["Asiatics etc.", The Hedland Advocate (Port Hedland, WA), Saturday, March 27]
Since we commenced a series of articles on the Asiatic influx into the Nor'-West various people have been put forth a bogey that we were seeking the annihilation of the pearling industry. So far has this bogey been labored that our critics have sought to place every pearler on an irreproachable pedestal of honor and respectability, with the colored indentured men forming a halo, and it now becomes necessary for us to say much we did not set out to relate. Mr. Davis, a very wordy resident of Broome, in an interview with "Truth," oiled over our contentions in our issue of January 10, and ended up by declaring that whitemen cannot do the pearling work, and if Australia ceases to allow cheap colored labor, the pearlers will leave Australia. In previous articles we clearly indicated that we were not yet prepared to advocate the abolition of indentured labor in the pearling, although we recognise that there are sound arguments in favor of such a course. Whitemen can perform all the work on the pearling ground, and some five or six divers have for some time been engaged in the trade on this coast. Mr. Davis points out that divers have died while at work, and it is better to sacrifice colored men than white. How would that argument be received if applied to the mining industry of the State? Similar arguments were advanced by the semi-slave holders in the Queensland sugar industry, which today is entirely worked by whitemen and is thriving.
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