Speech #640068002

Mr. Chairman. the political refugee has been very carefully taken care of on page 9 of the bill with the following proviso. beginning in line 13: Provided. That nothing in this act shall exclude. if otherwise admissible. persons convicted. or who admit the commission. or who teach or advocate the commission. of an offense purely political. The committee believed that was as far as we ought to go. that those who were otherwise admissible who were convicted because of teaching political heresies in their own country should not be excluded. But here is a literacy test. .a test from which we exempt fathers and mothers. wives and daughters. and those who by reason of religious persecution evidenced by either overt acts or by the laws of the country or by Government regulations. making it broader than any provision of that character which has been heretofore agreed uponand my good friend from Massachusetts . the former ranking member of the committee. on Saturday felt constrained to offer an amendment. saying "overt governmental acts." but being assured that that would be the construction that would be placed upon it by officials who would pass upon it. he withdrew it. although he has always been in favor of confining it to those fleeing from religious persecution solely. If we open wide the door. as the gentleman from Illinois has suggested. so far as the mob in Mexico is concerned. the literacy test would not be worth a bawbee. because they are having political revolutions there all of the time. and every bandit that can get together a dozen men and declare that he is in favor of political liberty would be entitled to come over here whether he could read a word of his own language or the language of any other country. The other day the gentleman from Massachusetts . indicated what seems to be a widespread temper among the American people to exclude all aliens for the next 10 years. I have never quite got myself up to that point. I do not want these gentleman who are honestly the friends of the immigrant. no doubt. to make a mistake and emasculate this bill. I do not challenge their patriotism. but by undertaking to -inject these matters they will take the teeth out of it altogether. especially in regard to our neighbors to the south. and by so doing they will unconsciously force the passage of laws much more rigid through this Congress. I stand here today snore a friend of the Jew and the Teuton and the Celt than the gentlemen themselves who are undertaking to draw the teeth out of this bill so that there will be scarcely nothing left in it.