In doing so, the proper way would be to examine any possible future change in the causes which constitute the present high birth rate. How, then, about the age distribution of the Japanese? It has been shown that 59 per cent. of them are between the ages of seventeen and forty, and that 15 per cent. of them are above forty. In other words, 74 per cent. of the Japanese are mature, while only 26 per cent. are minors. Now, we are all mortals, and grow old as time passes; even the Japanese do not have magical power to retain perennial juvenility, as some agitators seem to think. They grow old, the Japanese in California, as years come and go, passing gradually into the age when childbearing is no longer possible. Therefore, if fresh immigration is checked, which we have already indicated is desirable, it is manifest that a large portion of the present Japanese in California will die out without being reinforced by youths save those who are born in America, and hence are citizens thereof. That this tendency has already set in may be seen from the increase of the death rate among the Japanese in California, as the following table indicates: DEATH RATE OF JAPANESE IN CALIFORNIA. ======================== Year.|Number.|Percentage | | of Death | | per 1000. -----|-------|---------- 1910 | 440 | 10.64% 1911 | 472 | ..... 1912 | 524 | ..... 1913 | 613 | ..... 1914 | 628 | ..... 1915 | 663 | ..... 1916 | 739 | ..... 1917 | 910 | ..... 1918 | 1150 | ..... 1919 | 1360 | 20.00% ======================== The rate of death per one thousand population increased twice during the past ten years. When the age distribution becomes normal by the passing away of the middle-aged group which constitutes the majority at present, rendering the population evenly distributed among the children, middle-aged, and the old, the present high percentage of married people also will disappear, descending to the normal rate ruling in the ordinary communities, which is but half as high as that now prevailing among the Japanese living in California. When the number of young people relatively lessens, and that of married people also decreases, what other result can we expect but the marked fall in numbers born?