ALIEN IMMIGRATION IN GREAT BRITAIN AND THE UNITED STATES
[To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.] Sut,-.—In a recent issue of Harper's _Magazine was an article by One whom the Editor describes as a distinguished Ainerican
man of science, with an international reputation in biology. In the course of his article the writer says :—
" On the whole, the cheap and unskilled labourers who have been imported in vast numbers represent the poorest stock of the nations and races from which they were drawn. We have thus assembled in this country [America] many of the worst representatives of all the races of mankind."
In a later issue of the Daily Express an American lawyer says :— The crime jungles of the United States, as a result of indiscriminate immigration and the mighty uprush of development, are ferocious and formidable to a degree unparalleled elsewhere in the civilised world."
Further on, in the same article, the writer refers to the United States as " a crime-ridden country with the highest murder and crimes of violence rate in the world." In Great Britain, the master-crooks are mostly aliens, or controlled by aliens. Our housing problem in London is entirely due to the hordes of aliens flooding most districts, causing fictitious rents for poor people. Without our huge alien population, there would be no housing problem. Our hospitals and asylums are filled with aliens and the children of aliens. We have aliens on the dole, and on parish relief. They change their names in the most unblushing manner, usually adopting Scottish names. Their impudence is simply colossal. The wretched Englishman sometimes wonders if this is his country or theirs.
In short, the alien menace is the most serious thing facing Great Britain and the United States to-day, and it will have to be dealt with, or each country will have to face an upheaval such as it has never known.—I am, Sir, &e.,
[We do not agree with our correspondent as to the extent of the alien menace. There is no analogy between the alien problem in the United States and with us. In America it is a very real one because nearly fifteen per cent. of the popu- lation is foreign born.. In England the foreign-born population is not more than 300,000, or considerably less than one per cent., and apart from London and one or two other large centres there are practically no aliens. It is not fair to say that the housing problem is entirely due to "aliens flooding most districts." It is nothing of the kind. In certain districts overcrowding has been aggravated by the presence of aliens, but in many of the worst slums in Great Britain there are no foreigners, unless the writer regards Southern Irish as " aliens.--En. Spectator.]
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