Speech #760084362

Of course. legal alien entrants are only part of the problem. We know the legal entrants. but do not know. and have no way of finding out. the number of total aliens in the country in the absence of alien registration. There is also the emigration factor. Emigration statistics are not official in the sense that immigration statistics are. The Government only really checks or counts aliens coming into the country legally. Nobody knows how many aliens enter illegally. but experts have estimated. and it seems a fair guess. that as many enter illegally as enter legally for permanent residence. Annually our Inadequate immigration patrol apprehends hundreds of highpowered automobiles. a large number of speedboats. and even airplanes smuggling aliens into our country. In 1937. 163 smugglers of aliens. 13.054 aliens entering illegally. and 608 other law violators were arrested. and the autos. trucks. airplanes. and boats seized ran into thousands of dollars. When Department of Labor officials appear before the Appropriations Committee they urge a" 50percent increase in the immigration personnel. much larger appropriations. and tellI quote from the House hearings on the 1938 appropriation blll-"how quite serious this situation is. with 46.152.918 total border crossings. 795.333 alien seamen examined. and a shortage of help [meaning immigration lawenforcement officers] in practically every district." That is the picture painted by the Department of Labor officials as to aliens before the House Subcommittee on Appropriations. but when the same officials appear before committees of Congress charged with reporting immigration and deportation legiplation they say the alien has "vanished" from our midst. and even estimate that. although the last official statistics. the census of 1930. reveal the largest foreign population In our history. over 14.000.000 foreign born. and between six and seven million aliens. and over 40.000.000 "foreignstock persons." that we have now no aliens. because they have either emigrated. died off. or got naturalized. and when pressed about alien registration. the Secretary of Labor. after telling the House Subcommittee on Appropriations that the alien Is vanishing and is no longer a problem. she then expressed her deep opposition to registering aliens. because she said they (the aliens) "do not want to be fingerprinted" (p. 224) and it would "complicate the Americanization of these people." The Government does not check aliens out. as it checks and counts the aliens in. Socalled emigration Is merely the report of departure tickets sold by the steamship and transportation companies. In 1937. which is typical. transportation companies reported 26.736 alien emigrants departed or aliens emigrated from the United States as compared with 35.817 the previous year. Department of Labor officials also told the House Appropriations Subcommittee in 1937 that 50.244 of the 231.884 aliens that entered during the 1937 fiscal year were immigrants. showing immigration was twice emigration. even according to Department of Labor officials -interpretation and classification of the statistics. Even those Department of Labor classified immigration statistics show in 1937 and again in 1938 a 25percent decrease in emigration and that immigration is at least twice emigration when we have over 12.000.000 unemployed. are having to appropriate a quarter billion dollars for expanding relief rolls. and crime as a result of unemployment is on the rampage. There is no excuse for allowing a single additional alien job hunter or relief seeker to enter our country. Ninetenths of the section 5. 27.762. quota aliens that entered in 1937 and over 3.0.000 in 1938 have no near relatives here. were nonpreference or quota immigrants. and should not have been admitted. No other country of consequence permits it. Each country should care for its own deficient. dependent. and unemployed. Our first thought should be for our own. Charity should begin at home. Immigration should be further restricted at least by passing S. 407. which would merely exclude the thousands of aliens now being admitted under section 5. no one of whom has a near relative here and every one of whom comes to take a job away from someone already here or to go on relief or become dependent on someone who has to have a job to support him. First things should be first. We should not decide our American affairs or legislate the way aliens here and abroad want us to legislate. but for America and Americans. and as Americans.