Four years ago, Congress recognized the principle that immigration is a national problem, and not a problem for the individual states, by setting up an immigration commission; and every sensible person agrees with this view. In nine cases out of ten, Irish or Germans do not come to America with the intention of selecting a certain one of the thirty-six states for their future home, but rather with the purpose of settling in any part of the Republic where they will find opportunity to work or where friendly neighbors attract them. And although after a stay of some duration, they adopt certain customs and work for the causes in which their community is interested, they never develop a sense of individuality which is as intense as that prevailing in European communities. They do not become specifically New Yorkers, or Pennsylvanians, or Kentuckians, but rather German-speaking Americans. The whole country benefits from their immigration. How often 2do we not hear American economists say that each immigrant represents a contribution between $1,000 and $1,500 to our national wealth!

However, although this truth is simple and clear, yet a practice which is directly at variance with it has taken root in respect to the care of immigrants. Immigration, which concerns the whole nation, is rightly considered to be a specific matter of those states in which the landing ports are located; or, since four fifths of all immigrants disembark at New York, immigration is specifically an affair of that State. And New York levies a poll tax of $2.50 upon each immigrant--and has no more right to do so than it has to place a customs tax on imported goods.

It is true that the authorities of the State of New York try to justify the tax by claiming that it is a kind of premium for insurance. Every immigrant, they say, purchases with this small sum a claim to assistance in case he becomes a public charge during the period when he is not a citizen, that is, 3during the first five years of his residence in America. The principle itself is good, but it is not applied. The State of New York levies a poll tax upon every immigrant who lands in New York, or a total between $400,000 and $500,000 every year. The sum thus realized is to serve as an insurance fund for some 200,000 immigrants; but only a fraction of that number (one fifth, or one fourth at the most) stays in New York. The result is that those immigrants who settle in other states and become indigent through misfortune are deprived of the benefits which they purchased by paying the poll tax, and, since they have no legal claim to public assistance, they are dependent upon the meager aid which private charitable organizations render. During the past few years, we have come across several cases of this swindle (to call a spade a spade) practiced by the immigration authorities of New York.

No wonder that the Commission has so much money in its treasury; no wonder it could erect several magnificent buildings on Ward's Island during the past fifteen years and still maintain a reserve fund of more than half a 4million dollars. And now we understand, too, why the Commission is so eager to rush immigrants out of the State while they still have enough money to pay for passage (including the enormous commission of the pashas of Castle Gardens) to some Western State, for the poll tax paid by all immigrants who leave the State of New York is "net profit" for the Commission.

It is in the interest of all Western States, and especially of large cities which are railroad centers, to see to it that Congress brings about a change in this situation, that the poll tax system is thoroughly reformed, and that this be done on a national basis.

The solution of the problem is very simple. The poll tax is either a customs tax, and in that case no individual State ever had authority to levy or collect it; or it is an insurance premium, and any State has a just claim to a part of the fund amassed through collection of poll taxes, a part which is in proportion to the number of immigrants who settle in that State.

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As soon as Congress is again in session, local groups will propose a bill restricting the levying and collection of a poll tax to the Federal Bureau of Immigration and providing that the fund collected by that agency be distributed to each State in proportion to the number of immigrants who remain therein. Common sense, and a sense of justice toward all, dictate such a measure, no matter how loudly and vigorously the New York authorities protest against it and cite the present arrangement as a precedent.

The poll-tax rate could well be increased without being burdensome or unjust. It is much better, and more honest, to charge the immigrant five dollars for a real value, that is, insurance against need resulting from no fault of his own, than to take two dollars from him and give him nothing but unkept promises in return. An insurance company which knows beforehand that it cannot meet the just claims of three fourths of its insured can lower its premium rate more easily than a company which proposes to cover the losses of all its customers. However, that is a point of only minor importance. The premium rate of honest insurance will always have to be computed on the 6basis of an exact statistical theory of probabilities. The main thing is that immigrant insurance or poll taxes should be taken from the jurisdiction and control of the individual States and placed under the supervision and administration of the Federal Government.