izing courts, to whom, and never to the aliens themselves, the Department sends the certificates. The clerks are instructed not to accept petitions for naturalization from aliens who arrived after June 29, 1906, until after the necessary certificates of arrival are in their possession. Petitions filed by such aliens are not complete or valid unless at the time they are filed the certificates of arrival are attached thereto and made parts thereof. But in 1921 155 petitions incomplete and invalid because not so supported were filed and in due course denied, and $620 collected therefor. That was one of the things that occupied the time of the official force of 2,772 and helped to swell that total of a million pieces of mail.

One hundred and forty-six petitions for naturalization were denied in 1921 because the people who filed them were "Unable to Produce Witnesses or Depositions." Depositions are written statements taken to prove residence in States other than that of filing. Sometimes they can't be furnished. And sometimes the original verifying witnesses move away and other competent ones can't be found (substitution is permitted under these circumstances), and that's the end of it, and the petitions so defective have to be denied. It's a relief to chronicle a cause like that.

But "Premature Petition" is another matter. There were only 42 of those in 1921, but surely that was 42 too many,

for "Premature Petition" means petitions filed before the declarations of intention upon which they were based were two years old. Such petitions the clerks of the 2,265 naturalizing courts are strictly forbidden to accept, but when they have accepted them they are permitted and required to collect four dollars from each petitioner so misled, and the Government duly pockets half of it.

The fifteenth cause of denial is "Section 2169." Section 2169 of the Revised Statutes (on the books since 1875) says that only white persons and Africans may be naturalized. The 20 who were denied under that head during 1921 thought they were white within the meaning of the law, and were held by the courts to which they applied to be non-white. It has been a vexatious and confusing matter. The Bureau of Naturalization has held varied and conflicting views about it. At one time the Bureau even ludicrously undertook to limit the application of this statute to Europeans. Some courts have been beguiled into holding that Japanese and Hindus are white persons and have naturalized them, and so subjected them to the annoyance and humiliation of having their certificates of naturalization canceled by other courts. If there's any doubt about you, you have to go through the mill to find out what you are. It would seem that common courtesy to the other nations demands

that Congress specify which it means by "white" and which it doesn't.

That's the last of the tests by which the sheep are parted from the goats. Even this cursory examination of the fifteen of these tests shows that most of the 18,981 turned back in 1921 were made the goats by us, and were not inherently different from the sheep. Most of them should have come in.

What can be done about it? That of course is for Congress to say, but it ought to do something.

When an alien cannot be naturalized, he should be told so at once, without the present drain on his time and money and affection for America. There is no sense in feeding him through the mills of the law just to tell him at the end that his first paper is invalid, that he is already a citizen, that he hasn't lived here long enough, that he has come in the wrong court, that the clerk forgot to get a certificate of arrival for him, that his first paper is not two years old, or that he is not a white man. We ought to fix it somehow so that the official force of 2,772 persons can tell him that in the beginning. It is more important than examining 393,000 documents a year, interviewing half a million people, and handling a million pieces of mail. Our naturalization machinery functions not wisely but too well. Quite uselessly it is making enemies of moral and intelligent aliens whom we need for friends.

BY BRUNO ROSELLI

L

EONIDA BISSOLATI, one of the greatest political figures of modern Italy, died two years ago "of a broken heart because his beloved Wilson gave Italy too much in the north and too little in the east." In this paradoxical newspaper phrase is much food for thought. The situation in the Alto Adige (or upper part of the valley of the river Adige, as the Italians call the former Süd-Tirol) is avowedly one in which ethnical and geographical claims, each unusually potent, come to a clash. The Peace Conference unanimously awarded the district to Italy, in order to grant to her the completion of "God's boundary"-the stupendous amphitheater of the Alps. Thus three hundred thousand Teutons (or onetenth the number of Teutons awarded to Czechoslovakia on the same geographical grounds) became citizens of Italy, hitherto the most racially homogeneous of European countries. Signor Credaro, the Minister of Liberated Lands, is accused by the majority of educated Italians, led by the authoritative "Corriere della Sera" of Milan, of a laissez-faire verging on pro-Germanism in dealing with those populations. On the other hand, one hears in America all sorts of

"Serve? Where?"

"Here, on that mountain, where I lost these fingers," he replied, turning his eyes upon one of the superb peaks of the Dolomites and showing a badly shattered hand.

Human sympathy replaced the feelings born of the war which had hitherto occupied my mind. "And how do you manage to work, now, in that condition?"

"I do not work. As a mutilato of the Austrian army the Italian Government pays me a monthly allowance."

Here was indeed food for thought, especially for those Americans who whimper over Italy's "tyrannical" treatment of the Alto Adige. For that matter, Italy could not hold this rebellious region for a month if she acted tyrannically-no matter what the decisions of the Peace Conference, which took Fiume from Italy and gave her Bozen, in order to obtain Italian connivance to French encroachments upon the Rhineland and to create on the east of Italy a powerful Jugoslavia which would keep her busy in that quarter.

Later in the day I came across a Triestino who was staying at my hotel. When I recounted my conversation with the mutilato, "These people are angry," he said, "extremely angry with the Italian Government. Of course the Government has not treated them rightly; they have not yet been allowed to change into

lire, at par, the Austrian kroner which they held in the bank before the armistice."

"But how can they expect that?" I retorted. "An Italian lira is worth at least ten Austrian crowns to-day!"

"I know, but that is what they want, and they won't be loyal until they get it. After all, it is not their fault if their currency has depreciated."

Surely this was a new angle from which to look at the situation. I smiled to myself, wondering whether it is my fault that the lira itself, which used to be worth twenty cents, is now worth four, and if it is the fault of a certain member of my family in Florence that his monthly pension of three hundred lire, which used to pay the rent of a villa for the whole summer, now represents just the cost of a good pair of shoes.

When I returned to my hotel, the landlady reminded me, in fair English, that I had not yet registered. "I had entirely forgotten that," I answered inadvertently in Italian.

"Please do not speak that detestable language," she retorted in the harshest German.

"Why do you stay on the Italian side of the new frontier?" I asked, in the language of compromise.

"Because I like my three meals a day. People are too poor over there. Their money is worth almost nothing. But wait, and you will see. Very soon our savings will be officially changed into lire. Then we shall go across and

change our money again, at any banker's. For every lira ten, twelve, perhaps fifteen crowns. We shall be very rich then, do you see?"

Oh, yes, I saw. I also saw that in the room where I was led to register were two huge atrocious portraits of Bismarck and Metternich, and below them an Austrian helmet and one of those horrible maces with which our late enemy intended to "inspire awe." I also saw that the printed headings of the hotel register were entirely in German, and I made sure that it was not a left-over from pre-bellum days, but a recent acquisition fresh from Vienna.

It was a relief to go out and see a couple of Italian Alpine officers pass by, bound for some post far up on the heights. I greeted them and offered my company, which was readily accepted, and unbosomed myself of my anger.

was

If you have ever lived any time among these superb mountain gentlemen, who differ as much from the rough mountaineers as the country gentleman differs from the contadino, you will know what magnificent types of well-balanced, It serene humanity they are. proved to me again on that day. "Professor, you live in cities, transitory like all man-made things. We live among God's own eternal mountains. You help shape transitory policies; we deal in men's unchangeable feelings. We know that while the present generation of embittered ex-Austrian fighters lives any attempt at Italianization will seem to them to savor of tyranny. Granted that Signor Gredaro went rather far when he wrote the preface for a pan-Germanistic book on the Alto Adige, and reiterated the right of these Tyrolese populations to be left undisturbed in their Teutonism. But it is no treason to say that the general idea is correct. The Trentini were right when they sang: 'When the Adige shall flow into the Danube instead of the Adriatic, then we shall feel Austrian and not Italian.' Of course the line of the Alps, the tremendous and obvious boundary between Italians and non-Italians, is to be kept safe by our uniforms. But, mark my words! We are doing just the right thing. An efficient line of Alpine posts at the frontier, above the level of human habitations, and precious few uniforms below. No tyranny, no denationalization, no forcible absorption; in other words, no repetition against the northernmost part of the new territory of the measures which made Austria so bitterly hated in the southernmost part before the war."

Those were truly words of wisdom. And when we parted and I proceeded toward the station, and saw the tobacconist parading the regulation Italian coat of arms surrounded by a German inscription, and witnessed the scene of a formal address of welcome in the German tongue by the mayor of the town to a group of distinguished American visitors, and beheld at the station a halfdozen porters still wearing the little

Austrian caps with the inscription "Dienst," and when the conductor of a local train, wearing the attire of all Italian conductors, refused to speak Italian to me, I felt proud and hopeful: proud that Italy has learned how to

be free from the retaliatory mania; and hopeful that a country which knew how to absorb the French of Piedmont, the Germans of Lombardy, the Slavs of Venetia, the Spaniards of Sardinia, the Greeks of Sicily, and the Albanians of

Apulia will ultimately, by this same generous method of non-interference, write -not soon perhaps, but well-another chapter in the history of assimilation of foreign races in the land so markedly circumscribed by the Alps and the triple sea.

I

N Daniel Webster's address before the Historical Society he tells us: "I learned from the reports of controversies in the courts of law of the pursuits and occupations of individuals and of the objects which most earnestly engaged their attention." This was Mr. Webster's last public address in New York City, and it finds illustrations in the current reports of decided cases.

In a recent decision of the United States Circuit Court of Appeals in the Seventh Circuit, in which that Court dealt with the controversies between the United Mine Workers of America and some of the independent coal operators in West Virginia, we find the Court stating the following facts respecting the organization known as the United Mine Workers of America:'

"The evidence shows that members of the Mine Workers Union purchased firearms and ammunition and otherwise financed the violent activities in behalf of the unionizing forces in West Virginia, and this state of war continued until the President sent troops into the State, and it is only held in abeyance because of that fact.

"The evidence shows that the revenues of the Mine Workers Union are produced from dues and assessments laid upon the members; that these fines and assessments are, by an arrangement between the miners' organization and the operators, taken from the wages of the workers in the mines by the operators and paid by them to the organization of mine workers. This is the 'check-off' system. The membership is large and the dues and assessments yield an

enormous sum.

"Statements made by officers of the United Mine Workers show that the miners' organization has sent into West Virginia to carry on this struggle more than two and a half million dollars, and the secretary-treasurer of that organization, in his report to the Convention recently held in this city, stated that during the year ending August 1, 1921, the organization had sent into West Virginia more than a million dollars. This money was derived from the 'checkoff' system, and was sent to West Virginia to assist in the effort to organize the West Virginia field."

The system of the Mine Workers Union in all the districts where it has succeeded in what it calls "unionizing" the mines is this. No man is allowed

1 Ora Gasaway v. Borderland Coal Corporation. Chicago "Legal News," December 22,

1921.

to work in the mines unless he is a member of the union. When he becomes a member, he is required to sign a contract that his dues to the union shall be deducted from his pay and sent by the company to the treasurer of the union. As long as he remains a member of the union this contract remains in force. The only way he can get rid of it is by resigning from the union, in which case he loses his job. Another illustration of the work of trade unions is to be found in the testimony taken before the Lockwood Committee of the New York Senate, which was published in the New York "Times" on December 6, 1921.

There is a brotherhood of electrical workers in New York City. Unlike the miners' union, it does not seek to attract members to it, but has succeeded in enforcing a regulation of its own that no electrical worker should be permitted to put in work in the city of New York unless he pays to the union, if he be a journeyman $130 a year, and if he be a helper $52 a year. Additional testimony was given by one of the officers of the union that there was "no bookkeeping system to look at," and it appears that there was a large leak in the accounts of the union and that some of its officers had accumulated private property by methods not disclosed but which can be readily surmised.

The facts which have been thus disclosed call public attention to a condition that ought to be surprising and is familiar. Practically the unions are not subject to any public authority whatever; they are not incorporated, they are not required to keep or publish any accounts of their receipts and expenditures, as corporations are. They have large incomes, amounting in many cases to millions of dollars annually, and have accumulated funds, some of them to the amount of many millions. They are exempt from taxation; in short, they are a privileged class. Beginning as a protest against what was in many cases injustice, they have become great and powerful. Some of their leaders undoubtedly are sincere men who seek what they consider public good, but others are ambitious and have been encouraged to be lawless because of the privileges extended to them.

What the public has a right to ask is that all trade unions should be required to keep accounts of their receipts and expenses, that these accounts should be subject to the inspection of some public authority, and that a summary of them

should be published. All this is just as important for the members of the union as it is for the public.

It is hardly possible, for example, that the electrical workers would approve the blackmail that, according to this testimony, has been practiced by their offi cers. But, apart from this, no democracy can continue to prosper which tolerates the existence of a privileged class, having unlimited authority to raise money which, in the end, comes out of the pockets of those who have no voice in the management, and of associations which do not contribute in any way to the support of the Government. Every loyal citizen ought to be glad to do his part to support the Government that gives him protection.

For the purpose of removing the anomalies to which attention has just been called, it has been proposed to require the trade unions to become incorporated. The difficulty here is that their members are not willing to become incorporated, and it would be a difficult and perhaps impossible task to compel persons to incorporate against their will. Another method much more feasible is suggested by an examination of the Federal Tax Law which was approved by the President on November 23 last. Under 6 and 2 of this act we find the following clause: "The term corporation includes associations, joint stock companies, and insurance companies." Trade unions are certainly associations, and they would be taxable under the provisions of this law and required to account, as corporations are, were it not for a special exemption in Section 231. This provides that the "following organizations shall be exempt from taxation under this article: (1) Labor, agricultural, or horticultural organizations."

Whatever reason there may be for exempting from taxation agricultural or horticultural organizations we need not consider. But the facts already stated show that there is none for including labor organizations in the exemption. If Section 231 of the Tax Law were amended by striking out the single word "labor," the desired result would be accomplished as far as it can be by Federal legislation. Can there be any good reason for continuing an exemption which exempts wealthy associations, some of whom certainly are using their accumulated funds for unlawful purposes, and compels their fellow-citizens to bear the whole burden?

From a painting

EDWARD WINSLOW, GOVERNOR OF PLYMOUTH COLONY Such men as Winslow... did not cast in their lot with these poor people [the Pilgrims] for any worldly advantage. . . . It was the sanity of their religious views, and the goodness of their lives, that gained them such valuable support. From "The Pilgrim Fathers," by Winnifred Cockshott, of St. Hilda's Hall, Oxford.

WENTIETH-CENTURY America takes but a languid interest in the golden age of antiquity. In the face of a torn and agitated world it is complacently disposed to believe that life is to-day fuller, more interesting, and more agreeable than at any previous time in the history of man, and that to-morrow is likely to reveal still further promise. And yet at these dinners, and similar ceremonies held elsewhere, the Pilgrim Fathers are extolled in terms which would have brought the blush of shame to their tanned and sallow cheeks; and this despite the fact that their descendants could by no possible means be induced to exchange their present lot for that of these heroic ancestors. We praise, but we do not envy.

Pilgrims, but often it is ludicrously misconceived and misdirected, as who should praise Napoleon for his modesty, or Henry VIII for his domestic virtues. It has been said that it is better not to know so much than to know so much which is not true, and similarly it may be advisable to praise our forebears less or to praise them more justly.

The Pilgrim is often lauded as the founder of religious liberty; and it is true that by his struggle to secure opportunity to worship according to his conscience he contributed to this great cause. But the liberty he sought for himself he was reluctant to grant to others. A witty commentator has observed in regard to the Massachusetts Bay Colony, that after ten years its members had so far secured religious

heresies among the savages. As the Indians commonly scalped the heretic first and examined his theology afterward, few dissenters elected this alternative.

Again, there is often much unfounded accrediting to these glorious forebears of ours of the establishment of democratic government. It is true that in Connecticut there was at the outset a form of democratic town government, but it was hardly more than a form, and for many a long year democracy, as we now know it, was not only wholly lacking in New England, but was generally despised and distrusted. At Plymouth there was originally something closely approaching the communism apparently practiced in certain of the earlier Christian communities, but even this quickly passed away, being found impracticable. No one would deny that liberty of conscience and the forms of democracy both grew up in New England. But equally no informed person can truthfully assert that these achievements were characteristic of the earliest New England communities.

What we do find in the Pilgrims is the most superb devotion to religious convictions. For them the real world was the world of the spirit, compared with which the world of material things was but ephemeral dross. They feared not death nor physical suffering. Their dread was for sin, for the weakness of their souls in the face of temptation. Their heroic venture into the unknown wilderness across a wintry sea will always stand as one of the immortal landmarks in the onward march of the human soul, an enduring proof of the unconquerable power of complete moral and religious devotion. If we have that good fortune at all, we may well pride ourselves less on being their blood descendants than on being in some measure the worthy heritors of their undaunted spirit and their consecration to their vision of truth and righteousness. They respected law and human personality. Rank and social position as known in the polite world were to them an abomination, and in turn, as was not unnatural, they were despised and persecuted by the leaders of that world. Liberty they valued above all, but only as a prerequisite to the fulfillment of duty, to obedience to divine law, fealty to the Maker of all things. Thoroughgoing democracy, universal suffrage, and the like were far from their ideals.

We find among them also a position assigned to the family which made it the very foundation of the religious life of the individual and the community. He would be bold who should assert that our contemporary status of the family is an advance upon theirs. Moreover, they valued education, and from the first moment set themselves to pro