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Above is a cartoon published in a New York State paper in 1901, a period when there was (a) a great deal of foreign immigration, and (b) a big debate about whether this should be allowed to continue.
Title: A Crying Need for General Repairs
Publication: The Saturday Globe, Utica, August 27, 1901
Summary: An American Laborer pleads with Uncle Sam to repair the wall of “Immigration Restriction” because its neglect has opened the way for disreputable men to enter the country. An “Employer of Labor” in his top hat and tails happily assists a man wearing a fez as he climbs down the ladder. The image caption reads, “American Labor Calls Uncle Sam’s Attention to the Inefficiency of His Immigration Restriction Wall.”
(Source: Ohio State University. Emphasis added).
I might add that while there are various ethnicities climbing over the wall, the fellow with a dagger between his teeth who has undermined the wall and is crawling through is pretty clearly an Italian member of the Mafia, or “Black Hand,” as it was known at the time.
And the “employer of labor” with his top hat and tails is the rich guy who’s profiting from displacing American labor.
And finally, the “Immigration Restriction Wall” is not the kind of physical wall Trump is actually now building on the Southern Border:
The “Immigration Restriction Wall” was about reducing legal immigration by regulation: similar to what Trump managed to do in his first term, as I wrote in 2020
The cartoon above shows that the problems caused by immigration in the nineteenth century were huge, real, and led to more than thirty years of worker and immigration patriot agitation until the 1924 Immigration Act was passed and signed by Calvin Coolidge.
In a column written on VDARE.com 22 years ago, I called this The (First) Thirty Years War For Immigration Reform.
That led to the forty year Great Pause in which America won the Second World War without much in the way of immigrant soldiery. The nineteenth and early twentieth century immigration restriction activism was a tremendous success politically and economically—for the country at large and, of course, for the American workingman.
What you need to know is that Trump is doing what he can to repeat this.
While some American workmen are displaced by illegal aliens, the most serious worker displacement comes from legal immigrants, who, as I’ve said frequently “displace a better class of people”.
As “Prowler” writes on Twitter
First term Trump became the only president since 1965 to decrease the foreign population and cut legal immigrants by half.
Second term Trump is pushing net negative migration, restricting all types of legal immigration, and ending lawful status for millions. Elections matter.
And in spite of what the Washington Post says, Trump’s immigration policies are not “killing the labor force”, they’re making it more American:
Game designer Sandy Petersen writes in reply:
Fewer workers is ONLY better for the remaining workers.
Big business owners can suck it - hiring foreign labor to increase their cash at our expense
That’s the whole point of immigration for employers—the immigrants work cheaper than Americans. The Washington Post story linked above is by cheap-labor promoter Stuart Anderson of the Cato Institute, who has been pushing the argument that employers need cheaper more foreign labor for the last 25 years. He was actually executive associate commissioner for policy and planning and counselor to the commissioner at the Immigration and Naturalization Service) during George W. Bush’s first term, which tells you all you need to know about pre-Trump Republican immigration policy.
By contrast, Trump employs Stephen Miller, who realizes that American workers matter (and vote!)
Clearly, elections matter, and Trump’s election is better for American worker (who vote) and worse for foreign workers (who don’t.)
Happy Labor Day everybody! Below, I’ve posted 23 years of Labor Day columns from the archives of VDARE.com—which has suspended publication but which still exist online.
James Fulford has been writing about the national question for over 20 years, mostly for VDARE.com, more recently for WhitePapers.
Previous Labor Day Columns (mostly by me) from VDARE.com:
September 6, 2021: A Happy (American) Labor Day From VDARE.com!
September 1, 2019—On Labor Day, Remember That Immigration Enforcement Is About Jobs For Americans
September 3, 2017—NRO’s Labor Day Piece Asks ”Why Haven’t Wages Grown?” DOESN’T MENTION IMMIGRATION
September 5, 2016—Labor Day 2016: More Automation, More Foreign Workers, Fewer Jobs for Americans
September 3, 2016—Happy Labor Day from VDARE.com—A Celebration Of The AMERICAN Worker!
September 7, 2015—Labor Day And Immigration—Two Ways Of Looking At It
September 2, 2013—Happy Riot-Free Labor Day!—No Thanks To The Economic Policy Institute
September 3, 2012—No Jobs For Labor Day In ROMNEY’S America, Either?
September 5, 2010—A Labor Day Dissent—Dysentery and Immigration
September 6, 2009—Message On Labor Day: Working America Needs An Immigration Moratorium.
September 5, 2009—Labor Day Motto: Moratorium Now! More evidence from Canada
August 31, 2008—Labor Day In Mississippi—Job Openings For Americans After Raids
September 1, 2007—Happy Labor Day—AFL-CIO fights to lower US wages!
August 31, 2007—Happy Labor Day Teamsters—Here Come Mexican Truckers!
September 3, 2006—Labor Day In Cardinal Mahony’s Alta California
September 2, 2005—View From Lodi, CA: Labor Day—As the Rich Get Richer….
Comprehensive review of the Capital v Labor aspect of the immigration debate. Supplies VDARE's full Labor Day archive.