In all three towns some limitation on sales was imposed and the amounts quoted are only the restricted orders of the beer agents. Additional amounts were consumed at neighboring saloons or were carried into the towns by the men themselves. When it is remembered that the greater portion of these intoxicants was consumed by the more recent immigrants, some general idea of the amount consumed by each workman can be reached. It must be remembered that drinking is particularly heavy immediately after pay day, so that during this time the most marked effects on efficiency are to be expected. The following table shows the total amount of beer and whisky ordered in one Pennsylvania mining town during a period of ten weeks:

TABLE 218.-Quantity of beer and whisky ordered in one Pennsylvania mining town during a period of ten weeks, by race of consumer.

In the table following, a comparison of races is made according to

the order per man:

TABLE 219.—Quantity of beer and whisky per man ordered in one Pennsylvania mining

town, by race.

[The average weekly order is computed from orders for a period of ten weeks.]

In this town sales are restricted, and the figures given above are 40 per cent less than the amount formerly ordered when no restriction was practiced. Here again actual consumption is larger, since much is consumed in saloons outside the town and also carried into the town by the mine workers. The tables plainly indicate that consumption is much greater among more recent immigrants than among the Americans and the older immigrants, since the former group ordered per capita more than twelve times as much beer as the latter, and nearly seven times as much whisky. These results are somewhat influenced by the fact that the proportion of single men to women and children is higher in the second group than in the first, but it is also due in part to the fact that the women and children of the second group are much larger consumers than those of the first group.

Figures of liquor consumption in towns where no restriction is exercised were not obtainable, but in view of the fact that in the average mining town numerous beer and whisky agents are constantly soliciting orders, some idea of the general consumption in such towns can be formed from the preceding tables. The recent immigrants have been accustomed to drinking beer or light wines abroad. In this country, however, they drink whisky in place of light wines, and they drink to excess. This is due to several causes: (1) They "treat" according to the American custom; (2) they have little opportunity for decent amusements or to buy homes or property with their surplus money, and there is a disposition to spend money freely. Excessive drinking, particularly among the foreign workmen, lowers their efficiency to an appreciable degree. As already stated, this is more marked in the days immediately following pay day, when the drinking is especially heavy. There is usually a decreased number of men at work and a consequent falling off in the output of coal and coke. The general manager of one large company says that for the half week following pay Saturday their production shows a loss of approximately 20 per cent. Formerly this was often larger, until the company somewhat restricted the sale of intoxicants in its villages. The following reports from two mines give a fair idea of the effects of drinking on production during the period immediately following pay days:

At Mine No. 2 the output was also lowered by the fact that Tuesday after pay day was a church holiday.

Not only are fewer men in the mine immediately after pay day, with consequent loss of output, but the companies suffer additional loss through increased breakage of equipment, more numerous accidents, and consequent medical and hospital bills, and through reckless and careless mining, with the loss of more or less coal and time and labor. The life of the town and of the workmen is demoralized, and the industry is rendered more unattractive to the better and more ambitious workmen and their children.

CHAPTER VIII.

INDUSTRIAL EFFECTS OF IMMIGRATION.

Employment of recent immigrants made possible a remarkable growth in the industry-Changes in industrial methods and organization-Immigration in its relation to mining accidents-Displacement of former employees by recent immigrantsFailure of native-born to enter the industry. [Text Tables 220 and 221.]

EMPLOYMENT OF RECENT IMMIGRANTS MADE POSSIBLE A REMARKABLE GROWTH IN THE INDUSTRY.

The employment of immigrants of recent immigration has made possible the extraordinary expansion of the bituminous mining industry in Pennsylvania during the past thirty or thirty-five years. The extension of mining operations brought into existence a demand for a large and constantly increasing number of employees at the same time that the iron and steel and other industries were undergoing a rapid development and bidding in the labor market for more and more workmen. The existing sources of labor supply were unable to satisfy the demand and recourse was necessarily had by the mining operators to immigrants from southern and eastern Europe. Without the employment of mine workers drawn from this class of immigrants, the growth in the bituminous mining industry would have been impossible.

CHANGES IN INDUSTRIAL METHODS AND ORGANIZATION.

On the whole, the employment of recent immigrants has made relatively few changes in industrial processes and organization. The form of organization in the mines, from superintendents to trapper-boys, is the same that existed before recent immigrants became mine workers. The personnel of the mines is now of mixed races, with many workmen who do not understand English, while formerly it was relatively homogeneous, at least as regards language. This entails some additional work of supervision, since it is more difficult to make an employee do his work properly if he does not readily understand English. There have been changes in mining methods; mining machines have been introduced and more economical methods of mining have been applied which recover a higher percentage of coal, but these improvements have been due not so much to the employment of immigrants as to sharper competition in the business and to the natural development toward elimination of needless waste, increase in output, and cheapening of production. To some extent, the employment of the recent immigrant may have stimulated the use of mining machinery, inasmuch as this machinery

renders it possible to employ in large numbers inexperienced and untrained men. As showing the increasing use of machines in the bituminous mines of Pennsylvania, the following table of the number of machines used and number of tons so mined, as compared with the tons mined by hand in the State since 1904, will be of interest and recent immigrants will work after these machines with less objection than persons of native birth or immigrants from Great Britain, who seem to prefer pick to machine work.

TABLE 220.—Bituminous coal mined by machines in Pennsylvania, 1904 to 1908. [Production of Coal in 1908, Edward W. Parker. U. S. Geological Survey, Mineral Resources of the United States.]

The mines are said to be less safe than they would be with native American, English, Irish, Scotch, Welsh, or German labor, because recent immigrants will accept more dangerous working conditions than the first-named employees. Furthermore, the later immigrants are ignorant and untrained and are often more or less reckless or stupid from excessive drink, and are a source of danger to themselves and to the other workmen."

DISPLACEMENT OF FORMER EMPLOYEES BY RECENT IMMIGRANTS.

To a large degree the pioneer American, English, Irish, German, Scotch, and Welsh miners have been displaced and their positions filled by the more recent immigrants. This change is still in process, so that the number of recent immigrants is likely to increase both relatively and actually. It is not difficult to account for this racial change. The former operatives had opportunities to secure better wages or more congenial and safer work in other industries. The companies were not compelled as a result of agitation or protest to increase wages, shorten hours, make their mines safer, improve their houses, or free their operatives from trading at the company stores, in order to hold the natives and former workmen, since they were able to fill their places without difficulty with recent immigrants who were content with the wages and working conditions which prevailed in the bituminous regions. It is true that wages have risen in the industry, but as a rule only to meet the competition of other industries which use unskilled labor.

a The relation between the employment of recent immigrants and mining accidents is fully discussed in Part 1, Chapter VIII, pp. 209-241. As to the effects of the use of intoxicants, see pp. 419-422.