Speech #730136787

Whether or not these estimates are excessive. Supreme Court Justice Dike. of Brooklyn. in greater New York. has estimated. as published in the press. that there are at least 2.000.000 alien criminals in this country. While. of course. there has been some fraud in naturalization by means of forgery of essential papers. the Government is increasingly detecting and stopping this. The majority of these aliens bootlegged across the borders will not dare attempt naturalization for fear of discovery of their illegal entry and deportation. In this connection there is the possibility that the census count of 6.282.504 aliens does not cover the full number that are here. Human nature being what it is. it is entirely probable that a considerable proportion of those aliens who entered this country illegally carefully avoided being enumerated in the census. and were protected by their compatriots for fear the information or their unwillingness to give the information desired might lead to proceedings which would send them back. Of course. if they were not counted they do not figure in the basis of representation. However. 10 years from now. after they shall have become bolder. while still probably not daring to attempt naturalization. they are likely to be enumerated and in future apportionments to be represented. although they are here in violation of our laws. Then. too. Tammany has the most perfect system of exploiting aliens which has been developed in this country. Tammany has every incentive to naturalize every possible alien in order to vote him and so perpetuate Tammanyism. and yet. according to the last State census of New York. there were still more than a million unnaturalized foreigners in New York City. So it becomes apparent that. aside from those who are disqualified. there are many aliens in the country who have no intention of becoming citizens. However. the principle involved is a fundamental and vital one. and this amendment is just and righteous and will be imperatively called for so long as a citizen constituency large enough to make up a single district in a single State is deprived of representation in order to allow the big cities to retain an indefensibly padded representation by counting the citizens of other nations.