or agreement made previous to the migration of the aliens, and that their engagement was to perform skilled labor upon a new industry. (Sec. 1 and 5 of said act.)

You describe the applicants as "lace-makers." In the specification of the various individuals contained in the argument on behalf of the applicants I note only one who might be thought prima facie to fall within the professional or artistic category rather than that of laborers or artisans, however skilled. That one is the "managing draughtsman;" or, to include another possible exception, the "two lace draughtsmen" as well. But in my practical ignorance of what duties or functions are performed by such "draughtsmen," whether as manager or assistants, I must accept your designation of lace makers as embracing this entire group of people. I may, however, suggest that while in certain professions the designation of "draughtsman" aptly indicates a member of the profession, or one within its novitiate, and while the line between the professional and mechanical classification is often difficult to draw, a "draughtsman" in the present connection seems to describe one who is so closely connected with the particular trade as to be a member thereof, just as a molder or designer of molds appears to belong to the metal-casting trade. "Design" refers to manufactures as well as the fine arts, and the test of the individual's industrial character may depend upon the nature of his design or the conditions and method of its application to manufacture. (See "design," with note on "school of design," and "designer" (2), in Century Dictionary.) Nor does this suggestion require the broad conclusion that all designers are members of the trades for which they design. Some of them may lie well within the artistic and professional line, and be entitled to the protection of the act's exempting proviso.

Now, if the Trinity Church decision, even in its "general declarations," goes no further than to hold that the statute embraces manual labor alone (as your statement implies), I think there can be no doubt that the present case is within the prohibition of the law, and that it would not be necessary to seek to hold that case strictly to the exact point decided. For however skilled the workman may be, how

ever high the intelligence requisite in the handicraft, lacemakers in the organized industry are certainly engaged in manual labor. And this is true, although in some aspects such work as lace making, especially when "handmade,” is an "art;" and the general description of manual laborers applies to those who are masters of the trade as well as to those who are less advanced or in the apprentice stages, for the "mechanical arts" aptly describe and include most manufacturing industries. Therefore we must examine more critically the Trinity Church decision to learn whether it has the effect of entitling the applicants herein to enter this country; and if it has not that effect it will be neither necessary nor proper to endeavor to determine how far particular language used may be regarded as obiter dictum.

It is undoubtedly true that the precise point decided was that a contract for the services of a Christian minister residing in another country was not within the intention of the legislature and therefore not within the statute. And it is undoubtedly true, on the other hand, that the opinion finds— "That the title of the act, the evil which was intended to be remedied, the circumstances surrounding the appeal to Congress, the reports of the committee of each House, all concur in affirming that the intent of Congress was simply to stay the influx of this cheap unskilled labor."

It is this phrase, then, "cheap unskilled labor,” which has arrested attention and prompted inquiry, rather than the words "manual labor," which are used to indicate the broad tendency of the decision. Now, this finding of the Supreme Court is unquestionably extensive and unqualified in its import. But while it refers inter alia to a report of a House committee, in which the lowest type of foreign labor was especially in view, it cites also a Senate report in which the expression "labor and service"-as used in the final enactment, without qualification by the word "manual"was construed "as including only those whose labor or service is manual in character." This obviously did not refer to the lowest grade of labor alone. Furthermore, while the force of the word "unskilled" apparently carries the import of the quoted finding over a case like the pres

ent, so far as the word "cheap" is concerned that adjective may appropriately be applied to the rewards of labor abroad as compared with the United States, whether the grade of the labor be high or low. Thus, Senator Blair, chairman of the Senate committee which reported the bill, said (Cong. Rec., vol. 16, part 2, p. 1624):

The bill does not aim to prohibit the natural flow of immigration from any other land to the United States, but it does undertake to prohibit the efforts to introduce the cheap and servile

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labor of foreign lands and

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the skilled labor of other countries, because that labor, as we know, can be commanded at very greatly reduced wages as compared with what we pay the working people in our own country.

As to the force of the word "unskilled," I do not think it was intended by the court to defeat generally the plain implications of other portions of the law to which I shall presently refer, but was used to characterize the phase of the evil which was chiefly but not solely in the mind of Congress. For instance, the doubt of the Senate committee was whether the expression "labor and service" might be too broad without the word "manual;" not whether skilled manual labor as well as unskilled manual labor should be included in its scope. The counsel for the United States in the case necessarily strove for the broadest construction of the unqualified phrase "labor and service,” but was not specially concerned with manual labor, and still less with the distinction between skilled and unskilled man ual labor. The court, on the other hand, in excluding a clergyman from the prohibition, strikingly emphasized its restrictive conclusion by pointing out the general and most evident, but not necessarily the exclusive, purpose of the law. In showing that the remedy did not extend to a clergyman's case, the court forcibly shows that a clergyman was not within the evil, but certainly did not decide that the remedy does not extend precisely as far as the evil. In its interpretation of the statute the court studied the evil and found that it "guides to an exclusion of this contract from the penalties of the act." So far, then, it is proper to sug

gest the famous caution of Chief Justice Marshall in Cohens v. Virginia, 6 Wheat., 264, 399:

"It is a maxim not to be disregarded, that general expressions, in every opinion, are to be taken in connection. with the case in which those expressions are used. If they go beyond the case, they may be respected, but ought not to control the judgment in a subsequent suit when the very point is presented for decision. The reason of this maxim is obvious. The question actually before the court is investigated with care, and considered in its full extent. Other principles which may serve to illustrate it, are considered in their relation to the case decided, but their possible bearing on all other cases is seldom completely investigated."

But it is also to be remembered that the broad and guiding principle decided in the Trinity Church case, extending doubtless beyond the particular application, is announced in the following terms:

"Obviously the thought expressed [in the title] reaches only to the work of the manual laborer as dist guished from that of the professional man. No one reading such a title would suppose that Congress had in its mind any purpose of staying the coming into this country of ministers of the Gospel, or, indeed, of any class whose toil is that of the brain." (143 U. S., 463.)

The proper distinction, then, founded on the Trinity Church case, is that between manual labor, including the mechanical trades, on the one side, and the professions on the other. The act itself now fully recognizes this distinction, although in its original form it did not include the learned professions in the recognition. The principle was again interpreted and the distinction applied in United States v. Laws, 163 U. S., 258.

I must also remark that the decision in the Trinity Church case finally rested "beyond all these matters"—that is, the title of the act, the evil to be remedied, etc.-upon the religious character of the American people, by reason of which no purpose of action against religion can be imputed to any American legislation. Thus it seems that the reasoning of that opinion is directed to the single conclusion decided, and that it was not intended to determine as a conclusive judg ment of the court the broadest result suggested..

Now it is the fact that the contract-labor law was originated by the American Window Glass Workers' Association. No other trade or calling requires more skill than members of that craft. The records of Congress show that the organized glass workers, iron and steel workers, textile workers, printers, etc., representing the highest and best paid forms of skilled labor, united in an urgent appeal to Congress for protection against the unfair and injurious competition which threatened to reduce the standard of American wages in general, and which had caused disaster and discontent in many parts of this country.

It could not, I think, be contended that even the highest type of skilled mechanics, such as window glass workers and iron and steel workers, are brain toilers, as that phrase is usually intended. Such artisans are workers of brain and hand; they use their brains, and mental capacity informs and directs the skill of the handicraftsman; but the distinction is broad and obvious. The record of the proceedings in Congress, which may be consulted, not to control the language used by the opinions of individual legislators, but to show the situation "as it was pressed upon the attention of the legislative body," and as revealing "the contemporaneous opinion of jurists and statesmen upon the legal meaning of the words themselves" (Church of the Holy Trinity v. United States, ut supra, p. 463; Wong Kim Ark v. United States, 169 U. S., 649, 699), indicates that the very point at issue was raised. An amendment to section 5 of the act, which excepted artisans as well as professional actors, etc., was rejected (Cong. Rec., ante, p. 1837). Senator Morgan, in opposing the bill (id., p. 1632), shows that it was fully understood to apply to a skilled artisan as well as to unskilled labor, and refers to the numerous labor unions who supported the bill, as if they included unions of skilled as well as unskilled laborers. And on p. 1633 Senator Blair submits letters from organizations of skilled workmen; while on p. 1635 Senator Sherman says that in voting for the bill he will vote to prevent organized corporate importation of "bought men" who come here and compete with our mechanics and miners; "that is the intention of the bill."

The dictionaries are helpful in the inquiry. See the Cen