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money under threat that if they do not pay they will be taken to jail. It is very hard for any one located here to get a hold on the people who are practicing these things, for they are combined together, and threaten the foreigners if they tell these things.

The following case, among many others, was submitted in support of this statement:

In December, 1912, a Pole was arrested for selling liquor without a license and when brought before a justice was informed that the case could be settled for $200 for the complainant, and $100 as costs for the justice. The Pole could not, or did not put up the money, and the justice was about to send him to jail, when an accomplice in the foreign exchange department of a bank made an offer to go bail for him if he would go home and bring up his bank book so that he could fix the bank account to protect him for going his bail. This was arranged, and the Pole went home but did not come back with the bank book, but went away, and was not in the county for about six months.

When this accomplice learned that the Pole had left, he and the justice between them issued a warrant for the arrest of the wife of the Pole, when the justice had no information against her then or at any other time, and placed the warrant in the hands of a member of the state constabulary who went to arrest her. The Catholic priest and railway agent at that place interceded for her, and found her handcuffed in her house waiting until train time and under the custody of the officer. The priest called up the justice on the phone and asked him whether he would not accept him as bail for her, and allow her to remain at home, as she had three young children there and no one to care for them if she was taken away. He replied that he would not accept the priest as bail, but if she would turn over her bank book to the officer she might remain at home, and if not she would have to be brought to court, and the three young children with her if necessary. She had no bank book to put up at that time, and the constabulary took her and her three small children to jail. The accomplice met them near the jail as the officer was bringing them in, and said to her, "Now you will stay in jail." This was on a Saturday evening, and they all were placed in jail and remained there until Monday some time, when he got uneasy for fear the humane agent would get to know about it, and went with a woman to the jail and proposed to take the children out and take them to the woman's house. The children cried, and then they took her and the children all out to the house of this woman, who kept a sort of restaurant in the town. Here they were kept for about two days and hounded for money or a bank account.

Naturalization. The admission to citizenship is the highest honor which this country can confer. No act should be so free from exploitation as this. The federal government has established a high standard of qualifications. But in addition to this a number of states have passed laws making the earning of a livelihood depend

ent upon naturalization or the obtainment of first papers. This immediately opens the door to graft, encourages dishonesty and makes naturalization not a high privilege but a condition precedent to going to work. This results in wholesale evasion of the law, which is a part of the early education of the newly arrived alien, whose first introduction to America is as a protected law breaker. These laws apply primarily to employees on public works and to trades in which a license is required. In New York City, this restriction has led to wholesale frauds and exchanges in licenses and there are records showing that the little Greek boys who peddle flowers have been arrested as many as five times during their first few months in the country for peddling without a license. The padroni say it is cheaper to pay fines, as they cannot get licenses. The political leaders also turn this requirement to great advantage by assisting members of their clubs to obtain first papers and licenses, thereby controlling the voters. From among many cases this is of significance:

An alien had his first papers and wanted to get his final papers. A runner and shyster lawyer offered to get them for him. He turned over his first papers and paid $5 to the lawyer and was told to deposit $9 with a saloon-keeper as a guarantee. He was taken four times to the court and the lawyer demanded his expenses paid. The alien had no money and was asked to sign a paper which he found was used afterward to collect the $9 deposited with the saloon-keeper. Five dollars more was then demanded and he signed a memorandum agreeing to pay the runner for his services as follows:

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At the time the case came to my notice he had lost his first papers, paid $14, lost several days' work, and had not obtained his papers. The extent of these frauds is colossal. Bogus naturalization societies and schools for English have been found which are covers

for "ambulance chasers," insurance schemes, and land sales. One such society had over 3,000 persons registered.

There is a bill now pending before Congress asking for a commission to take up this whole subject and recommend adjustment of the inequalities and elimination of abuses, and I doubt if there is any subject more in need of such an investigation.

It is difficult to maintain a theory of equal rights for all in the face of some of the laws which have been enacted. It were far better in my judgment to maintain a strict and consistent policy of exclusion for the protection of American laborers than to discriminate against men to whom we have opened our doors, and who do not understand this version of justice. Such are the workmen's compensation laws where aliens are specifically excluded from becoming beneficiaries, or where non-resident families may not receive more than two-thirds of the amount payable to resident families, or where the amount for aliens is limited to a maximum of $750.

On the other hand, the establishment of governmental agencies looking toward the assimilation of immigrants has been strenuously opposed as discriminating and as tending to increase immigration. The past decade has seen, however, a steady development of such agencies. One of the most important of these is the establishment by New York state of a bureau of industries and immigration, which creates in effect an immigrants' court. This has the power to make investigations, hold hearings and make adjustments. This experiment has done more to reduce the law's delays, obtain justice and fair treatment for the immigrant and maintain his faith in American freedom and justice than any other one single experi

ment.

California has recently established a commission on immigration and housing with similar powers, and Cleveland has established the first municipal agency in the form of a city immigration bureau, which takes charge of all immigrants in need of information, advice and assistance.

It is through such measures and agencies as these that the alien will finally receive the full measure of justice which should accompany his admission, and it is to these we must look for a better knowledge and administration of our laws through the minor courts which bear so important a relation to the immigrant.

THE ALIEN IN RELATION TO OUR LAWS

BY GINO C. SPERANZA,

Member of the Committee of Crime and Immigration, American Institute of Criminal Law and Criminology, New York.

A native of one country who takes up his residence in another is obviously a political and national "misfit" in his new surroundings. Such "misfit" may be temporary or permanent, partial or complete, depending on a variety of causes, subjective or objective, some of which we shall have occasion hereinafter to consider.

An alien, as such "misfit" is technically called, is "fitted" into the body-politic, more or less successfully, by the highly conventional legal method of naturalization, and into the body-national by the subtler process of assimilation.

In countries of little immigration the problem of "fitting-in" aliens is of little practical importance, except that it occasionally calls upon diplomacy and international jurisprudence to disentangle some intricate questions of conflict of laws. But in countries like ours, where every year hundreds of thousands pour in from every part of the world, where whole villages and townships of peoples, alien to our history and race, are transferred from abroad, the problem of politically and nationally "fitting in" these outsiders is one of surpassing importance.

In older countries alien residents are, at most, such a small minority that their readiness to "fit" politically into the new jurisdiction, or socially and economically into the new environment is, in most instances, an interesting rather than a practical question; they are overwhelmed by mere force of numbers.

With us, instead, the question is eminently a practical one, and as such we shall study it from two distinct points: first, that of the alien trying to "fit" into the new country, and then that of our country trying to "fit" itself to this enormous alien mass.

The disabilities of an alien in a foreign land are either historical or actual. Historically an alien, entering a foreign state, was considered, if not an enemy, at best a suspicious person. With very few exceptions he was actively discouraged from staying in the new coun

try and every obstacle was thrown in the way of his settling or owning property there. Commerce removed some of these obstacles, and international goodwill is destroying others.

The actual disabilities of aliens are due to differences between the life, customs, laws and language to which they are born and those they find in the country of emigration. They vary, practically, with each individual; they are accentuated by ignorance, inexperience, lack of courage, and profound differences in historical, political and social precedents.

All such disabilities, historical or actual, are met and their rigor attenuated in numberless ways; by culture and international exchanges, whether it be the selling of American machines for Italian marbles, or the mutual lending out of professors between universities of different countries; it is also met unofficially by benevolence, such as by immigrant and travelers' aid societies, and officially by national and international legal enactments. It is with this latter form of aid that we are here principally concerned.

The law has from ancient times recognized the disabilities of the citizen outside his native country and has endeavored to make up for them in sundry ways. The oldest of these is the creation and recognition of the consular office and the gradual development of consular law. Friendly conventions and treaties between the commercial nations of the world and the development of diplomatic and international rights and obligations added strength to the protection thrown around the alien within a foreign jurisdiction.

It should be observed here, and constantly borne in mind, that this weighty structure of protection was built up in the course of those centuries when emigration from one country to another was sporadic and exceptional. But now let us examine at close range the workings of this venerable and high-sounding mechanism in overcoming the political and actual disabilities of an alien from one of the old countries coming today into our territory.

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His government has had our official assurance by solemn treaty that he, though an alien, "shall receive the most constant protection" for his person and property. We have also recognized divers officials from his own country as accredited diplomatic or consular officers, and have guaranteed that they may have recourse to our own authorities "whether federal or local, judicial or executive in order to defend the rights and interests of their countrymen."

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