Long Island, N. Y., in an address entitled "The Hereditary Influence of the Immigrant," which was delivered at the annual meeting of the National Institute of Social Science on February 23, 1923, calls attention to the fact that Walker's law has never been disproven, and analyzes also many other biological elements in the problem of immigration. Mr. BACON. How many immigrants would come over if we did not have a quota law? Doctor LAUGHLIN. That, too, would constitute a valuable study for research. I will explain that that is one of the things the Department of Labor was trying to get at the bottom of in my European studies. During times of economic stress in Europe and high wages in America, it would generally reach the full steerage capacity of the steamships. The following outlines have some other problems which, with the committee's consent, I will read. The CHAIRMAN. Proceed. Doctor LAUGHLIN (reading): PARTIAL LIST OF DESIRABLE RESEARCHES ON IMMIGRATION FROM THE STANDPOINT OF THE UNITED STATES 1. The deportation situation. a. Laws, administrative machinery, and statistics. b. The situation by States and institutions. c. The principle of responsibility for producing inadequates. 2. The age element. a. Analysis in reference to onset of inadequacy, ease of diagnosis, first commitment and recommitment. b. Application to immigration laws, immigration examination, deportation, social success, marriage, and reproduction. 3. Statistical standardization of studies, quota-fulfillment method, probable error. 4. Modifying factors to be considered in interpreting the findings for the nation as a whole. a. The geographical concentration of groups. b. Differential social treatment with special reference to custodial commitment. 5. Degree to which aliens in the United States are random and representative samples of the same races in their native lands. a. Comparison of quota-fulfillments of alien stocks in institutions of the United States with similar quota-fulfillments of the same stocks in their home countries, thus providing the natural gauge of quality of immigrants compared with home stocks. b. Analysis of forces which tend to unrepresentative selection among emigrants. c. Statistical evidence of dumping. 6. Are we receiving the " dregs" or the " cream"? 7. Analysis of factors which govern present-day immigration. a. The impelling factors in foreign countries. b. The attractive factors in the United States. 8. A special study of each race in the United States. a. Define particular race. b. Give its distribution in the world. c. Give its distribution in the United States. d. History and measure of its migration. e. Peculiar impelling and attractive forces. f. Nature of potential future immigration, modified by— (1) Statutory laws. (2) Economic principles. (3) Demographic conditions, particularly the total Old World numbers of this race, compared with its total New World population. ་ 9. Special study of the oriental problem in the West. a. History and statistical and geographical analyses. b. Potential immigration. c. Efficiency of the laws and the effects of customs and economic forces. d. Emigration. e. Assimilation. 10. Relative social status of national stocks and nativity groups. a. Classified with reference to sex, race, nativity group, and occupation. b. Success of the "general run" of the population. c. Special attainment among the better classes represented in high schools and colleges and by persons showing talents and special attainment. 11. Investigations in the relative values of racial and nativity groups within each of the following general levels: a. Social inadequates. Further analysis of data on social inadequacy of the several types. b. The "general run.' Statistical study at random and representative samples of native and alien stocks in the population at large, seeking data on social and economic success, intermarriage, special natural qualities, and fecundity. c. The more talented classes represented by persons in high schools and colleges and by persons showing talents and special attainments. 12. Mate selection of alien stocks by nativity groups, in reference to social levels, race and sex. 13. Differential survival of native and alien stocks, by nativity group, race and sex with special reference to a. Infant mortality. b. Reproductive period. c. Longevity. 14. Project for a Pan American study of human migrations to and within, and the repeopling of the Western Hemisphere since 1492. 15. The negro records of slave trade considered as migration. Trace out by 16. Trace the aboriginal Indian blood from the first days of race mixture follow- 18. Extend the studies in differential fecundity in relation to nativity and 22. Prepare an immigration code covering the whole subject of immigration and naturalization, in accordance with the principle that the immigrant is to be looked upon primarily as the progenitor of Americans of the future. Mr. BACON. The field is practically limitless, but we must, nevertheless, have the most pertinent facts. Doctor LAUGHLIN. Scientific researches can attack successfully many of the problems of human migration, especially in the analysis of its causes and consequences. The CHAIRMAN. I believe that we should go into Doctor Laughlin's proposal No. 14. The nations of this hemisphere are the receiving end of the immigration business. We might develop facts that would warrant a conference of these nations. PART II. REEXAMINATION OF PREVIOUS RESEARCHES PUBLISHED UNDER THE TITLE "ANALYSIS OF AMERICA'S MODERN MELTING POT" The CHAIRMAN. But before we adjourn we will give Doctor Laughlin an opportunity to present to the committee any new data and analyses in refutation of certain criticisms of the "Melting Pot" study. REPLY TO CRITICISMS OF THE PREVIOUS RESEARCHES Mr. VAILE. Doctor Laughlin, several witnesses before this committee have criticized severely your researches for this committee which were published under the title "Analysis of America's Modern Melting Pot." What have you to say in reply? Doctor LAUGHLIN. I have read the several criticisms of this study, both in the hearings of this committee and in other publications. In reply let me say that my studies were made with no preselected theory or policy to support. There were no conclusions drawn before the data were in hand and analyzed, and the conclusions were in sound keeping with the first-hand facts. It is true that the persons favoring the restriction of immigration and much higher individual and family standards for admission have found more ammunition in these biological studies than have been found by the advocates of the open door for immigration, but if the facts had turned the conclusions in another direction I doubt not that the present critics would have been silent. I decline to get into controversy with any heckler-critics, but when in sensible criticisms of the work which I have done for this committee I have come upon suggestions of reanalysis or have found wherein a different type of analysis would clarify a point, I have, instead of opening an argument, made these reanalyses and am now laying them before the committee in the form of tables and charts. I shall answer criticisms by supplying more first-hand facts, and I respectfully request that future critics be invited to supply firsthand material, competently and impartially collected and carefully analyzed, in trying to refute or to discredit these researches. The future critic should be asked, "What first-hand studies have you made in this same field?" "What more carefully collected, more extensive, and more accurately analyzed data than those presented have you got, or do you know about, to present to support your argument?" Facts can not be answered by badgering nor by guesses; more facts are the most competent critics. But don't worry The CHAIRMAN. Facts are the materials needed. about criticism, Doctor Laughlin, you have developed a valuable research and demonstrated a most startling state of affairs. We shall pursue these biological studies further. Doctor LAUGHLIN. Before describing in detail the new charts and tables, permit me to explain the nature and extent of the original data used in the "Melting Pot" analysis. The CHAIRMAN. Proceed, Doctor Laughlin. Doctor LAUGHLIN. In making the studies, the data were secured at first hand from every State and Federal custodial institution in the United States, from which the necessary cooperation in analyzing these inmates in accordance with race and diagnosis, could be secured. There was no attempt to favor or to disfavor any group or nation. There was no gerrymandering, with which some politicians are familiar. It was an investigation to find out the truth of the situation, and it was naturally gratifying to an investigator to find that his researches had been made use of. The facts were available, with equal freedom, to all persons and parties. The sound way to attack these studies would be to go into the same territories and make a still better survey, then to present the new findings before the critic's argument. A critic who had made no field studies of this sort could hardly be taken seriously when he advises what might have been found had studies been made under different conditions. He should, by all means, proceed to make studies under those conditions. He would then be armed with facts rather than with opinions. Personally, I am not uneasy, because I am confident that a new honest and competent survey would substantiate, in every main feature of fact and analysis, the findings printed in the "Melting Pot" paper. EXTENT OF THE "MELTING POT" SURVEY It has been suggested that because all of the defectives in the United States were not included in the survey made, that the study is invalid. As a matter of fact, the survey covered a sample consisting of 210,835 institutional inmates. Of the 657 institutions which it was desired to cover in the survey, 445 actually gave the racial and diagnostic classifications requested. These institutions represent every type, and were found in every State in the Union. The severest critic must agree that taking the United States as a whole, and all types of institutional inmates as a unit, the fairest of all results, that is, the one least liable to error on account of sampling, is that reported in Table 11, page 824, of the "Melting Pot" paper. The United States as a whole, rather than a single State, is the proper unit for a national study of this sort, because, first, all States do not institutionalize equally, either in extent or in types of defects; second, there is a great variation in the population density of nativity types in different sections of the country. The sampling (all institutions which could be prevailed upon to cooperate, and which were well distributed geographically and by type) which was followed, and which comprised 210,835 institutional inmates, is highly representative of the United States as a whole (which is also the migration control unit), and more representative than could have been secured by making studies State by State. However, to satisfy the critics, I have made some "single State, single trait" analyses, which I shall show presently (Table 8, p. 1322). Taken as a whole, the data analyzed in the "Melting Pot" paper are much more thorough and complete than any similar studies yet undertaken. Any student of mathematical sampling will confirm this. When the numbers of inmates of a particular type were large enough to make a distribution of individuals, in numbers expected among the several nativity and racial groups, with fairly large numbers in the smallest expectation group, this plan was followed. A comparison between expectations and the findings of each specialized type, such as the insane or adult criminalistic, supports the adequacy of the numbers used in the survey. Among many quota fulfillments, the critic should notice also the mathematical probable error which is given. If the quota fulfillment is less than three times the size of its accompanying probable error, it is valid to criticize the particular quota fulfillment on the ground that the numbers involved in the particular sample were not large enough to render an accurate mathematical picture. If, however, the probable error is less than one-third the size of its accompanying quota fulfillment, then the objection of smallness of sample can not fairly be made. |