376 WESTERN HEMISPHERE IMMIGRATION

Mr. Husuine., Referring to my charge against Mexican labor, it is
shiftless and thriftless. All authorities agree upon this point and the
charge is so true and so well known that details are unnecessary.
It is not healthy. The California Council of Social Work in 1925
made a study of the Mexican and found that in the Les Angeles
general hospital 43 per cent of all cases were Mexican. The city
maternity service of the same city reports that.62} per cent of all its
cases are Mexican, upon which 1t spends 73 per cent of its budget,
while the bureau of municipal nursing and the division of child welfare
both announce that 40 per cent of all their cases are from this group.
In Orange county, Calif., the Mexican population, which totals 10
per cent, just as in Los Angeles, provides 33% per cent of the general
hospital cases and in San Diego where 5 per cent are Mexicans, they
register 50 per cent of the clinical cases. The Mexican mortality
rate in Los Angeles County for 1926 was 124.6 as compared to 67.8
for the entire population. Mexico City, with an unequaled climate,
has the highest death rate of any city of like size in the world.
It can not be assimilated. Taylor reports that the Mexican is as
much opposed to intermarriage as the American, and if this did not,
stand in the way we should plan on bettering our stock rather than
lowering it as attempted assimilation of the Mexican peon would
tend to do for many, many years to come.
Mr. Chandler stated here last week that the Mexican was not a
problem like other immigrants, that he was not enterprising; that he
was docile; that after the crop season was over he returned to Mexico;
that he should not be barred; but, if he were, they would have to
then depend upon the Filipino as the only resource left. He also.
said there was no contract labor employed from Mexico and that
there was no unemployment in Los Angeles.
I agree with Mr. Chandler that the Mexican is not enterprising
but I do not agree with him as to the other points and I do know that
Mexican immigration is one of the greatest problems we have ever
had to solve.
I know he does not return to Mexico when the crops are harvested.
I find in Taylor's analysis of Mexican Labor in the Imperial Valley in.
the United States that “the best information from both employers:
and Mexicans indicates that the proportion of Mexicans who come
from Mexico to the Imperial Valley for seasonal employment and
who return to Mexico at the close of the season is very small, indeed.’
I know the Philippines is the only source left for them to turn to if
the Mexican is barred, but the Filipino also should be barred, and I
commend. Congressman Welsh’s bill (H. R. 8708) to you.
There is contract labor coming from Mexico and there are many
unemployed in Los Angeles, both Mexican and American, and in
other parts of the country also. In this connection I will read from
the December, 1929, issue of the Industrial Employment Information
Bulletin, which is published by the United States Employment
Service, Department of Labor, and which gives the employment conditions
 in the United States up to January 1, 1930.
I shall give only excerpts from these reports. First, is the State
of California, the reports saying that—
Cotton picking was still in progress during December, with sufficient labor
available. Pruning in orchards and winter sowing of crops employed some help..
The lettuce season was getting under way in Imperial Vallev. There will he a.