Immigration
Letters[edit]
Topics[edit]
Clearly unjust for white race to annex a country of coloured people and then forbid them admission (especially to a large country); however, there is some truth that if a country with a reasonably high standard of living freely admits people accustomed to a lower standard, the standard of living and culture is bound to suffer; need for education to lift standards of both races and impartial, representative international tribunal ought to consider population pressures and suitability of climate for races
"With regard to your question about the "White Australia" policy, it is clear that this policy of rigid exclusion of coloured Asiatic races from Australia finds no justification in the Bahá'í Teachings.
"Bahá'u'lláh and `Abdu'l-Bahá taught in the clearest possible way the necessity of getting rid of all racial and national prejudices and of equal justice for men of all races and colours. That a white race should forcibly annex a country previously inhabited exclusively by coloured people and then proceed to forbid the admission of coloured people to that country - especially a country so large as Australia, many parts of which are obviously better suited for coloured races than for white people - is clearly unjust.
"At the same time there is undoubtedly truth in the contention that if, in a country where a reasonably high standard of living, of culture, etc., has been attained, people accustomed to a lower standard of life and culture are freely admitted, and allowed unrestricted rights of commercial and industrial competition, the standard of living and culture in that country is bound to suffer.
"Even if we got rid of racial and colour prejudice, this economic and cultured problem would remain. The Bahá'í method of solving the problem is to educate both the white and coloured races in the teachings of Bahá'u'lláh. The white races must cease to regard themselves as "superior" and as having, by virtue of that innate superiority a right to exploit, take unfair advantage of and even to exterminate coloured races, on the principle of the "survival of the fittest". They must cease to regard the colour of a man's skin as a legitimate index of his "superiority" or "inferiority" and must recognise that a good coloured man (of whom there are many) is better than a bad white man (of whom there are also many). They must adopt a policy of even-handed justice for white and coloured people and recognise that coloured and white people have equally the right to live and to have access to suitable land on which to live. If there are certain parts of the world which by reason of climate are more suited to coloured people than to white, then coloured people ought to have preference in rights of access to such land, if white people have preferential rights in cooler regions, more suited to their health and well-being.
"The "backward" races must be educated and their standard of living and culture be raised as much as possible, their latent talents being developed to the fullest possible extent. If this is done their objectionable characteristics will disappear.
"The so-called "advanced" races however, are by no means free from objectionable characteristics, such as commercial greed, love of domination, materialistic conceptions, want of spirituality. By true education and true religion these also must be got rid of.
"When both the "backward" and the "advanced" races become educated in this way, then such questions as the admission of coloured races to Australian territories will no longer be settled by certain people who have seized such territory dictating to the rest of the world who shall be allowed admission to it, but by an impartial international tribunal in which all sections of the human race shall be fairly represented and which will consider the pressure of population in various regions, the suitability of various regions for the habitation of different peoples, etc., and decide what is best in the interests of humanity as a whole.
"For the satisfactory solution of any one such question we need the progressive application of all the Bahá'í principles. For instance in this case it is clear that racial and national prejudices must be abolished, that universal education is necessary, that a universal league of nations must have an authority superseding that of any one nation, that impartial arbitration must be substituted for domination by powers which are backed by strong armies and navies, that an international language is needed to promote international understanding, that materialism and selfish greed must be replaced by true religion and mutual love, and so on.
"The ideals of the Oneness of God, the oneness of religion and the oneness of humanity must be instilled into the minds of the children throughout the world, and when a generation grows up thoroughly imbued with these great ideals, the solution of the economic and political problems that now cause so much misery, strife and even blood-shed in the world will become easy.
"Meantime in political and economic matters, compromise is necessary but we must use our influence to see that the compromise is ever being modified and advanced in the direction of justice for all - not in the direction of the exclusive advantage of one section of the world's population over others."
This text is not known whether it may possibly be authentic or in the category of Pilgrim's notes- (Attributed as being on behalf of Shoghi Effendi, Messages to the Antipodes, 19 April 1925; note that the World Centre could not find the original to verify this and it requested its removal, with the 2016 publication not including this letter)
(A large number of souls living under minority conditions can have a disquieting influence)[edit]
"The disquieting influence of over thirty million souls living under minority conditions throughout the continent of Europe...these stand out as the gravest symptoms that bode ill for the future stability of the structure of modern civilization. Little wonder if one of Europe's preëminent thinkers, honored for his wisdom and restraint, should have been forced to make so bold an assertion: "The world is passing through the gravest crisis in the history of civilization." "We stand," writes another, "before either a world catastrophe, or perhaps before the dawn of a greater era of truth and wisdom." "It is in such times," he adds, "that religions have perished and are born.""
See also[edit]
To-dos for this page[edit]
- Quotes on need for providing refuge and shelter, etc.
