this bill to point out where they can secure labor to grub land. I will make that particular statement.

The CHAIRMAN. How much of a border have you on Mexico? Representative GARNER. About 400 miles, with the meanderings of the river.

The CHAIRMAN. You speak of the seasonal labor coming over. Can you make a suggestion or an estimate of how many Mexicans have come across each season?

Representative GARNER. Senator, that would be difficult to state just how many really cross in the particular territory that I have the honor to represent, but I will make this statement—and I think I am very conservative when I make it-that the labor that I refer to that comes over for the purpose of temporarily picking cotton and to help us plant our onions and to help us gather our onions and to help us gather our spinach and temporarily to contract for the grubbing of land, 90 per cent of it goes back to Mexico. They do not want to live in the United States; they can make as much money picking cotton and setting out onions in one day as they could make in two weeks in Mexico. You ask me how they can do that. A man will come over with his family--wife and three or four or five children; they are a quite prolific people in the way of multiplying and he will come over into this country and he will make $3 or $4 a day picking cotton, he and his family; or they will make $3 or $4 a day for the entire family setting out onions. Fifty cents a day is all he can make in Mexico, and there is no labor there for his wife and children. So the result of his two months' work over here is almost equal to the entire year in Mexico. He stays over here two or three or four months to get sufficient money to go back to Mexico and live the balance of the year in the manner in which they live over there.

Senator REED. May I interrupt you?

Representative GARNER. Certainly, Senator.

Senator REED. Why is not that reflected in the statistics? The statistics of immigration show very few returning Mexicans.

Representative GARNER. Senator, I would like to question those statistics. Have you any way to verify those statistics?

Senator REED. The report of the Commissioner General of Immigration.

Representative GARNER. Yes; I understand that report of the Commissioner General of Immigration. But if you will take his same report of all Canadians returning you will find he is in error, and I undertake to say if you had the statistics of Mexicans returning to Mexico you would find the same errors as in reference to Canada. That is where the question of statistics comes in. I challenge the fact that the Commissioner of Immigration has knowledge of what Mexicans return to Mexico. The fact of the business is I make the assertion that he can not accurately determine the number of Mexicans that come into Texas and go back. Now, Senator, there are 10,000, I will say, who cross in a day, and you can not tell how many of them go back.

The CHAIRMAN. Congressman, that becomes a thoroughly pertinent and quite important inquiry in connection with this bill, and I am very glad to have you speak about it.

Representative GARNER. I will call your attention to one fact: Take the Census of 1910 as compared with 1920, and in place of it

being 60,000 a year increase it is less than 22,000 a year, and that is including the increase by virtue of breeding. Now, may I just make one further statement in reference to the economic effect of it? I see the people in Georgia claim-I know a number of them, editors and newspapers claim that by permitting this seasonal labor to come over in the production of our country, we will say for illustration, is not fair to the competitive production in Georgia as compared with Texas. As I say, I represent those 21 counties, quite as large area. I assert that there is not a mathametician or engineer who can figure on the 150,000 bales of cotton that are raised in the fifteenth district of cheaper labor than it is raised in Georgia so as to tell the effect it has on 15,000,000 bales of cotton in this country. It is too small; it is not visible even with a microscope as to percentage. It is the millionth part in percentage that that competition brings about.

So I contend that that economic problem does not exist, because the larger portion of the people who come over do not engage in anything except the picking of cotton-not the larger portion of them engage in picking cotton, but the portion that comes over for the purpose of picking cotton. The larger portion is engaged in the grubbing of land and other temporary occupations. The reply might be made that if you would stop grubbing the land we would not have so much to go into cotton, and therefore we would not produce so much cotton. But I submit that that is not tenable; that you do not want to stop the progress of this country in order to stop competition. I do not think any statesman ever made such a suggestion as that, that in order to quit raising too much cotton you shall stop the progress in the way of development of raw lands in this country. The principal part of the Mexican labor is used in grubbing land. and in the vegetable and citrus-fruit industry.

Senator REED. I have those figures here now.
Representative GARNER. Yes, sir.

Senator REED. For the year ended June 30 last there were 66,766 Mexicans admitted for permanent residence in the United States, and there were 2,774 departed for permanent residence in Mexico.

Representative GARNER. Now, Senator, I will ask you just how did the Commissioner General get the 2,700 Mexicans. I would like to request you to ask the commissioner how he obtains that fact.

Senator REED. He keeps a record of departing immigrants.

Representative GARNER. I beg pardon. He would not keep a record of the departing immigrants. Only Mexico can keep that record. When a Mexican goes from this side to the other side he passes right on in. The American officials do not have a thing on earth to do when he passes the bridge in the first instance, but the Mexican official on the other side does. So when he comes over the Mexican officials have nothing to do except to look at him. I say it is impossible. I will ask you, is it not practically made impossible? I challenge the Immigration Commissioner to show how he ascertained those figures. If somebody stops one of those Mexicans going out of the United States, he says, "I am one of the fellows who came over and I am going back." But is he goes on down to the bridge and walks on across the American officials can not possibly tell how many of them have gone back.

I do not know, Senator Reed, but I have heard there were a number of Mexicans in Chicago in distressed condition. I can not testify what the conditions are in Pennsylvania, Illinois, or the Senator's State. I have heard it said over in the Immigration Committee of the House that the distressed conditions in Los Angeles is very great concerning the Mexican population. But I do know this, that so far as Texas is concerned it has neither affected the social conditions adversely, nor has it affected the economic conditions in that State, either of the farming class or of the manufacturing class except favorably.

I

I have challenged every member of the Texas delegation-and a number of them are supporting this legislation-I have challenged every one of them, and I mentioned them in the hearing, and it is now in the record-to show in their congressional district where a single wage scale has been lowered by means of Mexican immigration or social conditions affected. Not one of them can show that. assert that in Mr. Rayburn's district, one of the largest cotton districts in Texas, there are not 200 Mexicans within that districthe is producing cotton-but the cotton farmer there has been led to believe by the proponents of this measure that we are raising cotton in our country cheaper than they can, and therefore they want to stop it; and that is the only economic reason you can have.

The CHAIRMAN. Is it principally in the matter of raising cotton that the Mexicans are used in your territory?

Representative GARNER. No, sir, Mr. Chairman, not in my territory. They only come over there to pick the cotton. That is a seasonal labor, the kind you are speaking of; and most of the permanent population naturally are engaged in farming and every other kind of labor. For instance, you speak of the Mexican population in the district I represent. I know Mexican families who are living on the same land their forbears owned 200 years ago, and there has never been any transfer except in the probate court. Some of the Mexican people in our country are substantial citizens-Mexican descendants as you will find anywhere in this country.

Senator HARRIS. Do they average up to that statement?

Representative GARNER. Senator, I would not say that. I would say the old-time people do-the old-time settlers who were there whenTexas became a republic, their descendants are a good type of people. Senator HARRIS. I mean the ones coming over now, do they average up to the same type of citizens you have in the State of Texas?

Representative GARNER. I do not think they do.

The CHAIRMAN. The class you refer to?

Representative GARNER. Those people you refer to as coming over here and staying two or three months and going back, I do not think they do; and I assert as a fact, if it could be demonstrated, that 80 per cent of those people go back to Mexico. They do not want to live in this country; they want to live in Mexico, and the result is they come over here and get employment at a high wage compared to Mexico, but a low wage in our country compared with our general wage; stay here three or four months and go back to Mexico and remain there until their money gives out and then they come over again for three or four months to get some additional money and again go back and live in Mexico.

The CHAIRMAN. Could you give the approximate number of those who come into your territory and go back?

Representative GARNER. Senator, I said a moment ago I would not like to do that; I do not like to make an estimate where I have not a reasonable basis for that estimate. I would not want to make that estimate; I do not know. I notice Mr. Lassiter is here from that territory. He has had a good deal of experience in that matter. He might be able to tell you more than I could. But I want to impress upon the committee the fact that it has neither affected the social or economic conditions adversely in the terrtory I represent. I know that. I have been among them for 35 years. I have been representing that district for 25 years; and I know the social conditions are much higher among the Mexicans than they were 25 years ago. So the present conditions could not possibly have hurt it. Their economic conditions are very much better than they were. I remember when I used to hire a Mexican at 25 and 40 cents a day, and 50 cents was a good price. Now I have to pay $2 and $2.50. Senator REED. What would be the effect of this legislation? Representative GARNER. Absolutely disastrous, so far as my territory is concerned. I do not doubt that the reduction in production in the Fifteenth Congressional District as a result of this going into effect would be not less than $2,000,000 during the first year. long it would take us to adjust ourselves to it, I do not know. Senator HARRIS. Is that cotton alone?

How

Representative GARNER. No; more in the vegetable line, not in the cotton line-no; that would be a reduction in onions, spinach, citrus fruits, cabbage, and all the other vegetables.

Senator HARRIS. Do you think it would be possible to get labor? Representative GARNER. The kind of labor that will do this work, you simply can not get it. You can not get a white man to take his whole family, go out, and set onions—you could get them to set out onions at $3 or $4 a day, but the farmer is not going to plant onions if he has to pay that wage.

Senator HARRIS. Then your general wage scale is lowered, is it not?

Representative GARNER. For that particular class of labor it is; and you can not get white men to grub land; for instance, the cost of grubbing land is all the way from $8 to $20 an acre. I think that varies according to the density of the chaparral of mesquite and black brush. You can not get anybody to do that work. You can not pay a white man $6 or $7 a day to do it. He is not adapted to that, while the Mexican is adapted to that. He will do it economically and make a good wage himself.

Senator HARRIS. In my country a great many thousands of farms are abandoned because the negroes are taken away. What would you say to letting down the bars and permitting us to get negroes for our section and in California, where they are needed?

Representative GARNER. I do not think the negro problem is a fair comparison. The negro problem is a different problem. It is a problem beyond the solving of man at the present time, because of the race. You can not assimilate that race.

Senator HARRIS. That is true. You would be better off if you could not assimilate the Mexicans.

Representative GARNER. Senator, I think you will find you are mistaken about that. Some of the highest-type people in our country are Americans who intermarried with the highest type. I do not say that is a general rule, but I say in the old families, where they have built up there for a century and been living there for a century and have married; de Zavala is one of the heroes of Texas-a Mexican.

Senator HARRIS. You take it in California and that western territory, where they are short of labor. Do you think they ought to have seasonal labor come in from China, Japan, or the Philippines? Representative GARNER. Senator, I would not go so far as to say that. But I say that is not on a parity with this. I do not think there is any danger of Mexicans becoming so numerous in this country that they will be a menace from a military or national standpoint, whereas such a thing as the importation of Chinese or Japanese might develop such a condition in this country. So they are not on all fours at all, in my opinion. And may I speak about that just for a moment, since you have mentioned the national standpoint? I said to the Committee on Immigration in the House that if I was a member of that committee I would want to know the Pan American viewpoint. I say with all due respect to you gentlemen that if I had this matter to solve I would want the best authority on the Pan American viewpoint. I suppose you gentlemen have that, since you have to do with treaties and foreign countries more than I do. I would have Judge Charles E. Hughes here. Senator KEYES. When you speak of the Pan American viewpoint, do you mean exclusive of Mexico?

Representative GARNER. No; the entire Central and South American countries.

Senator KEYES. I do not think it violates any confidence to say the Pan American viewpoint is wholly against putting any of those countries on the quota basis.

Representative GARNER. Certainly, Senator, I think that is absolutely correct. I do not know whether this bill has, but Mr. Box's bill applies to Canada the same as Mexico and Central and South American countries.

Senator HARRIS. My bill was originally introduced to apply to all countries, but I now limit it to Mexico.

Representative GARNER. I submit it is a matter of more seriousness than you can at the moment think.

Senator GOULD. Are a great many of these Mexicans used in the Arizona mines?

Representative GARNER. I could not tell you about the Arizona mines. But there is a gentleman here

The CHAIRMAN. That happens both in Arizona and California. Representative GARNER. I would not be able to tell you about that. But I do just want to give you one word in regard to this Pan-Americanism: If you apply the quota to Mexico alone and admit similar people from Central America and South America, how can you explain to those people, who are, I will say, a part of the people contrasted with Central and South America.

Senator BLEASE. Will you say that a Mexican is as good as a clean sort of a negro?