Mr. Chairman and gentlemen of the committee. it will be my pleasure to vote for the Johnson immigration bill. as It looks like it is the best we can do under existing circumstances. It. seeks to protect American Ideals and institutions. In doing this it Is fairny. more than fairit is even generous to all the nations of the earth. A bill of this kind ought to have been passed some years ago. but It was. I presume. impossible then. as the idea was prevalent that Uncle Sam was young and strong and able to become the asylum for all the nations and tribes of the earth. But now the situation has changed. and the vast majority of the American people. in my judgment. believe that the time is now at hand to really restrict immigration or prohibit It altogether. Every delay on this matter now means danger. Good as this bill is. it Is not all I would have it to be. for the reason that I believe all Immigration ought to be prohibited until we can Americanize and assimilate the population we now have. and if there be any among us who can not and will not be assimilated. they should be sent back to the country from whence they came. In this view I do not stand alone. for the country is behind the movement. and this being a representative form of government it Is our duty to carry out the wishes of the people. I do not criticize the committee because I realize that In a committee. as in the House. practically all legislation is a compromise and the "giveandtake" element has its innings. But I am wondering why the bill was not written in more restrictive terms. Some days ago. when the gentleman from Ohio was discussing the Immigration question. he made the statement in an answer to a question that fie believed the House would pass a bill prohibiting immigration If the committee had reported it. The American Legion Weekly in its issue of February 29. 1924. quoted Chairman JOHNSON. of the House Immigration Committee. as having made the statementthat a poll of both Houses of Congress shows that a majority favors a more rigid restriction of immigration than has ever been written Into a bill. In his speech last Saturday In the House the distinguished chairman of the Immigration Committee said: I believe that fully 80.000.000 citizens of the United States are bending a laboring oar with a majority of the Members of the House and Senate In this effort to really restrict immigration to the United States. Therefore I am wondering why we can not pass a really prohibitive measure demanded by the vast majority of the American people. I am wondering why a more restrictive bill was not reported by the committee. In my campaign for Congress I advocated in my platform and on the stump an absolute prohibition of immigration. and I introduced a bill In this House seeking to carry out the idea I had advocated. I got my eyes opened on the Immigration question during- the great World War. for among the many valuable lessons we learned during that war was that we had in the United States too many people with us who were not of us nor for us. When General Pershing accompanied the expeditionary forces across the submarineinfested waters to assail hostile lines which had never been broken and divisions which had never been conquered. the first message. as I recall. that he sent back to the President of the United States was: You take care of the enemy at home. and I will take care of the enemy over here. What did that mean?
Identified stereotypes
Generalization that immigrants cannot be Americanized and are a danger to the country.