The following table, compiled from selected data, is believed to be representative of the wages earned in beet-sugar factories throughout the State as a whole:

TABLE 45.-Number of male employees 18 years of age or over earning each specified amount per day, by general nativity and race: Colorado.

The grand total, it will be seen, is naturally concentrated in the wage groups including earnings of from $2 to $3.50 per day, which represent the range of advancement open to common laborers through the acquiring of experience. Over 93 per cent of the workmen included in the table are found in these three groups. In further detail, 64.3 per cent earned from $2 to $2.50 per day, 17.2 per cent from $2.50 to $3, and 11.6 per cent from $3 to $3.50. Of the remaining workmen 6.5 per cent earned $3.50 per day or over, while only 0.5 per cent were paid less than $2. Thus, as in California, the general level of earnings in the factories is somewhat higher than that in the fields.

Examining the earnings in the table by races it appears, first, that native-born persons receive slightly higher wages than the foreignborn; 7.2 per cent receive $3.50 per day or over, 12.8 per cent $3 or over but under $3.50, 19.2 per cent $2.50 or over but under $3, as compared with 3.75 per cent of the foreign-born receiving $3.50 and over, 6.88 per cent receiving $3 and over but under $3.50, and 9.38 per cent receiving $2.50 and over but under $3. The percentage included in the $2 to $2.50 group is 60.3 in the case of the native-born and 78.75 for the foreign-born, the variation being found above this group rather than below, as the respective percentages receiving less than $2 per day are practically the same. Of the foreign-born races, the Germans and the German-Russians appear almost entirely in the $2 to $2.50 group, while the English-speaking races, the Scandinavians, and other European races," on the other hand, show a considerable range of earnings.

66

Race changes.

There are no important race changes to record in the brief history of the labor supply of the beet-sugar factories of Colorado. From the first the employees have been largely native-born Americans or northern European immigrants of long residence in the United States.

As in California, there has been no direct underbidding in attempts to secure employment in the factories. It is true, on the other hand, that German-Russians, Mexicans, and Japanese are assigned the heaviest and most disagreeable occupations which commonly command the lowest wages. These occupations, however, are not so generally filled by the immigrants named as to incite the "white" laborer to decline the work, except possibly in the two or three factories which employ a considerable number of GermanRussians or Japanese. Wages have not changed except to follow the general level of wages in the communities from which factory laborers are drawn.

Employers' opinions of races employed.

"American labor" in Colorado, as in California and elsewhere throughout the West, is invariably preferred to immigrant labor for the work of the sugar factory.

German-Russians are said to be industrious, attentive, and sober workmen, but to require slightly more supervision than "American laborers" because of their lack of complete familiarity with the English language. For a similar reason and because of the abundance of Americans eligible to managerial positions, German-Russians rarely become foremen. These people are essentially farmers and resort to the work of the factory, as a rule, only to supplement the work of the beet fields.

Mexicans are subject to the same general criticisms made of the members of that race employed in the beet fields of California and Colorado and sugar factories of California. As a rule few Mexicans and few Japanese apply for work in the factories.

Japanese have been tried in at least three factories, all in northern Colorado. Two of these reported that the Japanese were unsatisfactory, chiefly because ill-adapted to do heavy lifting, while the third, where Japanese were still employed in 1909 for the rough work, declared, as indicated in a previous section, that the results of the experiment were entirely satisfactory.

THE BEET-SUGAR INDUSTRY IN OTHER STATES OF THE WESTERN DIVISION."

UTAH.

The beet-sugar industry in Utah had its inception more than 20 years ago when the factory at Lehi was opened. The greatest development of the industry in Utah, however, has taken place since

a The report on Japanese Farmers of Northern Utah" should be read in

connection with this section.

the tariff law of 1897 went into effect. The following table shows the location, date of first production, and daily slicing capacity of each factory in the State:

The contributory acreage in 1908 was 31,152. Three of the four beet-growing districts of the State were investigated by agents of the Commission in 1909, and it was found that these three districtsthe Ogden, Cache Valley, and Garland-had an aggregate contributory acreage of 23,435, of which 638 acres were grown by sugar companies and the remainder, 22,797 acres, by farmers under contract. The total number of contract growers in these districts was not ascertained, but it can be said that the number is larger in proportion to the acreage of beets than in California and Colorado. In one district the largest area devoted to the growing of beets by a single individual was 130 acres, which were held by a Japanese tenant. There were also two beet fields of 80 and 60 acres, respectively, but the remaining fields were all of less than 50 acres and many contained only 2 or 3 acres. The average holdings for the total of 554 contract growers in this district was only 11.63 acres. In another district a number of plots ran as high as 70 or 80 acres, but the average acreage was said to be very much smaller. The reason for the small size of the beet fields in these communities is to be sought in the general farming situation. Each one of these districts was a well-developed farming community before the culture of the sugar beet was introduced and the latter, therefore, had to make its way into the favor of the farmer gradually in competition with such established crops as hay, grain, alfalfa, and garden truck. The result has been that the farmer has come to regard beet growing as a part of diversified farming in which it takes a more or less subordinate position in the rotation of crops.

The price paid for beets in the three districts investigated is $4.50 per ton f. o. b. the factory. In one case the company guarantees that the freight on beets shipped to the factory by rail shall not exceed 25 cents per ton. In another case, however, it is said that beets at some distance from the factory will not net over $4.15 per ton.

S. Doc., op. cit., p. 14.

The Lehi district was not investigated because practically no immigrant labor is employed in this district, the farmers and their families doing nearly all the work in the beet fields.

Although there are five sugar factories in Utah the State is divided into four districts for the purposes of this report, one district being made to include the two factories located at Logan and Lewiston, in the Cache Valley.

Practically all of the team work in the beet fields of Utah is done by so-called "American labor." Most of the beet lands are held in small lots, as has been shown above, by farmers who do their own plowing, seeding, cultivating, and hauling. In the case of lands held under lease, the owner commonly does the team work, and leaves only the hand work for the tenant.

About one-half of the hand work throughout the three districts investigated as a whole is done by the Japanese. White farmers and their families attend to most of the remainder. A little is also done by Koreans and American Indians. The proportion of the work done by Japanese varies, of course, in different localities. In one district they do nearly all the thinning and hoeing, but almost no harvesting. In another they do three-fourths of all the hand work, while in the third they do only one-half of it. The number of Japanese in the beet fields of the entire State is probably about 1,000. Prices for hand work range from $18 to $21 per acre for a yield, usually of 12 tons. If the yield is greater or less than this amount, the price for the work varies according to contract provisions. In one district 60 cents is added for every ton over 12, and 50 cents is deducted for every ton less than 12 down to a minimum of 10 tons.

The commission of Japanese bosses, when contracts are made with them, varies, in different districts, from $1 to $3 per acre. In one district the average commission is said to be $1, in another 7 or 8 per cent less than $1.50 on the prices current in this community, while in the third district the boss pays his men an aggregate price of $18 per acre, and retains as his commission the remainder of the $20 or $21 which he received from the grower. The most interesting feature of the Japanese hand-labor situation in the beet fields of Utah is the attempt to eliminate the Japanese boss. This attempt has been made in two districts. In one the boss system has been almost entirely abolished. In the other the total area controlled by the four or five trusted bosses who still remain is only 600 acres out of a total contributory area of 10,000 acres. In the first district the sugar company employs a Japanese on a strict salary basis to secure laborers of his own race and distribute them among the growers as needed. In the second district the same functions are performed by an American who speaks the Japanese language. The object of these movements against the "bosses" is the removal of the evil of subcontracting. Under the "boss system " the work has often been subcontracted so many times that the actual laborer would receive only $15 per acre out of the $20 paid by the grower to the contractor in the first instance, the remainder of the price being deducted as commissions. The result has been generally unsatisfactory to both growers and laborers. Growers, on the one hand, often have reason to complain of poor work and breach of contract, especially when, as frequently happens, the terms of the contract originally executed between the grower and the first contractor are materially changed in the contract under which the actual labor is performed. The Japanese laborers, on the other hand, have been equally dissatisfied with a system which deprives them of so large a part of the original contract price and forces them to slight their work in order to make good earnings.

a $5 for thinning, $3 for hoeing, and $10 for harvesting.

There have been no real race displacements in Utah. Such changes as have occurred have consisted chiefly in the importation of Japanese to meet the growing demands of the industry. When beet growing was in the experimental stage farmers used to seed only such land as they themselves, with the women and children of the family and the "regular hired help," could easily care for. Later, however, when the industry became more important and spread to more thinly settled localities the labor of these persons was found to be inadequate and Japanese were induced to come into the beet fields.

In one district, where the industry dates from 1903, an attempt was made to secure white labor for the hand work as well as for the team work. Public meetings were accordingly held in near-by towns during the month of May, and the nature of the work was explained by officials of the company. In June a special train was sent through the neighboring country to provide transportation for those desiring to work in the beet fields, but only about 60 persons, almost all of whom were schoolboys, entered the employ of the company, although the latter offered to pay the railroad fare and board and lodging in addition to $4 per acre for the thinning. Because of the failure of this attempt, the employment agency which had contracted to furnish the necessary hand workers lost $1.35 per acre on the season's work, although it was assisted by the sugar company in its efforts to induce a sufficient number of Japanese laborers to come and take the work. The agency itself, toward the end of the season, imported 40 Japanese directly from California, and agents of the sugar company were successful in the meantime in securing the immigration from other localities of about 60 more Japanese. It is estimated, however, that fully one-third of the crop of 1903 was lost because of insufficient help. The next year the situation was somewhat improved by the appearance of several Japanese contractors, but white men and American Indians had to be hired to supplement the Japanese, and it was not until the following year (1905) that a number of the latter sufficient to do all the hand work could be secured. Since then the hand work has been largely controlled by the Japanese.

In another district, now contributory to two factories, the hand work for several years after the first factory was opened in 1901 was done entirely by the growers and their families. However, when the second factory began operation in 1904 in a more thinly settled part of the district, where land holdings were larger, it was seen that laborers would have to be imported if the industry were to thrive. Japanese were accordingly brought in by the growers and Japanese contractors in 1905 and have gradually increased in numbers since that time, as the industry has grown. The third district has employed Japanese for about three years. Previous to 1906 the hand work was done largely by the women and children of the growers' families, but in 1906 the Japanese, of whom there was a large number in the district, which includes the city of Ogden, an important center for Japanese employed by the railroads, began to bid for the work. They were gradually given employment and the system of Japanese contracting slowly gained control of the situation. Contracts were all oral, even in 1909, and were for single operations only.a

• That is, for the thinning, the hoeing, or the harvesting alone.