Chapter 382: , Laws of 1889, to read as follows (17)

"There is plenty of land all through Australia for men who
are willing to go there and will be steady and sober and work
hard. I have been North, South, East, and West. I can claim
for myself the credit that I have travelled fairly hard, and I
have seen in every State of Australia plenty of land available
for close settlement. If the great landowners are disinclined
to sell their holdings—and I quite acknowledge that a great
deal of the best land in Australia is in comparatively few
hands—at all events the State Governments have very large
reserves of land; and by the application of irrigation and
other methods of scientific farming they could compete on even
terms at least with these squatters, and they could turn these
waste lands into fertile country fit for settlers. I am very
glad to think that both in New South Wales and Victoria very
large irrigation works are in progress and will be completed
in a very short time, adding enormously to the acreage of land
fit for cultivation; and I say deliberately and advisedly, I
care not for reports of Commissions or individuals, that there
is land and to spare for generations for men who are ready to
undertake the cultivation."

A correspondent of the London _Times_, writing from
Sydney in January, 1909, on the subject of the vast quantity
of fertile land in Australia that is locked up by private
owners in vast sheep runs, to the exclusion of settlement, had
this to say: "You may take it as an axiom that immigration to
Australia will do no good till the fertile lands are thrown
open. And a very large proportion of the closed land is
controlled from London, either by ex-Australians who live
there and draw their income from Australian property, or by
big British companies. … It is necessary to warn seriously
shareholders and directors of the big companies that they must
put pressure on their officials out here, or prepare to have
more drastic pressure forced on themselves. At present, those
officials are often responsible for Australian dislike of the
absentee company."

{307}

In another letter to the same paper it was said: "Somehow or
other the locked-up lands must be opened for agricultural
uses. No one now doubts that, and only a few owners, usually
either absentees or corporations, pretend to doubt it. The
Labour recipe is a Federal land tax on estates over £5,000 in
value, of such a kind that fair use of the land will produce
profit on which the tax will be a mere fleabite, while it will
be a serious charge on fertile land that is used only for
sheep runs. The proposed tax is to be Federal simply because
there is no hope of passing the requisite Bill through several
of the State Upper Houses; otherwise it is more properly a
State concern. Now what we have to remember is that this is
not only Labour’s remedy. I believe it would be quite possible
to carry such a proposal in the present Federal Parliament, so
definitely has public opinion swung round against the big
owners who keep their land idle. If it is not carried next
session, it will be because Mr. Deakin gave his word two years
ago that he would not introduce the subject in this
Parliament; but Mr. Deakin’s attitude is this—that he wishes
the States would do it, that he does not consider this
Parliament has any mandate to legislate for it, but that he
personally has always favoured such a tax, and, if the
States take no steps in that direction, he will support, or
even propose, the measure when it has been submitted to the
country at a general election. It is useless, therefore, for
any one to decry the tax as merely a Labour idea, a
‘Socialistic’ nostrum. The support given it in Australia is
far wider than that. And, apart from the many who advocate it
as the best remedy for the present land-hunger, there is an
increasing body of electors who are being forced into
supporting it because no other remedies seem practicable."

The attitude of the Australian Labor Party on the inseparable
immigration and land questions was stated very clearly and
succinctly in a letter to the London _Times_, dated at
Newcastle, New South Wales, June 30, 1909, by a member of the
Party, Frank Pittock, who signs himself "a Magistrate of the
Territory." He writes: "We cannot at present obtain land for
our own genuine land-seekers, skilled in the peculiar
requirements of pastoral and agricultural work on the
Australian soil. We certainly are unable to give our own
unemployed a chance on the land. Any importations of labour
from over the seas merely serve to render more distressful the
unfortunate position of the colonial out-of-works. On the
other hand, we do now, and always have, welcomed new arrivals
who may be able, in the near future, to effectively augment
our productive wealth. The party fully recognizes the need of
population—of the right sort. We have vast empty spaces all
over the continent, now grazing grounds for sheep, yet
eminently suitable for intense settlement. The Australian
Labour party seeks the support, at the forthcoming general
election, of all who believe, as does your own Australian
Correspondent, that the satisfying of the earth-hunger of our
people is the great outstanding need of the day. Can we but be
authorized to force the huge monopolists to surrender portions
of their holdings we shall have, not only land for our own
landless, but land and to spare for those who seek it from the
British Isles. … We dare not, as a conscientious and
humanitarian party, invite our kith and kin from other parts
to come here now. We should be traitors to the Empire,
betrayers of the race, if we endorsed in any way the attitude
of those who seek, apparently, to flood this fair land with
any population at all, regardless of the evil consequences to
the immigrants themselves, and alike regardless of the grave
injustice thereby done to native-born landless and, in many
cases, at present, work-seeking Australians."

A Press despatch from Sydney, October 30, made the following
announcement: "Under the closer settlement amendment Bill,
which is now before the Legislative Council of New South
Wales, the Government will be empowered by proclamation to
earmark estates in the vicinity of towns which might impede
settlement. When such estates are of the value of £10,000 and
upwards the Government may agree with the owners to subdivide
them on terms and areas to be agreed upon, so as to ensure
_bona fide_ settlement. If the owners fulfil the
agreement, the proclamation will be cancelled; if the owners
refuse to subdivide within five years, the Government reserves
the power to resume at the value on the date of proclamation."

IMMIGRATION AND EMIGRATION: Brazil: 1908-1909.
Increasing Influx.

"During the year [1908] 112,234 persons came into the country,
of which 17,539 were visitors and 94,695 immigrants. This
shows a notable increase of 26,908 immigrants, or about forty
per cent. over the number registered in 1907. Of these 74,999
came at their own expense and 11,109 at the cost of the Union.
The increase continues this year, as will be seen from the
record of the Port of Rio de Janeiro alone, which received
13,580 immigrants during the first quarter of this year, as
compared with 8,607 in 1908 and 5,943 in 1907. In spite of the
small grant allotted to this service, it has been conducted
with the greatest efficiency. The Department for the Peopling
of the Soil has effected the location of immigrants in 26
colonies, situated respectively in the States of Espirito
Santo, Rio de Janeiro, Minas Geraes, São Paulo, Parana, Santa
Catharina, and Rio-Grande-do-Sul, eleven of which are directly
under the supervision of the Union. All the nucleus colonies
founded last year enjoy unrestricted prosperity, and it has
been even necessary to acquire neighbouring lands in order to
satisfy the constant demand for more land on the part of the
families settled."

_President’s Message to Congress,
May 3, 1909._

IMMIGRATION AND EMIGRATION: Canada: A. D. 1896-1909.
The "American Invasion" of the Northwest.
Immigration of the last decade.

See (in this Volume )
CANADA: A. D. 1896-1909.

IMMIGRATION AND EMIGRATION: England: A. D. 1905-1909.
The Aliens Act.
Restrictions on the admission of Aliens.
A new policy.

Until 1905, England offered practically an open door to the
aliens who sought either a permanent home or a temporary
residence on her island soil. Little scrutiny was given to
them and almost no restriction on their coming in. But some
years before that date a growing criticism of such
unconditioned hospitality was begun.
{308}
In 1888 it induced the appointment of a Select Committee of
the House of Commons "to inquire into the laws existing in the
United States and elsewhere on the subject of the immigration
of destitute aliens, and the extent and effect of such
immigration into the United Kingdom, and to report whether it
is desirable to impose any, and if so, what, restrictions on
such immigration." The Commission reported in 1889 that it
thought "the alien population was not numerous enough to
create alarm," and that it was "not prepared to recommend
legislation at present," but saw "the possibility of such
legislation becoming necessary in the future." Several
proposals of restrictive measures were urged without success
in the course of the next dozen years, and, in 1902, a Royal
Commission was appointed, "to inquire into—

(1) the character and extent of the evils which are attributed
to the unrestricted immigration of aliens, especially in the
Metropolis;

(2) the measures which have been adopted for the restriction
and control of alien immigration in foreign countries and in
British colonies."

The Commission produced an elaborate report in 1903
(Parliamentary Papers, Cd. 1741). Reviewing the hospitality of
the past, it found that the migrant aliens of former
generations had made the English people "their debtors"; but
they were of a different stamp from the immigrants of the
present movement, which "may be said to have begun about 1880,
and is drawn mainly from the Jewish inhabitants of Eastern
Europe." The causes of this recent exodus have been partly
economic and partly due to oppressive measures; and the result
of the Commission’s investigation of it was the expressed
opinion that "in respect of certain classes of immigrants,
especially those arriving from Eastern Europe, it is necessary
in the interests of the State generally, and of certain
localities in particular, that the entrance of such immigrants
into this country and their right of residence here should be
placed under conditions and regulations coming within that
right of interference which every country possesses to control
the entrance of foreigners into it. Such regulations should,
in our opinion," the report went on to say, "be made in order
to prevent so far as possible this country being burdened with
the presence of ‘undesirable aliens’ and to provide for their
repatriation in certain cases.

"But we think that the greatest evils produced by the presence
of the alien immigrants here are the overcrowding caused by
them in certain districts of London, and the consequent
displacement of the native population. There seems little
likelihood of being able to remedy these great evils by the
enforcement of any law applicable to the native and alien
population alike. We therefore think that special regulations
should be made for the purpose of preventing aliens at their
own will choosing their residence within districts already so
overcrowded that any addition to dwellers within it must
produce most injurious results. On this point the Commission
recommended specifically that if it be found that the
immigration of aliens into any area has substantially
contributed to any overcrowding, and that it is expedient that
no further newly-arrived aliens should become residents in
such area, the same may be declared prohibited area.

"We are also of opinion that efforts should be made to rid
this country of the presence of alien criminals (and other
objectionable characters)."

An Act embodying substantially the recommendations of the
Commission passed Parliament in 1905. Both the Act and the
administration of it have been criticised since, as lacking
stringency. Its working was reviewed at considerable length in
_The Times_ of February 9, 1909 which made the following
statements, among others, on the subject:

"The Act, as now administered, does not subject all alien
immigrants, or even all steerage immigrants, to inspection. To
begin with, the regulation of alien immigration is confined,
practically, to the traffic between the United Kingdom and
ports in Europe or within the Mediterranean Sea."

In fact, according to _The Times_, "the vast majority of
aliens are not affected by the Act. A foreigner may enter this
country unchallenged—If he comes from an ‘extra-European’
port (with some exceptions); if he is a cabin passenger; if he
is an exempted second-class passenger; if he is a
transmigrant; if he is a passenger in a ship containing fewer
than 21 ‘alien steerage passengers.’

"Then also, though nominally a subject for inspection, he is
not called upon to satisfy the full requirements of the Act,
if he is proceeding to a destination outside the United
Kingdom; if he holds a return ticket; if he is a seaman; if he
is fleeing from religious or political persecution."

IMMIGRATION AND EMIGRATION: Germany: A. D. 1904-1908.
Remarkable decrease of Emigration.

"German emigration has dwindled so steadily and rapidly that
at present it would seem to have reached the low-water mark in
its downward trend. A glance at the official statistics of
emigration will indicate the remarkable extent of this
retrogression. In 1852, Germans, to the number of 145,918, and
in 1854, to the number of 215,009, went to the United States
alone. In 1872, just after the unification of the Empire, the
grand total of German emigration amounted to 128,152; in 1873,
to 110,438; in 1881, to 220,902; in 1882, to 203,585 persons.
During the years succeeding 1882 up to 1892, the figures, in
the average, still surpassed 100,000, but since then they have
shown a notable falling off. Thus only 22,309 in 1900; 22,073
in 1901; 32,098 in 1902; 36,310 in 1903; 27,984 in 1904—were
recorded as having gone from Germany to lands beyond the sea.

"This retrogressive tendency appears the more surprising when
it is remembered that Germany’s population, mainly as a result
of the excess of births over deaths, but partly through its
inland migration, has, since the foundation of the Empire,
increased at an average annual rate of over half a million,
during recent years at the still higher rate of 800,000 per
annum. The cause for this seeming anomaly lies in the
extraordinary economical development of Germany during the
last decade, in the consequent steady improvement of the
social status of its laboring classes, brought about by a
progressive rise in wages, and in the elimination, thereby, of
one of the strongest incentives to emigration in former days."

_Baron Speck von Sternburg,
The Phantom Peril of German Emigration and
South American Settlements
(North American Review, May, 1906)._

{309}

Of the emigrants from Germany in 1908, the United States
Consul-General reported that they numbered only 19,880, being
11,816 less than in 1907.

"From 1897 to 1907 the yearly mean average was 27,526, or 0.47
per cent. of the population. Altogether since 1871 the German
Empire has lost only 2,750,000 people by emigration, or as
many people as can be made good in four years by the excess of
births over deaths."

IMMIGRATION AND EMIGRATION: Italy: A. D. 1908.
Great falling off in the Movement of Emigration.

As reported in a Press despatch from Rome, in June, 1909, the
statistics of 1908 showed a marked falling off in Italian
emigration. "In 1907 the total number of emigrants was
704,675; in 1908 it was only 486,674. The most notable
reduction is in the number of emigrants to the United States,
which has fallen from 298,124 in 1907 to 131,501 in 1908. This
chiefly affects Southern Italy, the Abruzzi, Campania,
Calabria, Basilicata, and Sicily; the northern emigration,
which for the most part is directed towards European
countries, is also diminished, but in a less proportion.
Unfortunately, this change is not due to more favourable
labour conditions in Italy, but to a smaller demand for labour
in North America. The number of emigrants to Argentina has
slightly increased from 78,493 to 80,699; but the great market
for Italian labour, the United States, is, to judge from the
figures of this year as well as last year, surely and
irretrievably growing smaller."

IMMIGRATION AND EMIGRATION: Peru: A. D. 1906.
Decree for the Encouragement of Immigration.

The following decree was promulgated by President Pardo the
10th of August, 1906:

"First.
The State will provide third-class passages for the natives of
Europe and America who may wish to introduce industrial or
private enterprises, provided that they fulfill the following
conditions:

(_a_) That they are from 16 to 50 years of age, if they
are males, and from 10 to 40 if they are females, fulfilling
the conditions of morality and health laid down in the rules
now in force.

(_b_) That they come to engage in agriculture, in mining,
or in other industries, or to devote themselves to these
occupations for account of colonization, immigration, or
irrigation enterprises.

"Second.
The payment of the passages will be made through the consuls
of the Republic in the ports of shipment in view of the orders
cabled by the ministry of fomento, to which office must be
presented in writing the request of the interested parties for
such payment, indicating at the same time the number of
immigrants, the agricultural estate or industrial
establishment to which they are destined, and declaring
themselves obliged to provide lodging, board, and medical
attendance for the immigrants from the port of landing to the
place of destination.

"Third.
The consuls of the Republic, on receipt of the order from the
minister of fomento, shall make the payment of the passages to
the steamer companies direct, with previous personal and
individual evidence that the immigrants fulfill the conditions
set forth in Article 1 of this decree, and for this purpose
they shall give a certificate to each immigrant, which shall
be collected by the maritime authorities of the port of
landing and afterwards forwarded to the ministry of fomento.

"Fourth.
A general register of immigrants shall be opened in the
agricultural section of the ministry of fomento, in accordance
with the models and instructions obtained from that
department."

IMMIGRATION AND EMIGRATION: UNITED STATES: A. D. 1868-1908.
Chinese Exclusion Laws vs. Treaties with China.

See (in this Volume)
RACE PROBLEMS: UNITED STATES: A. D. 1868-1900, and 1905-1908.

IMMIGRATION AND EMIGRATION: A. D. 1905-1909.
National Conference of 1905.
The New Immigration Law.
Excluded Classes.
Congressional Commission to investigate Immigration.
Its Preliminary Report.
Information for Immigrants.
Measures for distributing them.
Backward turn of the tide in 1908.

At a National Conference on the subject of Immigration, held
at New York in December, 1905, under the auspices of the
National Civic Federation, the Commissioner-General of
Immigration, Mr. Frank P. Sargent, presented some facts of the
immigration of the preceding statistical year which claimed
very grave consideration. During the twelve months ending June
30 there had been 1,026,499 arrivals in this country, and of
this number seven hundred and seventy-seven thousand, or 76
per cent., settled in six States—New York, Pennsylvania,
Massachusetts, Illinois, New Jersey, and Ohio. New York
received over three hundred and fifteen thousand, while the
West received only forty three thousand; Pennsylvania received
over two hundred and ten thousand, while the South received
only forty-six thousand. Fifty-seven thousand came to New
Jersey, while North Carolina’s share was one hundred and
eighty-three. These figures gave point to Mr. Sargent’s
statement that the immigrants go where their friends are.
Their only sources of information concerning this country are
the agents of the transportation companies and their friends
who have come here before. The resulting lack of knowledge
concerning those parts of the country in which they are most
needed is the chief cause of the congestion in the large
cities and the more densely populated States which is one of
the most serious aspects of the immigration problem.

Nearly twelve thousand immigrants were refused admission
during the year, of whom eight thousand were paupers, two
thousand diseased, and one thousand brought in violation of
the contract labour law. "It is right," said Mr. Sargent,
"that they should be denied admission, wrong that they ever
should have been started from home."

In the new Immigration Law enacted by Congress in February,
1907, provision was made for giving information to immigrants,
after their landing in the country, such as may guide them in
the choice of their place of settlement. It authorized the
Commissioner-General of Immigration to establish a Division of
Information, the duty of which shall be "to promote a
beneficial distribution of aliens admitted into the United
States among the several States and Territories desiring
immigration." To which end "correspondence shall be had with
the proper officials of the States and Territories, and said
division shall gather from all available sources useful
information regarding the resources, products, and physical
characteristics of each State and Territory, and shall publish
such information in different languages and distribute the
publications among all admitted aliens who may ask for such
information at the immigrant stations of the United States and
to such other persons as may desire the same." Agents
appointed by any State or Territory to represent to arriving
immigrants the inducements it can offer to them are to have
perfect freedom and opportunity to do so.

{310}

For checking the immigration of prohibited classes of aliens
at the foreign starting-points of their journey to America,
instead of at the landing places on this side of the ocean,
the new law only lays more rigid restrictions and heavier
penalties on the transportation companies, to make them
exercise a more careful discrimination in their acceptance of
passengers. It adds several classes to the former list of
aliens to be excluded from admission to the United States. The
list now reads: "All idiots, imbeciles, feeble-minded persons,
epileptics, insane persons, and persons who have been insane
within five years previous; persons who have had two or more
attacks of insanity at any time previously; paupers; persons
likely to become a public charge; professional beggars;
persons afflicted with tuberculosis or with a loathsome or
dangerous contagious disease; persons not comprehended within
any of the foregoing excluded classes who are found to be and
are certified by the examining surgeon as being mentally or
physically defective, such mental or physical defect being of
a nature which may affect the ability of such alien to earn a
living; persons who have been convicted of or admit having
committed a felony or other crime or misdemeanor involving
moral turpitude; polygamists, or persons who admit their
belief in the practice of polygamy, anarchists, or persons who
believe in or advocate the overthrow by force or violence of
the Government of the United States, or of all government, or
of all forms of law, or the assassination of public officials:
prostitutes, or women or girls coming into the United States
for the purpose of prostitution or for any other immoral
purpose; persons who procure or attempt to bring in
prostitutes or women or girls for the purpose of prostitution
or for any other immoral purpose,"—together with contract
laborers, so called, assisted immigrants, and children under
sixteen years of age unaccompanied by one or both of their
parents.

The new law created a Commission to investigate the subject of
immigration and to report its findings and recommendations to
Congress. The Commission to be composed of three Senators,
three Representatives, and three persons to be appointed by
the President. A preliminary report from this Commission was
presented to Congress on the 1st of March, 1909. This
indicated no more than the progress that had been made in a
most exhaustive investigation, which probably would require
the greater part of another year to carry it to completion. It
was covering every phase of the immigration question,
including Oriental aliens and other excluded classes, peonage,
charity among immigrants, white slave traffic, conditions of
steerage, anthropology, congestion in large cities, alien
criminality, competition of immigrants, school inquiries,
administration of the immigration laws, distribution of
immigrants, and other questions. In its work the Commission
had employed 198 persons, of whom 82 were in Washington, 2 in
New York, 2 in San Francisco, 92 in field work, and 20 in
special lines of inquiry.

The preliminary report of the Commission indicates that the
present provisions of law for the exclusion of undesirable
persons are stronger in theory than they are effective in
practice, and that thousands of very undesirable immigrants
enter the country every year. The Commission expresses a
confident expectation of finding means of prevention that will
be effective. It is conducting an inquiry of great importance
into the subject of alien criminality. The higher criminal
courts of New York city are keeping records, at its request,
in detail, of each person convicted of crime, and it is
intended that a study of foreign-born criminals, and criminals
of the second generation, will be made in that city. The
investigation, however, is not confined to the larger cities.

The Division of Information in the Department of Commerce and
Labor which the new Immigration Law provided for was organized
with Mr. Terence V. Powderly, former Commissioner-General of
Immigration, as its Chief. In July, 1909, there was an
announcement of its undertaking to bring about coöperation
with the Governors of States and Territories, in organized
measures to accomplish a better distribution through the
country of the foreigners that come to it.

Dr. L. Pierce Clark has lately called attention to the fact
that the increase of immigration into the United States has
reached the point of making the influx of aliens the principal
source of population, and that "its character has changed so
fundamentally that it has assumed an entirely new relation to
American social problems. Up to 1900 the average annual
immigration had not exceeded one-half of one per cent of the
population of the United States, and the races which had made
the first settlement in the country were still contributing
more than 75 per cent. of the whole number of arrivals. By
1901 the new immigration had fairly started, the English,
Irish, German, and Scandinavian had been supplanted by
Hebrews, Slavs, and Italians, and the impetus had been
received which, four years later, was to carry immigration
past the million-a-year mark. More than one-fifth of all the
immigrants who have come to this country have arrived since
1900, and, with the changed source of immigration, a
remarkable transformation in the composition of our
foreign-born population is in progress."

The industrial depression of 1907, however, produced evidence
that much of this later immigration has not been for permanent
settlement; that the facilitation and cheapening of travel
have brought about extensive movements of people, from
southern and southeastern Europe, especially, who come to
America only to earn and save a little fund which suffices for
a comfortable remainder of life in their own land. The check
to such earning which occurred in 1907 turned the tide of
migration instantly back from America to Europe. According to
statistics prepared by Mr. Watchorn, the late
Commissioner-General of Immigration, the excess of departures
over arrivals at the port of New York, in the half year from
January 1 to July 1, 1908, was 129,511. In the whole fiscal
year that ended June 30, 1908, the departures from New York
were 631,458; the arrivals 689,474; showing the gain of
population to the country that year from incomers through the
port of New York to have been only 58,016, even if all became
permanent inhabitants.

See, also (in this Volume)
RACE PROBLEMS, AND CANADA.

----------IMMIGRATION AND EMIGRATION: End--------

{311}

IMPERIAL CONFERENCE.

See (in this Volume)
BRITISH EMPIRE: A. D. 1907.

IMPERIAL PRESS CONFERENCE, The.

See (in this Volume)
BRITISH EMPIRE: A. D. 1909 (JUNE).

INCOME TAX:
Proposed amendment to the U. S. Constitution.

See (in this Volume)
UNITED STATES: A. D. 1909 (JULY).

INDEMNITY FOR THE BOXER RISING:
Remittance of part of it by the United States.

See (in this Volume)
CHINA: A. D. 1901-1908.

INDEPENDENCE LEAGUE.

See (in this Volume)
NEW YORK CITY: A. D. 1905, and
NEW YORK STATE: A. D. 1906-1910.

INDEPENDENCE PARTY, or KOSSUTH PARTY.

See (in this Volume)
AUSTRIA-HUNGARY: A. D. 1902-1903, and 1904.

INDEPENDENT FILIPINO CHURCH.

See (in this Volume)
PHILIPPINE ISLANDS: A. D. 1902.

INDEPENDENT LABOR PARTY, BRITISH.

See (in this Volume)
ENGLAND: A. D. 1903, and 1905-1906; also,
SOCIALISM: ENGLAND.

INDEPENDENTS.

See (in this Volume)
PHILIPPINE ISLANDS: A. D. 1907.

INDEPENDISTAS.

See (in this Volume)
PHILIPPINE ISLANDS: A. D. 1907.

INDETERMINATE SENTENCES.

See (in this Volume)
CRIME AND CRIMINOLOGY.

----------INDIA: Start--------

INDIA: A. D. 1902-1903.
Ravages of the Bubonic Plague.

See (in this Volume)
PUBLIC HEALTH: BUBONIC PLAGUE.

INDIA: A. D. 1902-1904.
Forced opening of Tibet to trade.
The mission and expedition of Colonel Younghusband.

See (in this Volume)
TIBET: A. D. 1902-1904.

INDIA: A. D. 1903.
The question of Indian Labor in South Africa.

See (in this Volume)
SOUTH AFRICA: A. D. 1903.

INDIA: A. D. 1903 (January).
Great Durbar at Delhi.

A great _Durbar_ or reception was held at Delhi, on the
first of January, 1903, by the Viceroy and by the Duke and
Duchess of Connaught, specially deputed to represent their
majesties the Emperor and Empress of India. About 100 ruling
chiefs were in attendance, and the visitors drawn by the
spectacle were estimated to number 173,000.

INDIA: A. D. 1903-1908.
Hostility in the Transvaal to British Indian Immigration.

See (in this Volume)
RACE PROBLEMS: SOUTH AFRICA: A. D. 1903-1908.

INDIA: A. D. 1904-1909.
Coöperative Industrial Movement.

See (in this Volume)
LABOR ORGANIZATION: INDIA.

INDIA: A. D. 1905 (April).
Terrific earthquake in the Punjab and United Provinces.

See (in this Volume)
EARTHQUAKES: INDIA: A. D. 1905.

INDIA: A. D. 1905 (August).
Resignation of Lord Curzon.

Announcement of the resignation of the Viceroyalty by Lord
Curzon was made August 21. The immediate cause of his action
was understood to be the refusal of the Home Government to
approve his nomination of an officer, General Barrow, whom he
wished to have placed on the Viceroy’s Council. But friction
between Lord Curzon and the Commander-in-Chief in India, Lord
Kitchener, over questions of military administration and the
authority belonging to their respective offices had been
troublesome for some time past, and the Viceroy had seemed to
regard the attitude of the government at home as more
favorable to Lord Kitchener than to himself.

INDIA: A. D. 1905 (August).
Agreement concerning India between Great Britain and Japan.

See (in this Volume)
Japan: A. D. 1905 (August).

INDIA: A. D. 1905-1908.
The Starving Poverty of the Mass of the People.

"Suppose we divide the past century into quarters, or periods
of twenty-five years each. In the first quarter there were
five famines, with an estimated loss of life of 1,000,000.
During the second quarter of the century were two famines,
with an estimated mortality of 500,000. During the third
quarter there there were six famines, with a recorded loss of
life of 5,000,000. During the last quarter of the century,
what? Eighteen famines, with an estimated mortality reaching
the awful totals of from 15,000,000 to 26,000,000. And this
does not include the many more millions (over 6,000,000 in a
single year) barely kept alive by government doles.

"What is the cause of these famines, and this appalling
increase in their number and destructiveness. The common
answer is, the failure of the rains. But there seems to be no
evidence that the rains fail worse now than they did a hundred
years ago. Moreover, why should failure of rains bring famine?
The rains have never failed over areas so extensive as to
prevent the raising of enough food in the land to supply the
needs of the entire population. Why then have people starved?
… Because they were so indescribably poor. All candid and
thorough investigation into the causes of the famines of India
has shown that the chief and fundamental cause has been and is
the poverty of the people,—a poverty so severe and terrible
that it keeps the majority of the entire population on the
very verge of starvation even in years of greatest plenty. …

"And the people are growing poorer and poorer. The late Mr.
William Digby, of London, long an Indian resident, in his
recent book entitled, _Prosperous India_, shows from
official estimates and Parliamentary and Indian Blue Books,
that, whereas the average daily income of the people of India
in the year 1850 was estimated as four cents per person (a
pittance on which one wonders that any human being can live),
in 1882 it had fallen to three cents per person and in 1900
actually to less than two cents per person. Is it any wonder
that people reduced to such extremities as this can lay up
nothing? …

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"One cause of India’s impoverishment is heavy taxation.
Taxation in England and Scotland is high, so high that
Englishmen and Scotchmen complain bitterly. But the people of
India are taxed more than twice as heavily as the people of
England and three times as heavily as those of Scotland.
According to the latest statistics at hand, those of 1905, the
annual average income per person in India is about $6.00,
and the annual tax per person about $2.00. …

"Notice the single item of salt-taxation. Salt is an absolute
necessity to the people, to the very poorest; they must have
it or die. But the tax upon it which for many years they have
been compelled to pay has been much greater than the cost
value of the salt. Under this taxation the quantity of salt
consumed has been reduced actually to one-half the quantity
declared by medical authorities to be absolutely necessary for
health. …

"Another cause of India’s impoverishment is the destruction of
her manufactures, as the result of British rule. … Great
Britain wanted India’s markets. She could not find entrance
for British manufactures so long as India was supplied with
manufactures of her own. So those of India must be sacrificed.
England had all power in her hands, and so she proceeded to
pass tariff and excise laws that ruined the manufactures of
India and secured the market for her own goods.

"A third cause of India’s impoverishment is the enormous and
wholly unnecessary cost of her government. …

"Another burden upon the people of India which they ought not
to be compelled to bear, and which does much to increase their
poverty, is the enormously heavy military expenses of the
government. …

"Perhaps the greatest of all the causes of the impoverishment
of the Indian people is the steady and enormous drain of
wealth from India to England, which has been going on ever
since the East India Company first set foot in the land, three
hundred years ago, and is still going on with steadily
increasing Volume. … Says Mr. R. C. Dutt, author of the
_Economic History of India_ (and there is no higher
authority), ‘A sum reckoned at twenty millions of English
money, or a hundred millions of American money [some other
authorities put it much higher], which it should be borne in
mind is equal to half the net revenues of India, is remitted
annually from this country [India] to England, without a
direct equivalent.’"

_J. T. Sunderland,
The New Nationalist Movement in India
(Atlantic Monthly, October, 1908)._

INDIA: A. D. 1905-1909.
The Partition of Bengal.
Resentment and Disaffection of the Bengalese.
The Swadeshi Movement.
Reported improvement of conditions in the new province of
Eastern Bengal and Assam.

The partition of Bengal, in October, 1905, one of the latest
measures of Lord Curzon’s administration of the Government of
India, gave rise to much native agitation and disaffection,
and is still under criticism in England, but not likely to be
undone. In the view of the Anglo-Indian Government the
partition was a necessity, because of the magnitude of the
province, in territory and population, which made the task of
provincial administration too difficult. It was far the
largest of the administrative divisions of British India,
containing nearly a third of the Indian subjects of the
English King. Assam, formerly joined with it, had been
separated from it administratively in 1874, under a Chief
Commissioner. Fifteen of the eastern districts of Bengal,
adjacent to Assam, were now united with the latter to form a
new province, called Eastern Bengal and Assam, and this
disruption of the old province was resented very passionately
by a large part of the Bengalese. They refused to believe the
reasons given for the partition, but gave it an offensive
explanation, which one of the native journals in Calcutta put
briefly as follows: "The objects of the scheme are, briefly,
first, to destroy the collective power of the Bengali people;
secondly, to overthrow the political ascendency of Calcutta;
and, thirdly, to foster in East Bengal the growth of a
Mohammedan power which it is supposed will have the effect of
keeping in check the rapidly growing strength of the educated
Hindu community." In the official British view, on the other
hand, the whole stir of Bengalese feeling was artfully wrought
up for mischievous ends; but it is easier to believe that
something in the nature of a historic sentiment of nationality
was really hurt and angered by the partition. Yet Bengal
cannot be said to have had anything that resembled a distinct
national history for many centuries before it came under the
rule of the British East India Company, in 1765. Nor had its
name been precisely and continuously attached to any
well-defined territory.

Whatever the source of excited feeling may have been, however,
it was ardent and persistent, especially in the educated
class, and it gave a start to what received the name of the
Swadeshi or national movement of hostility to all things
English, directed mainly to the boycotting of English
merchandise, and to the organization of efforts for promoting
home production in all industrial fields. The Swadeshi
movement soon spread beyond Bengal; but its stimulations have
been centered there. The intensity of the feeling in Bengal
was such that on the 16th of October, 1905, when the partition
took effect, the Hindus of Calcutta put on mourning garments,
suspended business and work, and vowed that its anniversaries
should be memorial mourning days. Pupils in native schools
became so offensive in their anti-English demonstrations that
the Lieutenant-Governor of the new province, Sir Bampfylde
Fuller, in February, 1906, unwisely requested the Calcutta
University to disaffiliate two schools in the Pabna district,
taking away the pecuniary aid they received. The request was
disapproved by Lord Curzon’s successor in the Viceroyalty,
Lord Minto, and rather than withdraw it the
Lieutenant-Governor resigned.

In the winter of 1909 the London _Times_ sent a special
correspondent into Eastern Bengal to study the results of the
partition, so far as developed in three years. His
observations and conclusions were communicated in a long,
interesting letter from Dacca, February 15th. He wrote:

"No one can visit the new province, and endeavour to inquire
impartially into its condition before the ‘partition,’ without
realizing that some administrative division of Bengal had
become imperative. Until five years ago, Eastern Bengal was
the ‘Cinderella’ of the provinces of India. Good
administration stopped short on the line of the Ganges. Beyond
that line officers were few, and the interest of the central
authorities in their work and in the welfare of the people in
their charge was comparatively limited. …
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Land revenue administration was persistently neglected in the
temporary settled tracts. Calcutta and its immediate vicinity,
and the more accessible districts of Old Bengal, absorbed the
greater part of the time and attention of the Bengal
Government. Money was poured out upon Calcutta and its
environs, and Eastern Bengal was financially starved. Very
little was spent upon education, and the whole riverain region
was most inadequately policed. Crime was far more rife in the
southern districts of the province than in any other part of
India. The peasantry groaned beneath the exactions of the
representatives of absentee landlords, and they were left
unregarded and unprotected. The whole province suffered
because its rulers were immersed in the preoccupations of
Calcutta. The very railways were constructed, not to serve the
needs of these 30 millions of people, but to meet the
requirements of the city on the Hughli. …

"It is remarkable to note how, in the short space of three
years, the old deplorable conditions of Eastern Bengal have
already undergone a satisfactory process of modification. The
province is no longer content to be dragged at the tail of Old
Bengal. A new and independent provincial spirit is springing
up. Eastern Bengal is beginning to recognize all that a
separate existence means to it. Its Civil servants, from the
Lieutenant-Governor downwards, take a pride in the great work
of regeneration which has been entrusted to them. Their task
is enormous, and the workers are far too few. They are like
men who have been set to create a new colony out of a land of
chaos. They have before them almost as formidable an
undertaking as the making of modern Egypt, but it is an Egypt
of green rice-fields with half-a-dozen Niles. …

"The demand for higher education in Eastern Bengal is perhaps
greater than in any other part of India. The admirable
Government College at Dacca has now been provided with
splendid buildings, begun, however, before the 'partition.'
The whole province is being supplied with a set of colleges
adequate to its needs. The staffs of the colleges are being
augmented and their administration overhauled. The principal
private colleges are also being assisted with liberal grants
and transformed into institutions which will give a sound
education. The exceptionally large number of 'high' English
schools in Eastern Bengal had also been greatly neglected,
both those under the Government and those in private hands.
All are now being improved, and are receiving liberal
assistance. …

"Another important task undertaken by the new Government is
that of conducting an elaborate survey and framing a Record of
Rights in the zemindari tracts which constitute the bulk of
the province. The undertaking was devised before the
‘partition,’ but it has been expedited by the change. It is an
extraordinary thing that in all these permanently settled
areas there has been hitherto no record and no map. The
consequence was that the cultivators were constantly bullied
and harassed by the agents of the absentee zemindars, and were
never able to feel any reasonable security of tenure of the
land they tilled. Land disputes were incessant, and were
constantly accompanied by loss of life. In the Backergunge
district, the most turbulent area in India, there were
frequent riots, of which murders were an almost invariable
feature. Since the framing of the Record of Rights in
Backergunge this class of crime has already decreased by 50
per cent.

"I have yet to meet anybody, English or Indian, who can tell
me in what respect the ‘partition’ has injured a single living
soul; while one has only to visit this province, invigorated
with new life and inspired by new aspirations, to realize the
benefits the severance has conferred upon millions of
neglected people. To alter or to modify it now would be
suicidal folly; it would be worse, for it would be a criminal
blunder. It would not placate the wordy ‘patriots’ of
Calcutta, who have used the ‘partition’ as a rallying cry for
lack of a better grievance; and it would alienate the 18
millions of backward Mahomedans in the province who have
placed their alliance in British honour and British pledges.
The Nawab of Dacca, with whom I had a long conversation on the
subject, declared that any attempt to meddle with the
‘partition’—an attempt he still seemed to fear was
possible—would produce the most deplorable results among his
co-religionists. … Nor is there the slightest need for change
or modification. The ‘partition’ is already thrice justified
in the eyes of all men, save only a few malcontent members of
Parliament who know nothing of present conditions in Bengal.
Even in Calcutta the outcry, which was always less against the
fact of the ‘partition’ than against the motive which the
Bengalis erroneously believed to have prompted it, has long
ago died away. Yet, justifiable and necessary though the
‘partition’ was, it remains to be added that, apart from its
complex administrative problems, Eastern Bengal will never be
a very easy province to control. The high-caste Hindus, the
Brahmins, the Baidyas, and the Kayasths—the Brahmins and the
lesser Brahmins,—rule the roast, and it will be long years
before the teeming millions of Mahometan cultivators emerge
from their depressed condition. The few Mahomedan families who
can claim noble birth are decadent and disappearing. The
Hindus have absorbed their lands, the clever lawyers have
converted themselves into rich landowners. It is from the
ranks of these high-caste Hindus that are drawn the members of
the revolutionary societies to which I alluded in a
telegraphic despatch sent from this city yesterday. These
classes show a persistent and increasing spirit of hostility
to the British Raj which no amount of conciliatory measures
will overcome. It is impossible to move about the province and
to converse with the men who know it best without feeling that
the situation is full of dangerous possibilities. The men of
Eastern Bengal are more courageous, more determined, more
persistent than their compatriots in Old Bengal; and the
better classes of Hindus have qualities which are not easily
discernible in the Calcutta _babu_. They approach more
nearly to the spirit of the Mahrattas of the Deccan than any
other section of the people on this side of India. It is a
significant fact that most of the prisoners now under trial at
Alipur in connexion with the anarchist conspiracy came from
Eastern Bengal. But even as one writes one realizes how
difficult it is to generalize in this country of startling
paradox.
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Yesterday, in Dacca, 200 Hindu pundits assembled to present a
Sanscrit address to the Lieutenant-Governor, Sir Lancelot
Hare. Many of them had come long distances. They were all old
men with great nobility of countenance, some with long beards,
others with the face of the Cæsars. And at the conclusion of
the ceremony each kindly and venerable scholar advanced, and
with great dignity presented the Lieutenant-Governor with a
rose. From the bombs of last week to the roses of yesterday,
what a gulf lies between the two!"

INDIA: A. D. 1907.
Hostility in Western Canada to Hindu Laborers.

See (in this Volume)
RACE PROBLEMS: CANADA.

INDIA: A. D. 1907 (December).
Meeting and Resolution of the All-India Moslem League.
Mahomedan loyalty to the British Government.
A new factor in Indian politics.

"On December 30th last a Mahomedan Conference, in session at
Dacca, the capital of the newly-created Province of Eastern
Bengal, departing absolutely from its traditions, openly
discussed the question of the protection of Mahomedan
interests from a political standpoint, and finally carried
unanimously a motion for the formation of an ‘All-India Moslem
League’ to promote among the Mahomedans of India feelings of
loyalty to the British Government, and to remove any
misconceptions that may arise as to the intentions of
Government with regard to any of its measures; to protect and
to advance the political rights and interests of the
Mahomedans of India, and respectfully to represent their needs
and aspirations to Government, and to prevent the rise among
Mahomedans in India of any feelings of hostility towards other
communities, without prejudice to the other objects of the
League. A strong Provisional Committee was formed, with power
to add to its number, and the joint secretaries appointed were
the Nawabs Vicar-ul-mulk and Mohsin-ul-mulk, two of the most
important members of the Mahomedan community in India and men
of great intellectual capacity. The Committee was charged to
frame a constitution within a period of four months, and
further to convene a meeting of Indian Mahomedans at a
suitable time and place to lay the constitution before such
meeting for final approval and adoption. The Rubicon has been
crossed; the Mahomedans of India have forsaken the shades of
retirement for the political arena; henceforth a new factor in
Indian politics has to be reckoned with."

_E. E. Lang,
The All-India Moslem League
(Contemporary Review, September, 1907)._

INDIA: A. D. 1907-1908.
The Outbreak of Anarchism.
Summary Measures of Suppression.

The native disaffection in Bengal which became anarchistic in
its violence in 1907, and which perpetrated a number of
murders before it was suppressed, culminated on the 10th of
February, 1909, in the assassination of a prominent native
lawyer, Ashutosh Biswas, who had taken part in the prosecution
of some of the anarchists. Writing of that crime, from
Calcutta, a special correspondent of the London _Times_,
who had been pursuing an investigation of the terrorist
conspiracy from its beginning, gave an extended account of
what he had learned, part of which is given in the following:

"All that can be said with certainty is that the gospel of
violence, the creed which advocates the use of any form of
force against the British, is Mahratta in its origin; but so
far it is the Bengalis alone who have put it into practice. It
was conceived in Poona, which city has always continued to
inspire and direct it; it was transferred to Baroda, where it
flourished in secret among a limited circle; and it was
transplanted to Calcutta, where it grew apace, somewhere
between the years 1902 and 1904. Certain classes of Bengalis,
who are all adepts at intrigue, took up the new idea with
enthusiasm; but not all who knocked were admitted to the inner
circle. The real conspirators were still probably few in
number when the ‘partition’ of Bengal gave the politicians
their opportunity. The anarchists were furious at the
partition agitation. They were quite content that less
militant persons should prepare the ground for them, by
preaching to the people of the iniquities of the British Raj;
but they were reluctant to see the popular mind actively
diverted to such minor issues as _swadeshi_ and the
boycott. The extermination of the British was their one and
only aim.

"However, as the Congress politicians had succeeded in
arousing intense excitement about the partition, the anarchist
gang sought to turn the situation to their own advantage. …
Recruits were, however, only gradually admitted into the inner
ring; and there were many people who associated with the
anarchists, and sometimes furnished them with funds, who never
took part in their operations. Propaganda formed a prominent
feature of the anarchists’ work. In this department the worst
types of seditious journals, which have now disappeared,
played a great part. Such newspapers as the _Yugantar_
started ‘messes’ and ‘hostels,’ to which subscribers,
particularly those residing up-country, were invited to come
free of charge. They stayed for a day or two, heard the new
gospel preached, and then made way for others. …

"The existence of this considerable organization was not
really suspected by the police until after the attempt to
wreck Sir Andrew Fraser’s train in December, 1907. Some of the
anarchists were under suspicion, and were being watched as
notoriously disaffected persons, but even the shooting of Mr.
B. C. Allen, District Magistrate of Dacca, in the same month,
did not reveal the conspiracy. The police were, however, on
the right track; and a couple of days after two unfortunate
ladies had been killed by a bomb at Muzaffarpur, on April 30,
1908, they acted. At a house in Calcutta, and in a garden on
the outskirts, large seizures of bombs, explosives, and
revolvers were made and about 30 alleged anarchists were
arrested. Other arrests followed. The famous Manicktollah
garden was the principal scene of anarchist activity. It is so
secluded that one wonders it was ever discovered. Far on the
confines of Calcutta, through a network of mean huts beneath
waving palms, a series of winding paths leads to a couple of
mouldering gate-pillars innocent of any gate. Within, under
shady trees, stands a small building in the last stage of
disrepair. It is mean and dirty and squalid, the true squalor
of anarchism. If it is only in such a spot that any movement
can be hatched for the overthrow of the British Raj, then the
British Raj is safe for a long time.

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