STATEMENT OF DR. HARRY H. LAUGHLIN, COLD SPRING HARBOR, LONG ISLAND, N. Y. Doctor LAUGHLIN. One clause in which I am particularly interested is number 4 on page 4 of committee print number 1. Referring to deportables it includes in its list An alien who is a public charge from causes not affirmatively shown to have arisen subsequent to entry into the United States. Of course, the present law contemplates keeping out of the United States all aliens who are likely to become public charges, but there are so many loop-holes in the administration of the law that when one makes a first-hand investigation of the custodial institutions of the country he finds many aliens in them in violation of the purpose of our immigration laws, particularly of the act of 1917. For example, during our survey of 1922, we found in 445 of the larger custodial state institutions in the United States approximately 44,587 foreign-born white persons who entered the United States in violation of the spirit of the law. The reasons they have not been deported are, first, some have been in the United States more than five years and consequently they are not deportable under present law; second, many of these state custodial institutions, of which there are approximately 700 in the United States, do not feel that it is incumbent upon them to take the initiative in deporting deportable persons. We are now making a survey of state and institutional practice with a view to making a report to the committee after the holidays. I am now in touch with the superintendents of all these institutions and they are collaborating with the survey by describing practices and supplying statistical and historical data on deportation in reference to deportation of aliens found in their institutions. We now have returns from more than one-half of these institutions. Many of them have never deported a single person, although they have had many deportable persons in their custody. That is because the authorities in charge of these institutions feel that deportation is largely a Federal matter and therefore the Federal authorities should take the initiative. If clause number 4 of committee print number 1, page 4, were amended to cover the difficulties we have already found by the field survey, it would, doubtless, be much more effective. Clause number 4 says: An alien who is a public charge from causes not affirmatively shown to have arisen subsequent to entry into the United States. It does not say who must make the showing. It does not say whether the showing shall be made by the alien or by the United States. The clause should be made to read: An alien who is a public charge from causes not affirmatively shown on behalf of the immigrant to have arisen subsequent to entry into the United States. The burden of proof as to when the cause or causes arose should be placed upon the immigrant instead of upon the United States Government. That change would, in my opinion, be one great step in advance. There is another matter. The bill does not define "public charge clearly enough. If a person is in an institution maintained by the State, the Federal Government, a city, or a town, he is a public charge. The institution may be maintained in whole or in part by State funds, so that in order to cover the case clearly, a definition of "public charge" should be put into this clause to clarify it. Mr. BACON. Would you advocate that? Doctor LAUGHLIN. Yes, sir; I would add: For the purposes of this act a public charge is a person maintained in whole or in part by public funds in a Federal, State, city, county or township, custodial or charitable institution, or who receives outdoor relief at public expense. The matter of "pay patients" in State hospitals for the insane throws some light on this point. An insane "pay patient" in the State of New York pays a dollar a day, while the State of New York expends at least $2 a day for his care. Moreover, there is a great overhead expense in buildings and administration in the operation of these institutions. In an earlier institutional survey I found that in 1916 for 576 institutions in all of the States the average investment in institutional plant per inmate was $1,034.71 The term "public charge" should include the entire cost of maintenance, including overhead and administration; that is, what it actually costs the State. In 1915 our previous survey showed that Massachusetts spent 30.4 per cent of all of her State expenditures for maintaining State custodial institutions. In the same year Alabama spent 5.4 per cent of her appropriations for the same purpose, while the several States as a unit spent 15.8 per cent of their total State appropriations for this purpose. A large percentage of the inmates of these institutions are deportable aliens who are not deported. Thus, from the standpoint of dollars and cents, which is the least debit, failure of Federal deportation is costing the States a great deal of money. A third item is of importance in the consideration of clause 4. The Secretary of Labor should be instructed to maintain a roster of public custodial institutions and of all public agencies rendering outdoor relief at public expense. There is no roster of these public institutions and agencies kept now. When we want to make a special institutional survey, we have to gather the names of these institutions from random and scattered sources. The CHAIRMAN. Would you have a roster go beyond the State institutions and to the counties and cities? Doctor LAUGHLIN. I would have the Secretary of Labor maintain a roster of institutions for all classes of socially inadequate where such institutions are maintained in whole or in part by the Federal Government, the State government, cities, towns, or counties. I would list the whole gamut of institutions maintained or aided by public funds. The CHAIRMAN. It would be a great aid to the committee if you could hurry your study and report with reference to those who are deportable and yet are not deported. We hope to report this bill very soon. We shall need those statistics to which you have referred to back the bill on the floor of the House. Doctor LAUGHLIN. A first-hand survey is being made and it is about ready. The CHAIRMAN. When can you get the report to us? Doctor LAUGHLIN. Early in the new year. Returns are coming in every day. Besides providing for maintaining such a roster up to date, the law should require the deportation service to maintain friendly relations with all public institutions and charitable organizations and to take the initiative in explaining to the responsible authorities of each of these public institutions and organizations the law of deportation and the procedure to be followed in deporting an individual deportable and in instituting deportation proceedings in cases of deportable inmates. The CHAIRMAN. In the case of a person about to be deported, does the State pay the cost of transportation, say, from Oregon to Ellis Island? Doctor LAUGHLIN. The Federal deportation service generally pays that. The deportee or his friends pay the expenses of a friend or relative who accompanies, voluntarily, the deportee. Generally the deportee is a public charge and has no money. The State looks on deportation as a Federal matter. Mr. WATKINS. The Immigration Bureau in Portland, Oreg., in the month of October, 1924, spent $1,744 for railroad tickets alone for deporting aliens. The CHAIRMAN. Then you think a bill somewhat enlarging the scope and making clearer certain processes is necessary? Doctor LAUGHLIN. Yes, sir. Mr. CABLE. Have you any idea of the cost to the States and the -counties of maintaining deportable persons? Doctor LAUGHLIN. I have not the exact figures. That may be computed by finding the number of deportable persons and assuming that it costs just as much to maintain an alien as it does a native-born citizen in the institution. Mr. RAKER. How do so many of these nonadmissible aliens, the class described by you, get into the United States? Doctor LAUGHLIN. They get through the immigration sieve simply because the Immigration Service can not diagnose a man's prospect by 5 or 10 minute medical examination. Making a diagnosis is a big job is properly done. Mr. RAKER. You really do not mean a 5 or 10 minute examination. Do you not mean a half-minute examination? Doctor LAUGHLIN. The immigrants go through a line very hurriedly. There are so few inspectors that it is a physical impossibility for them properly to examine all immigrants. Mr. CABLE. Therefore the country suffers from a lack of proper inspection of aliens. Doctor LAUGHLIN. The authority is a function of the Federal Government, but the responsibility and cost for maintenance is upon the State government. The CHAIRMAN. How do the States fail to connect up with the Federal deportation service; that is to say, if they are sleeping on their rights, why? Doctor LAUGHLIN. The superintendents and boards of trustees of the custodial institutions in the States, having complete charge of persons committed to their keeping, rarely get in touch with the deportation service of the Bureau of Immigration of the Department of Labor of the United States. The alien lives in the insti tution the same as a native born, and when he crosses the five-year limit he is not deportable. Shortly after the first of the year I shall have statistics analyzing the nature of the contact and cooperation between the institutions and the Federal deportation service. Failure in this contact is why I suggest a roster of institutions and greater initiative on the part of the Federal service in enabling State and local institutions and organizations to avail themselves of the deportation law, and thus more completely weed out the deportable aliens who are public charges. This is especially important now that the five-year limit on deportability is removed. Mr. RAKER. Have you during the last four years observed the medical examination that is given aliens as they come from the ships and land at Ellis Island? Doctor LAUGHLIN. Yes, sir. Mr. RAKER. They do not make any physical examination except in rare cases, do they? Doctor LAUGHLIN. The line goes past the inspectors. The immigrants walk slowly along while the medical inspectors observe them. It seems that about every tenth man is pushed aside and held for a more thorough examination. Mr. RAKER. The men are not divested of their clothes and they usually have a large muffler around their necks. And the men usually have long whiskers and long hair, so that it is, in fact, almost impossible to observe any defect that may exist. Their shirts hang over their hands and cover them. Therefore, the medical officers can see nothing more than a part of those men. Doctor LAUGHLIN. That is true. Mr. RAKER. That condition applies particularly to the women. They have a long shawl around their shoulders and over their heads. Then their hands are covered. These are put through a chute, sometimes up a runway, and that is about all the examination that is made. Is that not about right? Doctor LAUGHLIN. Yes, sir; I agree with you. Mr. RAKER. So that if the law calling for a personal physical examination of the aliens by two medical men or medical women were complied with, we would exclude 90 per cent or more of these defective aliens in the first instance? Doctor LAUGHLIN. The more thorough the examination, the more surely would we exclude those who later become deportables. Mr. RAKER. So that, as a matter of fact, the trouble that the States and the counties and the Federal Government are up against is that we are not furnishing a sufficient number of employees, medical assistants, both men and women, who are competent to pass upon the aliens and make the personal physical examination that Congress has directed. Is that not one of the biggest troubles? Doctor LAUGHLIN. Yes, sir; that is one of the major troubles. This examination should include not only the physical examination at Ellis Island, but should be supplemented by records showing the history or background of the immigrant. His individual and family histories, or pedigree, are really more important than his physical examination. The Johnson Act of 1924 is a movement in this direction. But this refers principally to the prevention of necessity for deportation. This is the best remedy. However, do the best the Nation can, there will always be need for deportation or the "final selection" so long as we are an immigrant-receiving Nation. To summarize my testimony to-day: The bill under consideration seeks to perfect our deportation service to make it support our new standards of admission for immigrants. Section 4 of the draft refers to public charges. Our researches in this particular field point to the need of three specific improvements in this particular section: first, placing on the immigrant the responsibility for proving that he became a public charge from causes arising after his admission; second, defining more clearly a "public charge;" and third, estab lishing a roster of public custodial institutions and agencies for outdoor relief, and maintaining an active liasion between them and the Federal deportation service, on the initiative of the latter. The CHAIRMAN. If there are no further questions to ask Doctor Laughlin, let us thank him for coming to-day and excuse him. Before the committee goes into executive session I should like to read into the r cord two letters for the information of the committee. The first is from the American Defense Society (Inc.). It says: AMERICAN DEFENSE SOCIETY, (INC.), New York, N. Y., December 11, 1924. Congressman ALBERT JOHNSON, Committee on Immigration and Naturalization, Washington, D. C. DEAR SIR: At a meeting of the committee on immigration and naturalization of this society held December 8 at the residence of Mr. Madison Grant, New York City, I was requested to advise you that this committee at a meeting held November 14, favors and will advocate a period of time not less than 10 years before an immigrant here is qualified for naturalization. The committee also indorsed the two propositions approved by the Immigration Restriction League of Boston who favor the general plan of the registration of aliens and extending the quotos to the countries of the western hemisphere. It was also resolved that this committee favors a strengthening of the present law and the enforcement of its provisions in relation to the deportation of persons now illegally here. I was instructed to ask you to transmit this letter to each member of your committee. The following were in attendance at the meeting above referred to: Charles Stewart Davison, chairman of the committee, Madison Grant, Dr. Ellsworth Eliot, jr.. Miss Belle Gurnee, Elon H. Hooker, Francis Kinnicutt, Gino Speranga, Mrs. Coffin Van Rensselaer, Miss Wetmore, John A. Stewart, and C. M. Penfield, Yours very truly, C. M. PENFIELD, Assistant to the Chairman. I have another letter from The National Council of Jewish Women, New York City, which, while not in line with the matter under discussion, will be read into the record. It says: Hon ALBERT JOHNSON, THE NATIONAL COUNCIL OF JEWISH WOMEN, The Albermarle, Washington, D. C. SIR: Attached please find two resolutions passed by the board of managers of The National Council of Jewish Women at their annual meeting held in New York City November 17-21, 1924. We trust you will give these resolutions your careful consideration and do everything you can consistently do to secure favorable action in this connection. |