A recommendation in favour of reciprocity of treatment as between national and foreign workers was passed by the first International Labour Conference at Washington in 1919. This conference appointed an International Emigration Commission which met in 1921 and considered such questions as the co-ordi nation of national legislation on the subject of migration, equality of treatment of foreign workers, the elimination of agents inter ested in promoting emigration, and the creation of national sys tems of labour exchanges and information offices. At subsequent sessions of the International Labour Conference recommenda tions have been passed and draft conventions adopted dealing, among other things, with the communication to the International Labour Office of statistical and other information regarding migra tion; the equality of treatment of foreign workers as regards workmen's compensation ; the protection of emigrant girls and young women, and the simplification of the inspection of emi grants, on board ship. A standing International Commission as sists the International Labour Office in the work of endeavouring to give effect to the recommendations of the Conference.
In 1924, at the invitation of the Italian Government, an Inter national Emigration Conference was held at Rome at which about sixty countries were represented. This conference to a large extent duplicated the work of the International Labour Con ferences but it had the advantage of including the United States, which is not a member of the International Labour Office. The Rome conference dealt mainly with the technical and legal problems, similar to those discussed at the various International Labour Conferences, and was not of a diplomatic character. One of the most important resolutions was that dealing with the "Charter of Emigrants," which was an attempt to embody in a declaration the general principles which should govern legislation and international agreements for the regulation of migration and the treatment of emigrants. Some of the recommendations (and particularly the Charter) were not acceptable to certain countries as they were regarded as embodying principles such as the en couragement of migrants to cling to their former nationality or to involve too great a measure of State control. The Charter covered political and judicial questions which were regarded as outside the scope of a technical conference and others were con sidered to fall more properly within the scope of the international organizations set up under the Peace Treaties.
The matters dealt with at the Rome conference were further discussed at a second International Emigration Conference which was held in Cuba in 1928.
All measures of the nature referred to have as their object the protection and welfare of the emigrant and whilst they involve the strict control of migration they do not raise difficult political questions. There is a further international aspect of migration,
however, which raises problems of a different character. The re strictions placed upon immigration by oversea countries have in creased the difficulty of the population problem in Europe. The Rome conference revealed how closely the regulation of migra tion touches the sovereignty of the different States, and the diffi culties in the way of international uniformity on even technical questions. It is clear that the divergence of view between coun tries of immigration, and countries of emigration on matters of policy will be much more acute. On the one hand is the desire of a country to determine the composition of its own population by admitting only such persons and races and in such numbers as it considers it can assimilate on the other, the need for out lets for surplus population. The claim that any country with a sparse population must be ready to admit the overflow from a densely populated country has to be reconciled with the right of every country to protect its standards of life against incursions from outside and to safeguard itself from racial admixture.