The Dominion. FRIDAY, DECEMBER 3, 1920. AMERICA'S POPULATION GAINS

Dominion, Volume 14, Issue 59, 3 December 1920, Page 6

The Dominion. FRIDAY, DECEMBER 3, 1920. AMERICA'S POPULATION GAINS

Assigning as a reason that there are "more than two million unemployed in the United States, the American Federation of Labour a few days ago urged that a Bill totally prohibiting immigration for a fixed period, of probably a year, should be submitted to Congress. Post-war immigration to tho United States has not yet attained, the scale of pre-war years, but it is rapidly expanding. For the twelve months to the end of last June new arrivals in the United States from all other countries totalled 430.000. as compared with 1,218,000 in. 1914, and an average annual immigration of more than a million in the ten years to the outbreak of the European War. ' From that date onward, and even .while America herself held aloof from the world conflict, the movement of population across the Atlantic was, of course, increasingly restricted. Low water mark .was reached in the fiscal year 1917-18, when only 110,000 immigrants' entered the United States. Now tho figures are again on the up-grade, however, and there is every indication .that before long the United States will be absorbing the surplus population of Europe in even larger numbers than before tho war. The great annual inflow of immigrants may result temporarily in accentuating the disturbed conditions of trade and industry that are at prosent being experienced, but in its normal relation and effect, it undoubtedly contributes heavily to the industrial and commercial strength of the United States. In the past a state of trade depression in that country has usually been reflected in a slackening of the tide of immigration, but in view of the abnormal conditions now obtaining n Europe the flow may continue unchecked unless the temporary restrictions urged by the American Federation of Labour are imposed. The chief causes of the great migration of population to the/United States have always been essentially economic, and in the existing slate of Europe these causes, of course, are intensified. A vi'ry largo, proportion of the foreigners who go to America are impelled by a desire to secure bettei conditions of life and work than are attainable in their own country, and, as might be expected, Iboso .countries which are in the worst straits economically as a result of the war are contributing heavily to the mass of trans-Atlantic immigration. It is not surprising, for instance, to learn that according to the latest immigration figures, Italians are at present going- to the United States in larger numbers than tho members of any other race.

The movement of new population to America has been not a little stimulated by the extent to which she has been brought into effective touch with European nations since tho outbreak of war. "For several vcars," a writer in the Now York Eveninfi Post observed recently, "America has been the best-adver-tised nation in the world—modesty need not prevent the statement." Not only (he added) has she been advertised by her statesmen and tho course

of evonts Hint gave peculiar prominence to hor ontrv into the war, but hundreds of thousands of aliens going home to light have been emissaries of American prosperity. They have carried word of our wages mid-working conditions to their friends abroad. Never, probably, has a country had such an army of witnesses bearinje personal testimony to the opportunities they had found. It is not to be wondered that, with conditions in Europe still so unsatisfactory, wo should now be reaping tho harvest of this advertising and getting larger and larger numbers of people who are seeking more comfortable living.

There is no doubt that the United States is likely to draw heavily on the population of Europe by way of immigration. This docs not apply only to countries possessed of surplus population, fo'r instnncc, in normal times SoutliAnierican countries and Cuba receive annually between 200,000 and 300,000 Spanish immigrants. Conditions in SpanishAmerican countries are at present less favourable than they we're before the war, and in consequence emigration from Spain has of late been deflected in a considerable measure to the United States.

British people will bo specially interested in the fact that members of their own race have continued to constitute a not inconsiderable proportion of the immigrants entering the United States. The total of 435,000 immigrants during the fiscal year to the end of last June included 58,000 people of British stock. It is t'ruc that 30,000 of these immi' grants were from Canada, and that Dominion in recent years has profited substantially in exchanging population with its southern neighbour. In 1918. more than 70,000 people moved from the United States into Canada, while 32,000 Canadians emigrated to the United States. Between two great contiguous countries some such exchange of population is no doubt inevitable, but nearly thirty thousand people left the United Kingdom in 1919-20 to seek new_ homes in the United States. Various explanations have been offered of this loss of population to tho Empire. Some of the British immigrants entering tho United States have decla'iwd themselves dissatisfied with the conservatism of employees in their own country; others find fault with tho violent and self-seeking tactics of some sections of or.tranised Labour in Great Britain. The main fact brought out, however, is that as an Empire we are allowing ourselves to be outclassed to some extent by the United States in. the great enterprise of building up population. In its wide extent the Empire offers conditions of life and work which will compare 1" . an >' respect with the best the United States has to offe'r; and we' should not be content to lose population to the United States or any other country.