THE IMPROVEMENT OE CONDITIONS AMONG IMMIGRANTS INTO CALIFORNIA 67 



laws pertaining to the pa5T.Tient of wages, to employment generallj^ and 

 to housing conditions. 



With the aid of the commission's official publications we will shortly 

 examine its efforts in the principal spheres entrusted to it and the results 

 it has hitherto obtained, with particular reference to agricultural labourers. 



■§ I. Immigration and settlement. 



The commission, while realizing the advisability of directing the tide 

 of immigration towards agriculture in order to hasten development of the 

 land and to lessen the supply of unskilled labour which tends to lower the 

 wages of the working classes, has throughout been aware of the danger, 

 no less great, of recruiting for agriculture among untrained and unfit im- 

 migrants without necessary capital. In a recent article (i) we spoke of 

 interior colonization in California and showed the conditions of agri- 

 culture in this State and the needs formulated by the commission which 

 investigated them. The new system of land credit, instituted by the law 

 of 17 July 1916, will not fail sooner or later to facilitate the settlement of 

 a part of the floating rural population in that it will give it means of 

 access to the land. 



The commission has confined its attention to the improvement of rural 

 conditions and to furnishing general information to all those who are at-' 

 tracted to this country. Indirectly much of its work has tended to make 

 rural life more attractive, especially its eifort to secure better housing and 

 sanitation in small towns, on farms and in labour camps, and its educational 

 programme to which we will presently recur. It has taken direct action in 

 two ways, by prosecuting cases of fraudulent sales of land and securing the 

 passage of the Act which forbids dishonest advertising of land, and by ar- 

 ranging to supply information as to agricultural land to prospective purcha- 

 sers. By the Act in question, which was approved in 1915, a hew section 

 was added to the State Penal Code making it a misdemeanour to pubHsh 

 or disseminate any untrue or misleading statement concerning the situation, 

 extent, or any other quality or attribute of real estate situated in this State 

 or elsewhere. 



In all, since the Complaint Bureau was founded by the Commission, it 

 has dealt with 7,369 cases ; and of the 2,906 complaints received in 1915, 

 94 were of frauds connect with sales of land. 



As regards its supply of information the Commission has made an arf 

 rangement with the Division of Agricultural Extension of the University o- 

 California, in virtue of which the land experts of the latter department not 

 only furnish general information but also make special reports on particular 

 tracts of land. The following notice, in several languages, is placarded 

 throughout the State. " The Commission... will make an investigation and 



(i) Infcrnational Revieie.' of Agricultural Economics, September 1917, page 59. 



