American Passage_ The History of Ellis I - Vincent J. Cannato [253]
186 Immigration restrictionists: Victor Safford, Immigration Problems: Personal Experiences of an Official (New York: Dodd, Mead, and Company, 1925), 88–90. 187 Samuel Gompers, another friend: Gompers, Seventy Years, vol. 2, 164. 187 By the summer of 1908: BG, August 9, 1908, September 5, 1908; Gompers, Seventy Years, vol. 2, 164; Oscar Straus Diary, 214, OS.
188 It is no surprise: John Lombardi, Labor’s Voice in the Cabinet: A History of the Department of Labor from its Origin to 1921 (New York: AMS Press, 1968), 144–145. 188 Gompers, who never had : Gompers, Seventy Years, vol. 2, 168; Lombardi, Labor’s Voice, 147–148.
188 The in-house journal: Journal of The Knights of Labor, January 1909, quoted in “What of the Future?” Publication of the Immigration Regulation League, No. 5, File 1144, IRL. Powderly even wrote a letter to President-elect Taft urging him to keep Straus as secretary of Commerce and Labor. Showing how out of touch he had become with the labor movement, Powderly claimed that American workers would second his support for Straus. “Talk to labor men anywhere, as I have done, and you will find that what I state is correct and moderate.” Letter from Terence V. Powderly to William Howard Taft, January 7, 1909, Series 3, WHT.
189 Americans tried to: Allan McLaughlin, “Immigration and Public Health,” PSM, January 1904; Frank Sargent, “The Need of Closer Inspection and Greater Restriction of Immigrants,” Century Magazine, January 1904.
189 “The advocates of absolutely unrestricted”: Outlook, February 22, 1913; “Reports of the Industrial Commission on Immigration,” vol. 15, 1901; NYT, April 14, 1911.
190 Dr. Victor Safford struck: Safford, Immigration Problems, 88.
CHAPTER TEN: LIKELY TO BECOME A PUBLIC CHARGE 191 One day, the former president: Robert Watchorn, The Autobiography of Robert Watchorn (Oklahoma City, OK: Robert Watchorn Charities, 1959), 140–141.
192 While he had expressed: Letter from Theodore Roosevelt to Herbert Knox Smith, January 18, 1909, TR; Watchorn, Autobiography, 149–152.
192 Prescott Hall had been: Letter from Prescott Hall to Hon. William Howard Taft, December 8, 1908, File 801, IRL.
192 Despite the criticism: NYT, April 25, May 19, 1909.
193 The personal attacks: NYT, July 17, 1909; Letter from Robert Watchorn to Charles D. Hilles, January 20, 1913, Series 6, Reel 451, WHT. After leaving Ellis Island, Watchorn took a job with Union Oil Company, having befriended its owner Lyman Stewart. Despite Watchorn’s lack of experience in the oil industry or in business in general, he was named treasurer of the company. Many board members opposed him, believing him to be incompetent. The former coal miner, union leader, and government bureaucrat was soon traveling to New York and London to raise capital among the world’s savviest financiers. Watchorn was out of his element, and accusations of ethical impropriety followed him in his new career. He soon managed to upset Stewart and cast doubt on his own honesty and competence when he became involved in a controversy over a million dollars’ worth of stock options given to him by Stewart. Details of the deal remain murky, but it led to Watchorn’s resignation under a cloud of suspicion. Then, having entered the world of oil wildcatting in Oklahoma and Texas, Watchorn became a millionaire and by the 1930s had turned his attention to philanthropy. He endowed a church in his hometown of Alfreton, England, and a music hall at the University of Redlands. In 1932, Watchorn presented his greatest piece of philanthropy—the Lincoln Memorial Shrine—to his adopted hometown of Redlands, California. See Frank J. Taylor and Earl M. Welty, Black Bonanza: How an Oil Hunt Grew into the Union Oil Company of California (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1950) 165–166; Watchorn, Autobiography, 154–162, 185–211.
193 Just as Roosevelt: Letter from William