Proceedings of the first Independence congress : held in the city of Manila, Philippine islands, February 22-26, 1930 / Published under the direction of Dean maximo M. Kalaw, executive secretary, University of the Philippines.

LABOR SECTION

297

into the Islands. It is true that from 1900 to 1918 some
18,000 Japanese did come into the Islands, in the employ of
the Ohta Industrial Company and the Mindanao Island Exploit Company; but, due to the agitation and hard feelings
which raised against further colonization in Mindanao, some
sold out their holdings and left for the home country, so that
we have now only about 10,000 in the Islands. The Japanese
harbored no resentment or ill feeling, in as much as they were
excluded, not on the basis of racial discrimination as has been
done in the United States, but because the Filipinos insisted
upon their right to develop their country themselves which
right the Japanese people are willing to respect, as they have
done in South America and other countries into which their
people have migrated.
It is equally true that the Japanese are not by nature a migratory people. They have a foothold in Korea and in Formosa, but the Japanese population of 350,000 of Korea has
remained stationary for the last ten years, while in Formosa,
a country which can easily support 8,000,000 and at present,
with a population of only 3,000,000, has only 157,000
Japanese. On the other hand, the movement of Japanese from
the central provinces to the northern regions, which are colder
and therefore more inviting to the Japanese, has been steady
and persistent. The reasons are obvious-the Japanese has
more of an onion-skin than the American or the German and
has very little stamina for surviving in tropical region.
Recent developments in the Japanese Empire also preclude
the possibility of Japanese mass migration into the Philippines.
The leaders of thought of the country, such as Dr. Inazo Nitobe and Professor Ehimidzu of the Imperial University of
Tokyo, have come to realize that the solution of Japanese overpopulation can be solved, not through emigration, but by the
adjustment of social and economic conditions at home. Japan
is now 98 per cent economically self-supporting and the poisonous idea, that has been injected into our minds by the
imperialists that Japan has a larger population than she can
feed, is nothing more than a delusion and a snare. Only 15
per cent of the arable land of the Empire is now under cul