DISCRETIONARY AUTHORITY GRANTED OFFICIALS.

The most striking feature of the Canadian immigration law, and the one in which it differs most widely from the United States law, is its flexibility, or adaptability to emergencies or changed conditions. The Canadian law confers almost unlimited power on the governor in council in matters respecting immigration.

The last paragraph of section 3 of the Canadian law as quoted provides for the exclusion of

Persons who do not fulfill, meet, or comply with the conditions and requirements of any regulations which for the time being are in force and applicable to such persons under sections 37 or 38 of this act.

The importance of this provision will be apparent when the two sections referred to are considered. These sections are as follows:

SEC. 37. Regulations made by the governor in council under this act may provide as a condition to permission to land in Canada that immigrants and tourists shall possess in their own right money to a prescribed minimum amount, which amount may vary according to the race, occupation, or destination of such immigrant or tourist, and otherwise according to the circumstances; and may also provide that all persons coming to Canada directly or indirectly from countries which issue passports or penal certificates to persons leaving such countries shall produce such passports or penal certificates on demand of the immigration officer in charge before being allowed to land in Canada.

SEC. 38. The governor in council may, by proclamation or order whenever he deems it necessary or expedient

(a) Prohibit the landing in Canada or at any specified port of entry in Canada of any immigrant who has come to Canada otherwise than by continuous journey from the country of which he is a native or naturalized citizen, and upon a through ticket purchased in that country, or prepaid in Canada;

(b) Prohibit the landing in Canada of passengers brought to Canada by any transportation company which refuses or neglects to comply with the provisions of this act;

(c) Prohibit for a stated period, or permanently, the landing in Canada, or the landing at any specified port of entry in Canada, of immigrants belonging to any race deemed unsuited to the climate or requirements of Canada, or of immigrants of any specified class, occupation, or character.

Under the Canadian immigration act of 1906 the governor in council was given wide latitude in the matter of denying admission to persons not specifically debarred by law, but considerably greater authority in this regard is conferred by the above sections. As a matter of fact it would appear that the governor in council has practically unlimited power, and could, if deemed desirable, not only prohibit the immigration to Canada of any particular class, but practically suspend all immigration.

On May 9, 1910, five days after the new Canadian law became effective, several orders in council were promulgated under authority of sections 37 and 38, above quoted." One of the orders provided as follows:

1. No immigrant, male or female, other than a member of a family provided for under the following regulations, shall be permitted to enter Canada between the 1st day of March and the 31st day of October, both days inclusive, unless he or she have in actual and personal possession at the time of arrival money, belonging absolutely to such immigrant, to the amount of at least $25

a The Law and Regulations of Canada Respecting Immigration and Immigrants, issued by the Superintendent of Immigration, Ottawa, May 16, 1910. See Appendix G, No. I, p. 141.

in addition to a ticket or such sum of money as will purchase a ticket or transport for such immigrant to his or her destination in Canada.

2. If an immigrant so intending to enter Canada is the head of a family and is accompanied by his or her family or any members thereof, the foregoing regulations shall not apply to such family or the members thereof, but the said immigrant head of family shall have in his or her possession, in addition to the said sum of money and means of transport hereinbefore required, a further sum of money, belonging absolutely to such immigrant, equivalent to $25 for each member of the said family of the age of 18 years or upward, and $12.50 for each member of said family of the age of 5 years or upward and under the age of 18 years, and in addition tickets or a sum of money equivalent to the cost of transport for all the said members of the family to their place of destination in Canada.

3. Every such immigrant seeking to enter Canada, between the 1st day of November and the last day of February, both inclusive, shall be subject to the foregoing regulations, with the substitution of $50 for $25 and $25 for $12.50 wherever the said sums of $25 and $12.50 are mentioned in the said regulations.

It was provided, however, that male immigrants going to assured employment at farm work and females to assured employment at domestic service may be admitted if possessed of means of reaching the place of such employment. Under this order the money requirement may also be abrogated in the case of immigrants going to join certain relatives.

Similar orders in council had been promulgated under the law of 1906.@

Three other orders in council, all of which were promulgated on May 9, 1910, provided as follows:

No immigrant shall be permitted to enter Canada if he or she, being a subject or citizen of any country which issues a passport or penal certificate or both to persons emigrating therefrom, fails to produce such passport or penal certificate or both upon demand by the immigration officer in charge, and whether coming to Canada directly or indirectly from any such country.

No immigrant of Asiatic origin shall be permitted to enter Canada unless in actual and personal possession in his or her own right of two hundred dollars, unless such person is a native or subject of an Asiatic country in regard to which special statutory regulations are in force or with which the government of Canada has made a special treaty, agreement, or convention.

From and after the date hereof the landing in Canada shall be and the same is hereby prohibited of any immigrants who have come to Canada otherwise than by continuous journey from the country of which they are natives or citizens, and upon through tickets purchased in that country or purchased or prepaid in Canada.

The last two orders quoted were in effect identical with orders promulgated under the law of 1906. Both of these orders were evidently intended primarily to exclude Hindus. Canada has a special statutory provision_relative to Chinese immigration, and Japanese immigration to the Dominion is regulated under an agreement with Japan. Neither of these provisions applies to Hindu immigration, which is consequently affected by the money requirement mentioned. A still more effective safeguard against the coming of Hindus, however, is found in the order which requires that immigrants come to Canada by a continuous journey. The peculiar efficiency of this provision is due to the fact that there is no means by which a continuous journey from India to Canada can be accomplished.

As above stated, the orders in council promulgated under the act of May 4, 1910, were practically identical with orders issued under

• See Appendix B. Nos. II, V, and VII, pp. 98, 99, and 101.

See Appendix G, Nos. II, III, and IV, p. 142.

the law of 1906, which affirms a previous statement that the new law did not particularly affect the Canadian system of regulating immigration. Several orders in council quoted in the previous report of the Commission upon this subject are retained in the present report," and these indicate the earlier purpose of the Dominion government to absolutely control the immigration movement.

One of the orders promulgated under the old laws will clearly illustrate this point. Section 10 of the law of 1906 provided as follows:

The governor in council may, on the recommendation of the minister, make such orders and regulations, not inconsistent with this act, as are considered necessary or expedient for the carrying out of this act, according to its true intent and meaning, and for the better attainment of its object.

In practice this section evidently assumed an importance beyond what is suggested by a casual reference to its terms, as will be seen by an order of the governor in council dated May 27, 1908, which is here presented in full:

Whereas a considerable number of European immigrants arrive in Canada by way of United States Atlantic and Pacific seaports, coming in by rail from port of landing in the United States, many of whom are of the classes prohibited by the immigration act from landing in Canada, and are for this reason or for causes arising within a period of two years of their arrival in Canada deportable under the act;

And whereas upon the superintendent of immigration seeking to deport such persons, the railroad companies responsible for carrying them across the border have pleaded inability to take them back on the superintendent's order, for the reason that the persons sought to be deported were not legally admissible into the United States, and would not be admitted into that country, except for transit to port of landing and immediate delivery into the custody of the steamship company responsible for taking them back to the port or place from which they were brought;

And whereas the steamship companies have been communicated with in this matter and each company has been asked to enter into an agreement according to the draft attached hereto;

And whereas the steamship companies have had this agreement and the request of the department of the interior with respect thereto before them since about the 23d of February, 1908, but the only company that has thus far executed the agreement is the Allan Line Steamship Company (Limited) of Glasgow, running ships to Boston, Mass., and Portland, Me.;

And whereas on account of the neglect of the other companies to attend to this matter the department of the interior is, at the present time, in the position of having some 55 deportable immigrants on its hands and being unable to deport them;

Therefore his excellency the governor-general in council in these circumstances, and seeing that undesirable immigrants are constantly coming into Canada, as above described, and that the superintendent of immigration is unable to put the law in force with respect to such immigrants, is pleased to order, as a necessary measure of protection for Canada, under the authority of section 10 of the immigration act, chapter 93, Revised Statutes of Canada, 1906, that all such immigrants as seek to come into Canada by rail, who have come from any country on any ship landing at a United States port belonging to any steamship company or owner who has not entered into the agreement hereto annexed, shall be and they are hereby prohibited from landing in or coming into Canada.

The importance of this traffic to steamship companies bringing to United States ports passengers bound to Canada, is indicated by "Appendix B, No. IV, p. 99.

a See Appendix B, pp. 97–101.

the fact that 29,308 out of 204,157, or 14.4 per cent, of the transoceanic immigrant arrivals in Canada during the year ending March 31, 1908, came via the United States. These were distributed by ports as follows: "

Perhaps it is needless to add that the agreement suggested by the Canadian authorities was entered into without great delay on the part of the steamship companies.

REJECTIONS AT PORTS OF ENTRY.

Observations at Canadian ports indicate that, generally speaking, the inspection of immigrants, both medical and otherwise, under the Canadian law is less rigid than under the United States law, which statement is substantiated, in part at least, by the record of rejections in 1908 under the respective laws, as shown by the following table: TABLE 33.—Total number of immigrants admitted and rejected under Canadian and United States laws, fiscal year 1908.

[Compiled from reports of Superintendent of Immigration, Canada, and reports of United States Commissioner-General of Immigration.]

An exact comparison in this regard is impossible, because the laws of the two countries differ somewhat as to excluded classes. The principal difference to be considered in this connection is the United States contract-labor provision, under which 1,932 aliens were excluded in the year 1908. This does not seriously affect the comparison, however, for disregarding the number of contract laborers excluded, the proportion of other classes excluded to those admitted to the United States in the year mentioned was 1 to 87. Therefore it is fair to assume that under the United States laws the proportion of comparable exclusions in the year mentioned was three times as great as under the Canadian act.

A study of exclusions by classes of immigrants under the Canadian and United States laws strikingly illustrates the effect of Canada's policy of discrimination between immigrants from different sections of Europe as compared with the result of the nondiscriminating

a Report of Superintendent of Immigration, Canada, 1908, p. 3.

policy of the United States in this regard, as will be seen by the following table:

TABLE 34.-European immigrants, including Syrian, admitted and rejected under the Canadian and the United States laws in 1908, by race or people.

[Compiled from reports of Superintendent of Immigration, Canada, and reports of United States Commissioner-General of Immigration.]

While not nearly so pronounced as in the case of Canada, there is apparently a discrimination on the part of the United States against immigrants from southern and eastern Europe; but this is doubtless entirely due to the fact that a preponderance of certain excludable classes, such as contract laborers and persons afflicted with loathsome or dangerous contagious diseases comes from that section, and not to a discriminatory policy with regard to races or peoples, as such. On the other hand, it must be assumed that the large proportion of rejections among south and east European immigrants to Canada, compared with the number of north and west Europeans debarred, is due almost entirely to the fact that Canada discriminates in favor of the latter. The same causes which obtain in the United States, as above stated, may account in a small degree for the result in Canada, and it is possible that the more or less definite system of selection exercised by Canadian officials abroad may have some effect in this regard, but in the main the difference is undoubtedly due to Canada's official attitude toward the classes mentioned.

A medical officer of the Canadian immigration service is now stationed at New York for the purpose of examining arriving immigrants destined to Canada. In the fiscal year ending March 31, 1909, this officer rejected 131 such immigrants, or 1 in every 65 arriving, a considerably larger proportion than was rejected under the United States law for the corresponding year."

DEPORTATION AFTER LANDING.

Although the number of immigrants rejected under the Canadian act is proportionately much smaller than under the United States law, Canada has an additional safeguard, or second line of defense, in a provision of the immigration act of 1910 which makes possible a general deportation of aliens who become public charges within three years after their landing in the Dominion.

Under the law of 1906 the limit within which deportation of public charges could be made was two years, and what follows is necessarily based on the operation of the earlier law.

a Report of Superintendent of Immigration, Canada, 1909, p. 103.