Speech #770194833

I thank the gentleman for his contribution. Now. along these lines. the committee saw fit. in the passage of H. R. 6600. to vest the power of issuing these certificates in the Justice Department. that is. the Immigration Service. which has investigated the situation. which has a setup now ready and willing and able to go to work. and give some identification to honest Americans. born in this country. for the purpose of procuring defense jobs. and establishing the fact that they are American citizens. You understand -that an alien or person who is naturalized can very easily establish the fact that he Is an American citizen by presenting his certificate of naturalization. whereas a nativeborn citizen has a difficult time. because he may have been born in a community where there were no vital statistics kept. where there were no physicians. but only midwives. and there was no record kept of their birth. It seems to me that the Americanborn are having a hard time in this defense program. I talked to a distinguished Senator. member of the Senate Immigration Committee. and he thinks that the matter ought to be placed in the hands of the Census Bureau. We have heard the Census Bureau at length. and the committee did not feel that Congress should appropriate additional money. running into the millions. to create a new bureau in the Census Bureau. to issue these certificates of identity. when the Justice Department through its field offices all over the country is now definitely equipped to handle the problem. The Immigration and Naturalization Service has sufficient investigators to make a careful investigation in each case. so that when a certificate of this character is issued the person is known to be a person of American birth.