234 WESTERN HEMISPHERE IMMIGRATION

In spite of prison statistics anyone who has lived among the Mexicans in this
country knows that they are not the criminals they are sometimes made out to
be. Statistics are often quoted to show that as high ag 10 to 15 per cent of the
inmates of our prisons are Mexicans, whereas they constitute a far less proportion
of our entire population. That is not a fair comparison, however, for I think
we all recognize that for some classes of our American population there are too
many criminals not in jail who ought to be. The Mexican never escapes, and,
in fact, in many, many instances it has been possible to prove that Mexicans
have been sent to jail for crimes for which they were not responsible just because
they did not know how to proteet themselves.

USUAL COMPARISONS ON IMPROPER BASIS

Furthermore, in comparing crime statistics in proportion to population one
should consider only the classes directly comparable. If the Mexican classed as
common labor were compared in regard to criminal proclivities with comparable
whites, viz, the class which ranks as common laborers, there is no question at
all that the Mexican would show far less tendency to crime than would the
American of the same class in proportion to numbers. The record shows that
even those who attack his presence here the most admit that he is ‘‘as a rule
peace loving, docile, and obedient,” and good to his family.
MEXICAN NOT UNRULY OR LAWLESS

Violations of prison laws and rules are eited as evidence of his-unruly disposition.
 The reason for this is that he can not comprehend the prison situation in
which he suddenly finds himself, without in many instances knowing why he is
there, and many of the broken rules are attributable to the simplicity of his
intelligence, rather than to eriminal tendencies or natural unruliness. Those who
have lived most with him and worked with him most closely agree that the Mexican
 averages unusually high in civic orderliness, law-abiding qualities, in so far as
he understands the laws, and in respect for public authority, and causes less
trouble of a civic or public nature than any other national of equal opportunity.
For example, Judge Moses, of Fort Worth, Tex., who was born in and has
spent his entire life in Texas, serving as district attorney and in other positions
of responsibility in that State, says:
‘‘ As the district attorney, of course, I was familiar with conditions of law and
order and lawlessness in that section of Texas. For the last 12 years a part of
my duties were to prosecute men charged with the theft of cattle and horses
belonging to members of this organization (Texas and Southwestern Cattle
Raisers Association), and in the discharge of those duties I visited from time to
time all portions of Texas in which there are range cattle, including the entire
western portion of the State, the northwestern, and the southern and southeastern
portions of the State.
“In the southeastern portion of Texas, in one county in Mr. Box’s district
and in two counties that are in Congressman Briggs’s district, in which there are
practically no Mexicans at all, there is more cattle stealing going on in those three
counties than there is in the entire congressional districts represented by Mr.
Garner and Mr. Hudspeth. I have attended court oftener at Beaumont, at
Liberty, and at Anahuac than I have in the congressional districts represented
by Messrs. Garner and Hudspeth. As district attorney and as a practicing
lawyer in that same district where I have had some little experience since I
resigned the office of district attorney, I can say that the percentage of Mexicans
in that district who are charged with violating the law is almost negligible.”
The probation officer of Ventura County, where one-third of the population is
Mexican, says that the Mexican, from his standpoint, makes a very good showing,
and that he has found by personal contact that the average Mexican is “very
easily handled when given the proper supervision, expresses a willingness to
cooperate and does show results that are gratifying.”

MEXICAN INHERENTLY HONEST
Ii these same hearings Mr. A. C. Hardison, as a director of the Santa Paula
Building and Loan Association, showed conclusively that the Mexicans as borrowers
 ‘have been more considerate and more attentive to the payment of their
loans than the whites, and give far less trouble in the collections.” If time permitted
 we would present testimony of bankers and others to the same effect.