Speech #690198962

Mr. Chairman and gentlemen. I intended to discuss at some length this afternoon the "national origins" provision of the 1924 immigration act. but as time is now so limited I will have to be content with pointing out a few interesting features. with a view of making an extension in the REcORD. and thus place further interesting facts before you. But before proceeding along that line I would like to say this to the gentleman from New York and others: The Committee on Immigration is making a very serious effort to find some simple plan of extending a modicum of relief to a large number of wives and children of decarants who would like to come to the United States and join their husbands and fathers who have taken out first papers for naturalization. The committee. however. is pressed with a number of other problems. and It seems impossible to carry any one to fruition because of the immediate coming up of some other problem which interferes with it. For instance. this morning. while we were discussing a proposal to transfer preference for farmers quota in countries where the quota is less than 6.000. and using that preference for wives and children. we were met with statements that the quotas should not be so tied that they can not be distributed among other relationsmothers. sisters. and so forth. I have decided. andin this I represent a number of members of the committee. to introduce. through the basket. a resolution which would authorize the appointment of a commission comprised of Members of the Senate and House Committees on Immigration. who would be authorized to sit prior to the Seventieth Congress. to investigate conditions and to frame suggestions for legislation. The proposal is as follows: Joint resolution to create a commission to study the immigration and naturalization laws Resolved.. ctc.. That(a) A commission is hereby created. to be known as the "Joint commission on immigration and naturalization " and to be composed of such members of the Committee on Immigration of the Senate and of the Committee on Immigration and Naturalization of the House of Representatives. whose terms of office include or who have been reelected to the Seventieth Congress. as may be designated by the chairmen of the respective committees. (b) Such commission Is authorized(1) To select a chairman and vice chairman from among its members . (2) 13y subcommittee or otherwise to hold such hearings and to sit at such times and places within the United States and to make such investigation and examination of the immigration and naturalization law of the United States. their operation. administration. and effect as it deems necessary. (3) To have such printing and binding done. to employ such clerical and other assistance. and to incur such expenses as it deems advisable (but the cost of stenographic service in reporting hearings shall not be in excess of 25 cents per hundred words) . and (4) To report to the Congress not later than the close of the first session of the Seventieth Congress with recommendations for any legislation deemed necessary. (c) The expenses of the commission shall be paid onehalf from the contingent fund of the Senate and onehalf from the contingent fund of the House of Representatives upon vouchers signed by its chairman or vice chairman. -As Members of the House. all of you will realize that problems of immigration and naturalization have become so magnified and involved as to make it impossible for any one committee of the House to finish even in one long session. to say nothing about a short session. the legislation necessary to bring into harmony both the immigration and the naturalization laws. It is highly desirable to find some method of giving the right to naturalization to a considerable number of people who are in the United States. and who through no fault of theirs are unable to get complete naturalization because they were not given by the Federal Government the very proof that they must have to comply with in order to become a citizen of the United States. If there were a dozen Members who would care to stay here after adjournment and work four or five weeks. I think they could complete the work of codification and rewriting. with orderly proposals for additional legislation.