Speech #760039791

No one knows how many others there are like him. This goes to illustrate that unless you get a squeal in these cases you cannot possibly find out who the culprits are. If the Committee on Immigration can obtain this resolution from the Committee on Rules without any further pussyfooting or without hemming and hawing as to who is going to conduct the investigation. we can get to the root of this smuggling racket that is going on and has been going on for years. In fact. they have a scale of prices which starts at $250 and goes up to $1.500. A Chinese girl brings a top price of $1.500. while a Chinese man is charged just $1.000. There is an international group that has been operating on these two borders. and the Department. with all its forceand I am not criticizing the Department of Labor. which is doing all in its power to prevent these occurrencesis unable to stop the smuggling. How can you prevent smuggling when we have a border 9.000 miles long. counting both the Canadian and Mexican borders? We have 850 enforcing officers known as the border patrol. Of this force there are 68 maintenance employees. leaving about 775 actually doing patrol work. When you bear in mind that the borders are open 24 hours a day. you will see it requires 3 shifts. we must divide that 775 three ways. leaving about 290 shifts. if the men could work 24 hours a day. 365 days a year. However. you must remember that they only work on a basis of 51/2 days a week and must have necessary time off for vacations and sick leave. When you have what is left. you must divide that in two. because the nature of the work is so dangerous that the men have to patrol the borders in teams of two. You might be interested in knowing that since the border patrol was created in 1924. 23 officers have been killed in battles with smugglers of aliens. This shows that there is no limit to which smugglers will go to attain their end. It is difficult to prevent smuggling entirely with such a force. The Committee on Immigration and Naturalization should be given the right to study this problem and should have the right to see what can be done to close our borders. If necessary. I would create a real organization of veterans of the World War and put more men on the border to stop the smuggling of aliens.