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object to such a measure is a mystery; for the countrymen of those who would be chiefly excluded under such a bill are, as a rule, not voters, and take little interest in this country except as a place in which to earn more money than they could at home. The Germans and Scandinavians have practically no illiteracy, and immigrants of these races, therefore, would not be affected by the measure.

I have spoken of the certainty and precision of this test regarding the matter of admission; but there is another advantage about it which I have not seen mentioned hitherto, namely, as helping the identification of immigrants who come in violation of law. Some of these may possibly learn to read and write after being here some little time; but they must either learn within a year after coming in or run a great risk. For, upon applying to a hospital or an almshouse, or upon being brought to trial in any court, the test could be applied then and there, and the fact established whether the immigrant came, through Canada, for example, in violation of law, so as to be liable to deportation.

It is to be hoped, therefore, that before long Congress may find time to give this subject the attention it deserves. Every year of delay means an additional expense to the community, by reason of the numbers of the unfit who now find an entrance, and who increase our expenses for police, prisons, hospitals, law courts, almshouses, and private charity.

But, while most students of the immigration question agree that an educational test is a very desirable addition to the present laws, there are several other measures which need attention. These may

be roughly divided into two classes: first, those designed to prevent deception and evasion on the part of immigrants; and, second, those tending to increase the efficiency of the inspection. There is not space to discuss in detail all the suggestions which have been made along these lines, so I shall take up only a few of the more important Under the first head come:

ones.

(1) Additional information on the manifests to show how often the immigrant had been here before, how much money he had taken away on each return home, by whom passage had been paid, etc.

(2) Giving officials the power to administer oaths and take testimony; making all false evidence at any stage of the inspection process perjury; devising some practical punishment for the frequent perjury known already to exist; and preventing and punishing the "coaching" of immigrants.

(3) Extending the contract labor laws to cover cases where the contract is not complete before landing and to punish the soliciting of persons to come.

Under the head of increasing the efficiency of the service may be mentioned:

(1) Power to debar anarchists and suspicious characters unless they can establish their good character.

(2) Extending to two or three years the period within which public charges may be returned, and including in this arrangement all those who within the period fall into the present excluded classes of immigrants. Inasmuch as there is now no express provision for the deportation at any time of some of these classes of persons, such a provision is implied in the above. Thus, those who become insane or are convicted of crime within three years after landing should be deported quite as much as those who come upon the state for support; and in the case of the latter the mere becoming a public charge should be a ground for deportation, whereas at present the government is obliged to show that the pauperism is due to causes existing before admission. It has been suggested that an order of court might be obtained for such deportations. This would guard against hardship; but, considering the expense and delay of legal proceedings, it is a question whether an executive order of the Commissioner-General of Immigration or the Secretary of the Treasury would not be more practicable, if proper power to enforce it were given.

We come now to the most important reforms:

(3) The matter of uniformity in respect to decisions upon appeals to Washington regarding the exclusion of immigrants. It is obvious that inspection cannot fail to become lax when an appeal from the decision of the board of special inquiry excluding an immigrant is at one time sustained and at another time reversed on practically the same state of facts. In the customs service, in all departments where civil law governs, there is some consistency and uniformity in the rulings; but in this branch of the service there has been no clear and intelligible evolving of the principles of decisions.

(4) There are few branches of government depending so largely as does our immigration inspection upon the individual discretion of the lowest grade of the service. The credibility of the immigrant, the question whether he is likely to become a public charge within a year after landing, and countless other matters, involving not merely a thorough knowledge of foreign languages and dialects, but also a

keen and judicial habit of mind, are passed upon finally as to over 85 per cent of all immigrants by inspectors who receive only $1,200 per year. The interpreters who are essential in the examination of a large portion of immigration are paid only $1,000 per year, or just one-half of what is paid to court interpreters in New York city.

The private watchmen who guard the material interests of the people in the large buildings of our cities are well paid. Should not the public watchmen who guard the nation's doors be adequately compensated and be the best men that can be obtained? The needed change can be easily brought about by increasing the head-tax from $1 to $2, which would not be an excessive burden either upon the steamship companies or the immigrants; and such an increase would provide for additional inspectors along the Canadian frontier. The need of better inspectors at higher salaries was fully brought out in the testimony before the United States Industrial Commission, which recently examined some twenty-two witnesses on the subject of immigration.

These are some of the problems of immigration at the present day. The tide is again setting toward our shores, which proves that industrial depression, and not the Act of 1893, was responsible for the falling off in numbers from 1896 to 1898. Whenever business conditions are favorable in this country immigration increases. It is, therefore, desirable to make the law as perfect as possible before the number reaches another maximum. The people, regardless of political parties, demand an efficient and thorough regulation of immigration. Congress at the coming session should make this demand effective. PRESCOTT F. HALL.

THE NEW CONGRESSIONAL APPORTIONMENT.

ON June 1, 1900, the Census Office announced the population of the United States as 76,295,220. This includes the population of the States, the Territories, the District of Columbia, Alaska, and Hawaii, but not of Porto Rico or the Philippines. It includes all human beings in the country; thus differing from previous statements of the population, which included what is commonly regarded as the "constitutional population" only. Since the determination of who are to be included in the constitutional population may become an interesting and somewhat complicated question, the Census Office evidently prefers that Congress shall decide it rather than assume the responsibility itself.

I propose to point out, in the course of this article, some of the possible differences between the gross population and the constitutional population.

The primary purpose of making an enumeration of the constitutional population is to determine the representation in the lower house of Congress and the number of presidential electors. The Territories and the District of Columbia have no representation in the lower house, nor do they take part in the election of a President; therefore, their population may be excluded from consideration. This restricts the number under consideration to the population of the States.

The Constitution expressly provides that Indians "not taxed" shall not be included in the representative population. This provision is in the following terms in the Constitution, Article I, section 2:

"Representatives and direct taxes shall be apportioned among the several States which may be included within this Union according to their respective numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the whole number of free persons, including those bound to service for a term of years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three-fifths of all other persons.'

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The meaning of this expression is not clear, but it has been generally construed to signify that Indians upon reservations or under tribal relations are not to be regarded as of the constitutional population;

and it has been practically construed accordingly in recent censuses. Indians found living among the whites off of reservations and those who have taken lands in severalty have been included in the constitutional population, while those living upon reservations have been excluded. Exception has been made, however, in the case of the Pueblo Indians of New Mexico, who have been regarded as citizens by the tenth and eleventh censuses, and of the Moqui Indians of Arizona and the Mission Indians of California, in the tenth census. These exceptions were made in accordance with the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo with Mexico, under which all Mexican citizens in the annexed territory were accepted as United States citizens. No other classes have been heretofore excluded from representation, except two-fifths of the slaves, as above described.

The total number of Indians not taxed living in the States in 1900 was only 44,617. These were scattered among twelve States, the largest number in any one State being 10,932 in South Dakota. Montana had 10,746, New York 4,711, and North Dakota 4,692, those in the other States being much fewer in number. As will be seen, the reduction in population on account of Indians not taxed is trifling, not being sufficient in any State to affect the number of representatives.

In 1890 there was in the country a large class of non-constitutional population which was included within the constitutional population without apparent question. These were aliens - people owing allegiance to other governments, but residing in this country. That this class should not be included in the constitutional population requires no argument, since it is self-apparent. The number of aliens in the country in 1890 was large, the males of voting age numbering 1,189,452. Assuming that the alien family was as numerous as that of the average of foreign birth, the total number of aliens, including women and children, numbered about 2,500,000. While the number may be somewhat reduced at present, owing to a diminution in the immigration during the past ten years, it is probably not greatly lessened, and doubtless still forms a considerable element of the population. The distribution of the aliens followed that of the foreign born very closely. Nearly four-fifths of them, 79 per per cent, were in the Northern States, i. e., north of Mason and Dixon's line, the Ohio River, and the south boundary of Missouri and Kansas; 15 per cent of them were found in the Western States, i. e., those of the Rocky Mountains and the Pacific coast; while

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