III THE PROTECTION OF THE LABORER AGAINST COMPETITION 1From one point of view all labor legislation has as its object the protection of the laborer as a competitor. The wage-bargaining power of men is weakened by the competition of women and children, hence a law restricting the hours of women and children may also be looked upon as a law to protect men in their bargaining power. The same is true in a different way of industrial education and free schools, for they tend to reduce the competition for the poorly paid jobs by increasing the efficiency and wage-earning power of laborers who otherwise would be serious competitors. But for these classes of legislation the protection of the laborer as a competitor is not the main object. There are two classes of legislation, however, of which it may be said that the main purpose has been to protect the American workman from competition of poorly paid laborers: (1) legislation on immigration, especially the laws against induced immigration and the Chinese exclusion laws; (2) legislation as to the sale of goods manufactured by convicts. A. FROM ALIEN LABOR "There are four protective purposes which are served by immigration legislation. The first is the social protection of the community generally. . . A second kind of protection [is] that of the national health. . . A third type of excluded class is made up of those persons who are looked upon as constituting a danger to the tax-paying classes. . . . The fourth kind of protection put forth by the law over the people of this country is, from the standpoint of labor legislation, the most important. The contrast between the protection afforded to American 1 1 Reprinted from The Principles of Labor Legislation by Commons and Andrews by permission of the publishers, Harper & Bros., 1920 ed., pp. 68-69. 2 Reprinted from The Principles of Labor Legislation by Commons and Andrews by permission of the publishers, Harper & Bros., 1920 ed., pp. 69-76. 53 goods in the commodity market and the lack of any such effort to lessen the competition of labor in the labor market was early noticed, and efforts have been made since 1868 to control immigration after the example of the tariff. . . . After the first quarter of the nineteenth century indentured labor had practically ceased to exist; but in 1864 a stimulus was given (owing to the war-time scarcity of labor) to a similar system of bringing numbers of Europeans here to work under contract, by a law3 which provided that such contracts should be valid and enforceable in the United States courts. In spite of agitation in Congress and feeling in the country, it was not until 1868 that this act was repealed, nor until 1885 that the inducement of immigration was formally forbidden by law. . . . . The contract labor law of 1885 forbade the assistance or encouragement of immigrants coming here under contract to work. . . . Another immigration act was passed in 1891, which had as one of its objects the prevention of induced immigration. The government was beginning to make it more difficult for a man who had previously obtained work to come into the United States. Transportation companies were now forbidden to solicit or encourage immigration, and the practice of issuing advertisements in foreign countries promising employment here was prohibited. ... A later revision of the contract labor law was made in the general immigration act of 1917.8 . . . That laws against induced immigration, although in force for thirtyfive years, have done very little to protect the American laboring man from the competition of immigrants is evident from two facts: the enormous numbers of unskilled laborers who have since entered the United States, and the efforts that were constantly being made to secure other means, notably a literacy test, for creating a "labor protective tariff." No doubt race feeling enters to some extent into the composition of laws excluding Chinese, Japanese, and Hindus; but more deep-lying is the fear of the competitive worker. · ... It was this agitation by the people on the Pacific Coast, who had learned to fear the industrial competition of the Chinese, that led to 3 United States, Laws 1864, C. 246. 4 United States, Laws 1885, C. 164. 5 United States, Laws, 1891, C. 551. 6 • United States, Laws 1916-1917, C. 29. [See Sec. 1, infra.] federal legislation and finally to the exclusion of the Chinese laborers. The British self-governing colonies have found in the literacy test a weapon against Asiatic immigration. In this country a long struggle was made to apply to all immigrants a test of this kind, succeeding in 1917 over the Presidential veto which had three times defeated earlier Congressional action in this direction. 7 I. IMMIGRANTS SECTION 3. That the following classes of aliens shall be excluded from admission into the United States: Persons hereinafter called contract laborers, who have been induced, assisted, encouraged, or solicited to migrate to this country by offers or promises of employment, whether such offers or promises are true or false, or in consequence of agreements, oral, written or printed, express or implied, to perform labor in this country of any kind, skilled or unskilled; persons who have come in consequence of advertisements for laborers printed, published, or distributed in a foreign country. . . . . The provision next foregoing, however, shall not apply to persons of the following status or occupation: Government officers, ministers or religious teachers, missionaries, lawyers, physicians, chemists, civil engineers, teachers, students, authors, artists, merchants, and travelers for curiosity or pleasure, nor to their legal wives or their children under sixteen years of age who shall accompany them or who subsequently may apply for admission to the United States, but such persons or their legal wives or foreign-born children who fail to maintain in the United States a status or occupation placing them within the excepted classes shall be deemed to be in the United States contrary to law, and shall be subject to deportation as provided in section nineteen of this Act. That after three months from the passage of this Act, in addition to the aliens who are by law now excluded from admission into the United States, the following persons shall also be excluded from admission thereto, to wit: All aliens over sixteen years of age, physically capable of reading, who can not read the English language, or some other language or dialect, including Hebrew or Yiddish: Provided, That any admissible alien, or any alien heretofore or hereafter legally admitted, or any Section 3 and sections 5-8 of the Immigration Act of Feb. 5, 1917. 39 Stat. L. 875. citizen of the United States, may bring in or send for his father or grandfather over fifty-five years of age, his wife, his mother, his grandmother, or his unmarried or widowed daughter, if otherwise admissible, whether such relative can read or not; and such relative shall be permitted to enter. . . . The following classes of persons shall be exempt from the operation of the illiteracy test, to wit: All aliens who shall prove to the satisfaction of the proper immigration officer or to the Secretary of Labor that they are seeking admission to the United States to avoid religious persecution in the country of their last permanent residence, whether such persecution be evidenced by overt acts or by laws or governmental regulations that discriminate against the alien or the race to which he belongs because of his religious faith; all aliens who have been lawfully admitted to the United States and who have resided therein continuously for five years and who return to the United States within six months from the date of their departure therefrom; all aliens in transit through the United States; all aliens who have been lawfully admitted to the United States and who later shall go in transit from one part of the United States to another through foreign contiguous territory: Provided, That nothing in this Act shall exclude, if otherwise admissible, persons convicted, or who admit the commission, or who teach or advocate the commission, of an offense purely political; . . . .: Provided further, That skilled labor, if otherwise admissible, may be imported if labor of like kind unemployed can not be found in this country, and the question of the necessity of importing such skilled labor in any particular instance may be determined by the Secretary of Labor upon the application of any person interested, such application to be made before such importation, and such determination by the Secretary of Labor to be reached after a full hearing and an investigation into the facts of the case: Provided further, That the provisions of this law applicable to contract labor shall not be held to exclude professional actors, artists, lecturers, singers, nurses, ministers of any religious denomination, professors for colleges or seminaries, persons belonging to any recognized learned profession, or persons employed as domestic servants: Provided further, That whenever the President shall be satisfied that passports issued by any foreign Government to its citizens or subjects to go to any country other than the United States, or to any insular possession of the United States or to the Canal Zone, are being used for the purpose of enabling the holder to come to the continental territory of the United States to the detriment of labor conditions therein, the Presi dent shall refuse to permit such citizens or subjects of the country issuing such passports to enter the continental territory of the United States from such other country or from such insular possession or from the Canal Zone: Provided further, That aliens returning after a temporary absence to an unrelinquished United States domicile, of seven consecutive years, may be admitted in the discretion of the Secretary of Labor, and under such conditions as he may prescribe: Provided further, That nothing in the contract-labor or reading-test provisions of this Act shall be construed to prevent, hinder, or restrict any alien exhibitor, or holder of concession or privilege for any fair or exposition authorized by Act of Congress, from bringing into the United States, under contract, such otherwise admissible alien mechanics, artisans, agents, or other employees, natives of his country as may be necessary for installing or conducting his exhibit or for preparing for installing or conducting any business authorized or permitted under any concession or privilege which may have been or may be granted by any such fair or exposition in connection therewith, under such rules and regulations as the Commissioner General of Immigration, with the approval of the Secretary of Labor, may prescribe both as to the admission and return of such persons: Provided further, That the Commissioner General of Immigration with the approval of the Secretary of Labor shall issue rules and prescribe conditions, including exaction of such bonds as may be necessary, to control and regulate the admission and return of otherwise inadmissible aliens applying for temporary admission: Provided further, That nothing in this act shall be construed to apply to accredited officials of foreign Governments, nor to their suites, families, or guests. SEC. 5. That it shall be unlawful for any person, company, partnership, or corporation, in any manner whatsoever, to prepay the transportation or in any way to induce, assist, encourage, or solicit, or attempt to induce, assist, encourage, or solicit the importation or migration of any contract laborer or contract laborers into the United States, unless such contract laborer or contract laborers are exempted under the fifth proviso of section three of this act, or have been. imported with the permission of the Secretary of Labor in accordance with the fourth proviso of said section, and for every violation of any of the provisions of this section the person, partnership, company, or corporation violating the same shall forfeit and pay for every such offense the sum of $1,000, which may be sued for and recovered by |