160 WESTERN HEMISPHERE IMMIGRATION

up, I would say, on the wages, looking at it from an argumentative
standpoint, and vice versa; it works both ways.
Mr. Austin. That would be true if you paid a different wage
rate to the Mexican from what you do to the ordinary laborer.
The laborer signs a contract. That contract is signed by all classes
of labor, whether of German extraction or Polish, or others. There
is no distinction at all between the wages and in the contract price.
Taking it from the number of days they work and the number of
acres one man can handle, in the testimony in the last hearings I
think it figured out between $3 and $4 a day that a Mexican actually
earns during the time he is actually engaged in beet work. In just a
few moments I will finish.
I merely mention these facts, Mr. Chairman, to demonstrate that
every attempt is made by our industry to induce unemploved labor
in the cities to go out in the beet fields to work.
While the lack of farm labor is being seriously felt in many agricultural
 industries, it is undoubtedly accentuated more fully in the
beet-sugar industry than in many others.
Restriction of immigration has had a very serious effect upon the
labor situation in our industry. Prior to the enactment of this legislation,
 there was an inflow of agricultural labor from northern Europe,
from which source our industry was able to draw. These people
were peculiarly adapted to labor in the beet fields, because of the
fact that the beet-sugar industry has been established in the Continent
for more than a century, and every farm laborer who came to this
country had had considerable experience in this character of work.
But since restrictive measures have been enacted those laborers who
had already come into this country and were working in the beet
fields have now advanced to the stage where they either own or rent
farms, and instead of being laborers are now employers. It is obvious,
therefore, that this condition has brought about a critical situation
n our industry.
Mr. Chairman, the time allotted to each witness is so short as to
preclude any very lengthy discussion of this serious problem. I have
endeavored simply to cover some of the high spots of the broader
subject of lack of farm labor for the consideration of this committee.
While the sociological phase of the subject is no doubt of importance.
from an economic viewpoint, it seems to me that it would be a great
calamity, after the farming interests in the West and Southwest
have become dependent to a great extent upon seasonal labor from
Mexico and Canada, to suddenly deprive them of this source, and by
50 doing work a harship upon them.
It is our hope, Mr. Chairman, that before any definite legislation
is enacted full information should be available as to the nature and
extent of the problem which it is desired to correct; also careful
sonsideration should be given as to whether the proposed legislation
would effect the desired result if passed, and an endeavor should be
made to find other means of attaining the same object which would
involve less injury to the agricultural interests of the country.
Speaking for our industry, we would welcome a general survey on the
ground by this committee, or some other body whose province it
would be to visit the various localities in which Mexican laborers
are used to any considerable extent, to study at first hand the sociological
 conditions, agricultural needs, and all other questions which