REVISION OF IMMIGRATION, NATURALIZATION, AND

NATIONALITY LAWS

TUESDAY, MARCH 6, 1951

UNITED STATES SENATE,

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES,

SUBCOMMITTEES OF THE COMMITTEES ON THE JUDICIARY,

Washington, D. C. The joint subcommittee met at 2 p. m., pursuant to call, in room F-82 of the Capitol, Hon. Pat McCarran, chairman, presiding. Present: Senators McCarran, O'Conor, and Ferguson; and Representatives Walter, Feighan, Chelf, Gossett, Graham, Fellows, and Case.

Also present: Richard Arens, staff director of the Subcommittee on Immigration and Naturalization of the Committee on the Judiciary of the United States Senate; Drury Blair and Miss Ethel Johnson, staff members of the Immigration and Naturalization Subcommittee of the Committee on the Judiciary of the United States Senate; and Walter M. Besterman, legislative assistant to the Subcommittee on Immigration and Naturalization of the Committee on the Judiciary of the House of Representatives.

Chairman MCCARRAN. The committee will be in order.

We will insert in the record at this point S. 716 and H. R. 2379, bills to revise the laws relating to immigration, naturalization, nationality, and for other purposes.1

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Chairman MCCARRAN. In opening the hearings on S. 716 and the companion House bill, H. R. 2379, I desire to comment respecting the background of these bills.

The task in which we are engaged is one which has never before been accomplished in the history of the Republic; namely, to revise and codify all of the numerous immigration and naturalization laws. Since the first immigration law of 1798, these laws have been enacted piecemeal and consist of literally hundreds of enactments which have been supplemented and implemented by thousands of rules, regulations, proclamations, Executive orders, and operations instructions.

The bills which are before us today have not been hastily conceived. They are rather a result of an intensive investigation and study of our entire immigration and naturalization system which was made over the course of 22 years by a subcommittee of the Senate Committee on the Judiciary, of which I had the honor of being chairman.

18. 716 and H. R. 2370 were filed with the subcommittee; subsequently H. R. 2816 was filed with the joint subcommittee.

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I shall not undertake to recite in detail the work which went into the study and investigation. Suffice it to say that the subcommittee and its staff spent literally thousands of hours of time in the study and investigation. We studied not only the history of the immigration policy of the United States but the immigration policies of other countries. We delved into the history and development of international migrations and the problems of population and natural resources. We studied the characteristics of the population of the United States, insofar as they were related to our immigration and naturalization system. We studied the organization and functions of the agencies of the Government which are concerned with the administration and operation of our immigration and naturalization law. We studied each of the thousands of provisions of our immigration and naturalization laws with end in view of appraising their adequacy, force, and effect. May I say in passing that not only were these thousands of provisions of the law themselves studied carefully but in conjunction therewith we studied the judicial and administrative interpretations of those provisions of the law and the rules and regulations implementing them.

In the course of our work the subcommittee obtained and considered appraisals and suggestions from several hundred officers and employees of the Immigration and Naturalization Service and the Visa and Passport Divisions of the Department of State. In addition, we received and considered appraisals and suggestions from numerous individuals and representatives of various interested nongovernmental organizations.

The study and investigation disclosed many inequities, weaknesses, loopholes, and inconsistencies in our present hodgepodge immigration and naturalization system. The gravity of this situation is not merely academic nor is it confined to the question of serious inconvenience to those who undertake to administer or understand our laws. Today, as never before, a sound immigration and naturalization system is essential to the preservation of our way of life, because that system is the conduit through which a stream of humanity flows into the fabric of our society. If that stream is healthy the impact on our society is salutary, but if that stream is polluted our institutions and our way of life become infected.

Simultaneously with the filing of these comprehensive and detailed reports on our immigration and naturalization system (S. Rept. No. 1515, 81st Cong.) on April 20, 1950, I introduced in the Senate S. 3455 of the Eighty-first Congress, which was the predecessor bill to S. 716 and H. R. 2379 of this session of the Eighty-second Congress. S. 3455, like the instant bills, provided for the repeal of all of the immigration and naturalization laws and the enactment of one completely revised immigration and naturalization code. Many months of tedious work were devoted to the preparation of S. 3455, and it went through several drafts before it was finally introduced. In that work I was assisted by not only the staff of the Senate Immigration Subcommittee but also by experts from the Immigration and Naturalization Service, the Visa Division of the Department of State, the Passport Division of the Department of State, and the Legislative Counsel of the Senate.

After the introduction of S. 3455, copies of the bill were circulated to interested governmental and nongovernmental agencies for study

and comment. The Immigration and Naturalization Service assigned two experts who prepared a 525-page detailed analysis and comment on the bill, and the Department of State set up a special committee within the Department which performed a similar function. In addition, a number of noncongressional and nongovernmental agencies submitted analyses and suggestions on the bill. In the course of numerous conferences in which the various suggestions and analyses were considered, S. 3455 was further refined and each of the thousands of provisions was checked and rechecked. On January 29 of this year I introduced S. 716, which is the refined version of the original bill. I am gratified that the chairman of the Immigration and Naturalization Subcommittee of the House of Representatives, Congressman Francis E. Walter, introduced a companion House bill, H. R. 2379, which, with only a few slight changes, is identical to S. 716.

The cardinal principle which has guided me in determining the provisions of the proposed legislation is simply this: The best interests of the United States of America. Consistent with that principle, however, are the several provisions of the proposed legislation which remove inequities and discriminations in our present system.

If the bills now before us did nothing more than eliminate the deadwood from our present immigration and naturalization laws and integrate into one legislative enactment all of the remaining provisions, they would be worth the time and effort which has gone into them. But they do much more than that. The bills do not, however, undertake to change any of the provisions of existing law just for the sake of change. It has been my policy not to change those provisions of the present law which have proven to be sound, especially since throughout the years there has been built up a body of judicial and administrative interpretations of those provisions upon which we can rely.

In addition to making numerous technical and minor changes in our immigration and naturalization laws, the instant bills make several significant changes. Among these are the following:

(1) A system of selective immigration, within our quota system, is established, geared to the needs of the United States;

(2) Racial discriminations and discriminations based on sex are removed;

(3) More thorough screening, especially of security risks, is provided;

(4) Structural changes are made in the enforcement agencies for greater efficiency;

(5) The exclusion and deportation procedures are strengthened;

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(6) Naturalization and denaturalization procedures are strengthened to weed out subversives and other undesirables from citizenship. In conclusion, may I say that no subject is more complex and controversial than the subject of immigration and naturalization, with all its many ramifications. I am confident, however, that after these bills are subjected to the cross-fire of opinions and arguments in these joint hearings, we shall be able to report them with such amendments as appear to be justified for prompt action by the respective Houses

of the Congress, to the end that we shall establish a comprehensive and sound immigration and naturalization system for our country. Congressman Walter, the chairman of the Immigration and Naturalization Subcommittee of the House, is present and will now be heard.

Representative WALTER. I am grateful to the Senator from Nevada for stressing the fact that we are today initiating an unprecedented legislative venture. In full realization of this fact, and being fully aware of the importance of this legislation, we shall with particular diligence proceed with the preparation of the final bill which we expect to emerge from our hearings in the not-too-distant future.

Writing legislation such as this, legislation which will affect the fate of millions of human beings, in this country and abroad, is a task that will require foresight, caution, and painstaking study, as well as careful weighing of equities, human rights, and of the best social, economic, and security interests of this country.

As pointed out by the Senator from Nevada, there has been no revision and codification of our many and varied immigration statutes. True, the act of February 5, 1917, is still regarded as the basic qualitative law and the act of May 26, 1924, as the basic law quantatively. But a complicated superstructure of amendments, substitutes, and repeals have been added through the years to these two basic statutes. Many obsolete laws, reminiscent of their day, remain on the statute books. Inequities, gaps, loopholes, and shortcomings have become apparent with the years.

Permit me to point to only a few of them: We are still operating under the formula of "first come, first served." This formula serves the intending immigrants all right, but it does not serve the needs of our hospitals, our universities, and our industrial and defense establishments. In this legislation we intend to provide for selectivity in immigration, and I believe that the need for such selectivity has been demonstrated by the unanimous approval of the House of Representatives of my bill, H. R. 3001, in the Eighty-first Congress. The 1924 act makes a sharp and certainly unjustified distinction between the prerogatives accorded to husbands as differentiated from their wives. This legislation tends to correct this inequity.

The removal of racial bars in our immigration and nationality statutes has been a piecemeal proposition and the result is that some races designated by the anthropologists as "yellow" or "brown" remain barred while other people of similar races have been granted eligibility to immigrate and to obtain citizenship.

In the field of our nationality laws, very important codification work was done in 1940. A draft of a proposed codification of the then obsolete nationality law was presented to the Congress jointly by the Departments of State, Justice, and Labor. This proposal, in amended form, became law on October 14, 1940, and is now known as the Nationality Act of 1940. This statute represents the first attempt to bring within one cohesive and comprehensive statute, the various laws relating to nationality. However, since then, not less than 31 amendments to the Nationality Act of 1940 have been enacted, some for the purpose of clarification and others to meet the spirit and the requirements of the ever-changing times.

A great number of changes in the basic structure of the Nationality Act of 1940 have been proposed in recent years, and it looks as though

we will again have to proceed with piecemeal legislation unless we revise our nationality laws at this time.

I am happy to say that my bill, H. R. 2379, is generally in accord with the naturalization provisions set forth in Senator McCarran's bill, S. 716. I want to stress, however, at this time, that I propose in my bill the retention of the shorter residential requirements for alien spouses of United States citizens. While I fully agree with the Senator from Nevada that there should be a uniform period of residence required for all aliens, I do believe that a uniform, but a shorter period of residence should be required for those who are a part of American families. A 3-year period of residence spent in American family surroundings by alien spouses of American citizens should insure the necessary understanding of our fundamental principles, of our form of Government, and should provide sufficient opportunity for demonstration of attachment to this country and to its Constitution.

As I pointed out on the floor of the House on February 5, 1951, my bill, H. R. 2379, now before this joint committee, is, in my opinion, not the last word of what we would like to see enacted. My main purpose in introducing it and in making it not very much different from S. 716, introduced by the Senator from Nevada, was to expedite the holding of the hearings that we are just about to start.

I believe in the great need of this legislation and I, therefore, urge everybody to give us the benefit of their experience but not to prolong the hearings unduly.

I cannot conclude my remarks without expressing our gratitude for the sincere and hard work done in the preparation of the basic draft of this legislation. I know that the bills before us represent the prod uct of long months and even years of effort designed to produce a comprehensive and workable draft. I hope that the final product of our labor will emerge in improved form and that it will be approved by the Congress before this current session adjourns.

Chairman MCCARRAN. Thank you, Congressman Walter.

Representative CELLER. I would like to be heard, Mr. Chairman. Chairman McCARRAN. You asked to be heard, and we have had an exchange of correspondence between ourselves, and I want to hear you, Mr. Celler, and I want to hear you at length. We have here, however, an agenda of people who have come here from a distance, and I think in all fairness to yourself and to this committee, you should wait for a date at which you can be heard at length, so that the committee can have the benefit of your discussion.

To now step in, after we have had this exchange of correspondence in which I told you that the agenda had been set up and I wanted you to come at some day when you could have the time for yourself, I think would be unfair to those who have come here, and especially when you are here and can come at any time.

The Veterans of Foreign Wars' representative, Mr. Ketchum, is here to be heard.

At the opening of this hearing you asked for 3 minutes.

Representative CELLER. You had 10 minutes, and Mr. Walter had 8.

Chairman MCCARRAN. I am the chairman of this committee, how

ever.