Speech #610262046

Now. another word in reference to the expenditures which have just been discussed by the gentleman from Georgia . I have never voted against a proper appropriation. as the gentleman from Illinois well said the other day. I was inclined to vote against an appropriation to continue the work of the Immigration Commission during the last session of Congress. That commission had been in existence for more than two years and had expended out of the Public Treasury hundreds of thousands of dollars. It had an expensive piece of machinery and in one of the nearby buildings an immense corps of clerks. experts. and in addition the commission was organized and traveled abroad investigating a question that every sensible American citizen knew all about even before the creation of the commission. Do we need any testimony or the expenditure of at least a million dollars to convince us the time has long since passed for allowing undesirable immigrants to land upon the shores of our country? Why. we had the promise of the chairman of that committee if we- would give him an additional appropriation that commission would wind up its business. and that some practical legislation would be submitted to this Congress for it to pass that would close our doors to the riffraff and criminal class and the Black Hand and the scum of the earth that has been pouring in upon our shores for years and years. and. as a Republican Member of Congress. I feel indignant that a Republican majority. -charged with the responsibilities that we are. is about to go out of power in this Hous without enacting a proposed law which.