And so. Mr. President. out of that reflection grew what was called the nationalorigins feature of the immigration law. That provides. In effect. that the aggregate immigration to America shall he 150.000 a year instead of 164.000. as under the temporary method. It reduces the aggregate to 150.000. plus normal quotas of 100 to a lot of small countries which do not use them but must necessarily be listed. In practical effect. it reduces the inflow of immigration about 14.000 persons per year. It provides. not that we shall take each present living individual and try to trace his pedigree and determine what percentage of him is German and what percentage French and what percentage British. Of course. that is absurd. It provides. on the other hand. that the process shall be worked from the past down to the present by taking the record of immigration into the United States from various countries. and determining from that. with the known factor of increase. what percentage of the present population of the United States owes its origin to each of the European nations from which immigration is permitted. That process had been worked out long before immigration was restricted. It had been studied coolly and scientifically long before the matter of national origins was ever heard of in connection with immigration matters. In 1910 the Census Bureau had put out a most carefully studied publication dealing with the composition of the stock of America at that time. and that. made up without any partisanship. without any strife among these different nations. was the foundation of the work of the quota board in establishing these nationalorigins quotas. The results can be well tested by the claims that these different nationalities made before this became a contentious question.
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immigration