricting Filipino immigrants, there is not much doubt as to how the people would divide. Those who want cheap labor in order to in- crease their profits would vote against restriction. Those who want to see un- employment reduced and wages raised would vote for restriction. The same division would occur on the subject of restriction of Mexican, West Indian or Canadian immigration. The restriction- ists always outnumber the anti-restric- tionists, but the anti-restrictionists are very influential and thus far have suc- ceeded in blocking restrictive legislation. They know what they want, while the workers are misled into thinking that their salvation lies in other fields. WHEN the question of Chinese immi- gration was acute on the Pacific Coast, the workers, including the work- ing farmers, were for exclusion; the em- ploying classes were against it. The workers eventually won. When the question of Japanese immigration was uppermost, the same division showed itself, and the same result followed. The large employers of the East uniformly opposed the restriction of European immigration; the workers were for re- striction, and the workers won after a long struggle. It remains to be seen who will win in the next struggle. The menace of cheap labor is not only an economic menace, it is also a social menace. It tends to widen the gap be- tween classes. It was slave labor which widened the gap between the slave-hold- ing aristocracy and the working farmers of the old South. Slave labor enriched the one class and impoverished the other. It enriched the one class by reducing the cost of growing cotton and other crops. It impoverished the other class by forcing them to sell their crops in competition with those produced by cheap labor. It was not the fact that the labor was black or slave, but the fact t it was cheap that enabled it to en- rich one class and impoverish the other. Because slave labor was cheap it was impossible for a white man who had to compete with it to avoid being poor. He must have felt embittered to see his wealthy neighbor growing rich on the very thing which was impoverishing him. That would, sooner or later, have pro- duced an upheavel. It is a mistake to assume that the so- called “poor whites” of the old South were of a different race or stock from the old aristocracy. They were of the same race and stock. They were simply not in~a position to take advantage of the cheap labor of slaves. They had to compete with it. No man of any race or stock could sell his labor or the products of his labor in competition with that of such cheap labor and avoid “Panting With Excitement” By Nina Wilcox Putnam any chances on not being recognized from the back view. Small danger, however, of anybody wanting to recognize their grandmother in a PEAKING of who wears the pants in your family, how has all this stuff in the newspapers about pajamas by any other name being just as sweet af- fected your household? Up to our place the woman folks are panting like a pack of dogs on a hot day. The race is to see who can look the worst in pants the quickest. The other morning I went to the front door, looked down the road, and then yelled for Junior to come quick, the circus was in town. But on second look I found out that what I had taken to be a retreating elephant was merely Aunt Eata strolling toward the village in her new gray oxford slacks. Aunty is one of the few living women who is able to have a group-photo taken all by herself. In order to get her slacks she had to buy four pairs of pants and put ’em together and the outfit makes her look real boyish. Sister Anne has had a terrible time deciding between the long and short of the pants ques- tion, and she decided to sell short—I mean buy short. What I really mean is she come down to breakfast yesterday in what I first thought was Pa’s Summer underwear, but which Sister Anne allibied as a bicycle suit. Well, shell never wear the knees of the pants out because they are out already. And when I called her attention to the fact that she ain't got a bicycle, she answered me that these half-por- tion, demi-tasse suits was also called “play suits.” As all Sister Anne plays is the radio, I can't see why she couldn’'t play it just as easy in my old quilted bathrobe. Even Grandma has been affected by the pants craze, and “affected” is the right word. Darned if she didn’t go mp to the attic the other day, rummage in ner o0id “trunks” and come down wearing a pair of overalls she claimed she used to don when pioneering in the beer industry, way back in the early days, when beer was illegal and you had to wear an asbes- tos garment of some kind when examining the crock in the back kitchen. I believe Grandma even went so far as 10 put a board in the seat of hers, on account #a once kicked a plumber off our premises and she didn’t want to take rig like that, from any angle. But Grandma claims she was started out in life wearing pantalettes and she sees no reason for not shaking a leg along with the rest of the girls. Our lsundress come to work Monday—at least she calls it work—wearing her husband’s pants. And she told me where this new trousers style had proved a great blessing to her on account her husband laid around home all the time and didn’t really need the pants, so she was using ’em instead of buying herself a Spring dress. Also she pointed out it was now practi- cally impossible for him to continue alibing himself for not working by going out and bringing her home new washings. One of the great conveniences in having a man around the house these days is that practically any married woman can be in style without spending a penny. And I understand that the sale of two-pants suits to married men has increased & hundred per cent this Spring. In fact, the only married woman in our neighborhood who has been out of luck in this respect is Mrs. Angus Jock McPherson, and her husband come recently fra th’ bonnie ault Highlands and still wears a Kkilt. On the side of disadvantages is a story Mrs. Smith told me of where she picked up her husband’s pants while he was still asleep, went through his pockets and took $8.10 she found there, only to discover later it was her own pants she’d robbed. While another time friend Hubby went off to the city wearing her pants and in the pockets was his wages he'd given her the night before. And pants are only the half of it, if you know what I mean. The shirts and ties of many a family have become community prop- erty. Just imagine the feelings of a man who meets his wife downtown wearing his favorite tie? I know Aunty Bellum used Uncle Useless S. Grant-Jones’ favorite old tie for weeks, leaving him nothing but the new pink satin brocade tie she gave him for Christmas, and ‘the' women thought she was making a sacrifice —and so she was—a human sacrifice, I'm telling you, for I seen that gift tiel being forced down to a cheap standard of comfort. The same thing was beginning to happen on the Pacific Coast under Chi- nese immigration; but, fortunately, it did not last long enough to produce its worst results. This form of cheap labor was driving a wedge between the em- ploying and the working classes. It was enriching the one class, the builders of rallroads and other large enterprises. It was beginning to impoverish the work- ing classes by reducing their wages and increasing unemployment. It was not because this labor was Chinese, but be- cause it was cheap, that these results logically happened. Any other kind of cheap labor in equal quantities would have produced the same results. Had it not been for Chinese exclusion, or at least a rigid restriction, the Pacific Coast would soon have had its wealthy aristocracy and its poor whites. Later it would have had only Chinese. Japa- nese immigration was tending in the same direction, but that danger was also warded off. HERE is nothing in the character of Filipino, Mexican or West Indian labor to differentiate it from Negro, Chi- nese or Japanese. They are all alike in the one essential character of being cheap. Differences in culture, tradition, color or language do not change the re- sults. Since they all supply cheap labor they all produce the result of enriching those who can hire it, but impoverishing those who have to compete with it. If permitted to continue long enough they will all widen the gap between classes. They will all support a small class in aristocratic comfort and create a large class of “poor whites.” These cheap immigrant laborers from the Philippines, Mexico and the West Indies produce, also, race problems to add to our difficulties. It seems to some that we have race problems enough already. A few years ago, when Philip- pine immigrants were numerous, there were race riots in California. Earlier, when Chinese immigrants were numer- ous, there were anti-Chinese riots; later there were anti-Japanese riots. The same conditions will produce anti-Mexi- can riots. 5 There is danger that our people will be lulled into security by the small vol- ume of immigration at present. We need to look ahead to the time when there will be more employment. We need to conserve the opportunities for employment for our own people. It is not a sign of generosity to give away other people’s jobs. If we wait until a heavy tide of immigration sets in again, much injury will be done before we can get the needed legislation. If we refuse to act now because there is little immi- gration, and can't act later promptly enough to save the situation, we shall be about as wise as the Ozarkian who couldn’t put a roof on his house while it was raining and didn’'t need one when it wasn’t raining. I.F Asiatic immigration were not ex- cluded or close restricted, it would be possible, in the course of time, for hun- dreds of millions of Oriental coolies to come to our shores. Eventually they would displace our own people and make our country an Asiatic colony as our people once made it a European colony by displacing the Indians. You may say that this would be poetic justice—but who wants poetic justice meted out to his own people in that way? If that result had been permitted, some artist of the future might paint another pic- ture and called it “The End of the Trail.” Instead of an Indian on a cayuse disconsolately facing the Pacific, the whole continent behind him occupied by an alien race, his own people having been driven steadily westward to the shores of the western sea, this new pic- ture would show a Yankee in a flivver disconsolately facing the Atlantic, the continent behind him occupied by Asiatics, his own pcople having been driven steadily eastward. It is not a pleasant picture. Fortunately, that picture will never be painted, because of our exclusion of Oriental immigration. But another one, equally dismal, may be painted unless we do something to check immigration from other countries with low standards of living and high birth rates. The next step is to extend our restrictive legisla- tion to the Western Hemisphere and to exclude 'immigration from the Philip- pines.