WESTERN HEMISPHERE IMMIGRATION 435

[s it not true that one rotten apple will cause all the others in the barrel to decay?
Can a man lift himself by pulling at his own bootstraps? What will happen to
American standards of living and American civilization “if we build it upon the
shifting sands of peon labor?
Speaking before the same club, Dr. S. J. Holmes, professor of zoology in the
University of California, stated: “Do we want to bring about the mongrelization
»f America? We are, in a certain sense a melting pot, but, if you want a real
melting pot, go down to South America; there you will see how it works. Go over
to Egypt * * * Aslong as we continually feed in cheap labor and go lower
and lower in our efforts to get cheap labor to supply our menial tasks, why the
more our civilization is going to be composed of inferior material, and the more
apt our civilization is to suffer the fate of nations that have tried that same
experiment in the past, to their sorrow.”
The American people must realize that it is not the selfish welfare and profits
of a puny cotton industry or a few transient copper mines or a small section
of a transcontinental railroad or a few vegetables and beet growers that are at
stake in this question. The problem is immeasurably greater and broader than
that. It is whether we shall preserve the Southwest as a future home for millions
of the white race or permit this vast region to continue to be used as it now is
veing used, as a dumping ground for the human hordes of poverty stricken peon
Indians of Mexico. We must decide now before it is too late whether we wish the
complete Mexicanization of this section of our country with all which that
implies—enormous decreases in the value of all property; an economic organization
 based upon peon labor, exploitation and oppression; the complete nullification
 of the benefits derived from the restriction of European and the exclusion of
oriental immigration; a lowering of all our standards of morals and of our political
and social ideals; the creation of a race problem that will dwarf the negro problem
of the South; and the practical destruction, at least for centuries, of all that is
worth while in our white civilization. The Mexican knows if present conditions
continue that he will be able to control the labor situation in the Southwest
more effectively as time goes on, and that from there his power will extend to the
uttermost parts of our country. Therefore, he works as he pleases and cares
nothing for “Gringo efficiency.” He faces the future with apparent equanimity.
Once again he sees himself in control of the land—not by military power but by a
peaceful invasion; the victory of which will be more effective than that of any
possible army that could assault us from the South. Many of the Mexicans
frankly state this to be their purpose. Indeed, the prevailing sentiment throughout
 the Southwest seems to be that the border line seems to apply only to the
Gringo and that it exists for the purpose of keeping Americans out of Mexico.
A prominent American lawyer residing in a border city filed a claim in September,
 1929, with the United States Government in behalf of a client who had been
robbed by Mexicans. This significant statement appears in the documents
submitted: “Any time the Mexicans from the other side have wanted to raid
over here, they could always count upon the help of their people on this side—
and the incompetence and unconcern of American officers. Only last winter
8 or 10 came over with handkerchiefs over their faces and raided a commissary,
and escaped back safely with their plunder. The officials in Guadalupe knew
who they were, saw them bringing over the stuff, robbed the robbers of half their
booty, and justice was satisfied. Nothing but a little bluster on the part of the
deputy sheriffs was done over here. Our Mexicanized newspapers gave the story
half a dozen lines. If Americans should go over to rob on the other side (though
there is nothing over there worth stealing), they would have the whole countryside
 to fight, and the Mexicans this side would snipe them as they returned.”
A careful check seems to indicate that if a vote were taken on the border,
fully two-thirds of the people would be in favor of excluding the Mexicans. But
this majority is unorganized, whereas the opposition is highly organized and ean
make an awful noise before Congress and the public. The dominant few throughjut
 the entire Southwest control the press, form the conventions which send out
their propaganda and publish their resolutions, and cry out that their crops are
perishing and their industries going into financial ruin for lack of labor, when the
fact seems to be that most of the Mexicans on this side of the border—some say
9 out of every 10—are idle all or most of the time. Only the newcomers will
work except in extreme necessity, for as one resident on the border put it: “They
soon learn that it is as easy to live and starve by smuggling, bootlegging, stealing,
and the prostitution of their women patronized by white men, as it is to live and
starve by hard labor.”