The Guardian And Evening Star, with which is incorporated the West Coast Times. WEDNESDAY, JUNE 12, 1929. CANADA AND THE UNITED STATES.

Hokitika Guardian, 12 June 1929, Page 4

The Guardian And Evening Star, with which is incorporated the West Coast Times. WEDNESDAY, JUNE 12, 1929. CANADA AND THE UNITED STATES.

It is justifiably a matter for pride that along the long frontier line between the United States aiid Canada there is neither a fort nor a military establishment of any kind. That the united States Administration finds it necessary to maintain a considerable police force on the boundary, as part of the machinery for the attempted enforcement- of prohibition • will, however, be realised. It is apparent also that the United States must maintain a small army.of immigration officials on the frontier. The duties of these officials, says an exchange, will he appreciably increased as the effect of the ruling of the Supreme Court’ ol too United States that British subjects resident in Canada cannot cross the frontier, as many thousands of

thorn have to do every day in the pur-

suance of their occupation, unless they are in possession of the immigration passport that is issued under the quota law. It has linen customary for popu-

lation on the frontier to move freely

between the two countries. The Can- . adian harvests are reaped largely by

labourers from the States who help to plane the cotton crop of Texas in midsummer and then follow the harvest nurtmvards as it is ready in successive weeks in higher latitudes. Canadians, for tneir part, are employed in considerable numbers in Detroit, the city which is identified with the mass production of a weil-kn'owu motor vehicle, and the restrictions, which are now being applied to them and will doubtless prove to be extremely vexatious, may be traced to a demand that was made on behalf of the workers in Detroit two years ago, when there was

an ebb in the tide of industrial prosperity in the city, that protection should be accorded/to them against the (ompetition of non-American workers. It will probably be found, however, mat the new ruling involves a discriminatiton that will be favourable to the BifiLfsh-born Canadians. Jt requires that British residents in Canada who daily cross the frontier to the businesses in which they are engaged in the united States shall provide themselves with passports—and also, no doubt, pay the poll tax that is imposed by the United States upon visitors But, if this obligation is imposed only on British residents in Canada, the effect of it will he to exclude the foreign-horn workers who reside in Canada, it may be assumed that it is to the competition of foreign-born workers that the American workers must strongly object. Yeti the introduction of any restriettion upon Die free movements across the frontier of residents on cither side of it is scarcely compatible with tne tradition of the most friendly intercourse between the peoples of the two countries.