JAPANESE PROBLEM AGAIN.

Taranaki Daily News, 4 September 1920, Page 9

JAPANESE PROBLEM AGAIN.

ALAEM W THE STATES. San Francisco, July 10. Once more the Oriental peril, whereby the Pacific Coast may become dominated by Japanese and Chinese, is showing signs of causing a heated controversy, judging by certain official action which had its inception in the Legislature of California. Warning that California Japanese are obtaining "an intimate knowledge of coastline, harbors, and defences, which would bo extremely dangerous and serviceable to an enemy during a period of war," the State Board of Control of the Golden West State, in the latter portion of its report to Governor Stephens, calls attention to the fact that such information is now available to the Nipponese because they have been allowed to secure a monopoly of the fishing industry on the Pacific Coast.

Commenting on the hold which the Japanese have secured on the fishing industry, and its importance in the event of war between the United States and Japan, the report states: — "The experience of the British Government, in particular, during the world war demonstrated the value of the services of the fishing fleet for patrol duty, along the coastline during the war. The fishing fleet, with its small boats scattered along the entire coast, proved exceedingly valuable in reporting the approach of enemy boats and submarines. "In the case of California, with a fishing fleet manned by aliens, especially if circumstances made them enemy aliens, we would not only lose the valuable services of these boats for patrol duty during a time of war, but this same fishing fleet might become a powerful aid enemy. r "The Orientals, particularly the Japanese, have recognised the importance of this industry, and have entered the fishing business in ever-increasing numbers, until to-day there are more Japanese fishermen operating on the coasts of California than any other nationality. In the 1015-10 license year there were 491 Japanese fishermen out of a total of 3758 or approximately 13 per cent. The year 1019-20 shows 131(1 Japanese out of a total of 4071 or 28 per cent, of the ■total." Jt is noted in the report that the Japanese fishermen have increased until tl.ey now outnumber any other nationality, having increased about 108 per cent. Of the total number of fishermen's boats operated from the coast of California, 355 of them are manned by Japanese, and 700 are operated by. all other nationalities combined, the total value of the Japanese boats being 1,397,OOOdols., and the value of all the other boats being 2,055,000d015, Referring again to the possibility of war between the two nations, tflie Board of Control advises that Japanese, though bora in America and holding all (.he rights of American citizens, owe first obligation of allegiance and military service to Japan under the dual citizenship custom. TO BAN ORIENTALS. Governor Stephens, of California, has called upon the United States Federal Government to take immediate steps to check Japanese colonisation in California. In his letter Governor Stephens said: "The people of California are determined to repress a developing Japanese community within our midst. They are determined to exhaust every power in their keeping to maintain the State of California for its own people. This determination is based fundamentally upon the ethnological impossibility of assimilating the Japanese pepole, and the consequential alternative of increasing a population whose very race isolation must be fraught with the gravest consequences. California wants peace. But California wants to retain this commonwealth for her own people, where they may grow up and develop their own ideals. We are confronted at this time by the problems that have arisen in the Hawaiian Islands, where the Japanese have now developed to an extent which gives them a preponderance, I. am informed, in the affairs of that territory. That mistake of Hawaii must not, and California is determined shall not, be repeated here." The influx of Japanese into California has brought about "alarming" conditions, and it has become necessary to protect the sovereignty of the State against this "growing menace" through diplomatic negotiation or a strict exclusion. Act, Governor Stephens added in his letter to Secretary of State Colby. Governor Stephens expressed the hope that the initiative measure now being projected in California to deny Asiatics the right to all land purchases or leaseholds would be accepted by the electorate by an overwhelming majority. He'asked in the letter that immediate negotiations be entered into with the Empire of Japan to make impossible any further "evasions" of existing immigration agreements, and to make such [ agreements as rigorous as possible.

THE RACE PROBLEM. Forty years ago, says the report, the problem in California was essentially a Chinese problem, the Japanese population then being negligible. The Chinese immigrants arrived later in such numbers that the Pacific Slope, was threatened with inundation by the Oriental influx, and the Chinese Exclusion Act_ was passed, successfully checking Chinese entry to California. Ten years ago there were 41,,'f.5(i Japanese, but in W2Q there are 87,'279, or 80 to So per cent, of the wholo of the Japanese population of con-, tinental United States.

The Japanese .in California have indicated a strong trend to land ownership and land control, and by their unquestioned industry and application, and by standards and methods, both in connection with hours of labor and standards of living, have gradually developed to «• control of many of California's important agricult ural industries, adds the report to the United States Government. At the present time they operate 623,752 acres of the. very best lands of California. The increase within the last decade in acreage control lias been 412..1 per cent. The market value of crops lias jumped from 6,2'fc>,fisG dollars in 100!), to 67,143,730 dollars in 1019, or approximately tenfold. Governor Stephens, says Americans of the West admire the advance made by the Japanese nation, but they cannot tolerate California being overrun by Nippon, adding that ''California views with alarm the rapid growth of these pepole within the last decade in population as well as in land control, and foresees in the not distant future the gravest menace of serious conflict if this development is not immediately aud effectively checked."