Speech #800198341

It is not only necessary for us to catch up with our 5 years of lost production for domestic use during the war but we must also keep pace with our rapidly increasing population. This will tax our production facilities for several years to come. I served on the Immigration and Naturalization Committee for 4 years. and there I was able to observe the tremendous forces. alien and international in nature. bringing constant pressure on the Congress to open wide our gates to immigration. The same confusion. the same distortion of facts. the same withholding of facts. the same flood of misrepresentation obtained that always prevails when the administration is promoting some sinister political scheme contrary to public interest. It was made evident that the detention camps in Europe were a desirable source of propaganda to prey upon our people. and those whose objectivd is to break down the immigration laws of this country saw to it that the problem of displaced persons was not solved satisfactorily. Their one objective was to get countless thousands of European immigrants into the United States. and it appears they are succeeding to a very great extent. The United States since the war has admitted more aliens than all other nations combined. We have always admitted more. and. further. we have paid the expenses of the detention camps all over the world. About 2 years ago. President Truman assigned 8 or 10 ships for the exclusive use of immigrants coming to this country and sent a commission to Europe to expedite their travel and admittancd. Since then tens of thousands have entered monthly. Let us look at the record. For the fiscal year 1946. 312.190 aliens of all classesquota. nonquota. and nonimmigrant-:were admitted. In 1947. 513.597 immigrants. quota and nonquota. of all classes were admitted. The figures for the first 6 months of 1948 are not complete but it is reasonable to assume that the number of aliens to be admitted this year will exceed 700.000. Here we have .1.500.000 in 3 years. It Is safe to say that these immigrants occupy .00.000 living units. and we do not have houses for veterans. We do not have accurate figures on aliens in this country through illegal entry. but the number is estimated by competent authorities to be between 500.000 and 1.000.000 annually. They have hundreds of schemes to get Into this country. For example. a Greek ship arrived in New York early last year with a crew of 242 and left with a crew of 80. In 1944. more than 33.500 wouldbe immigrants were apprehended by our border patrol. In 1946. the number was 100.785. If the current rate of apprehension is maintained for the rest of this year the number will exceed 200.000.