Speech #820201760

I do not think that it Is unjust in principle. I recognize it seems unfair to those individuals who might otherwise be able to enter our country from colonies under quota numbers of the mother country. They have been able to come in through an unforeseen exception to the basic national origins principle that underlies our immigration policy. The bill is not. however. unjust to them when it extends to them the same principle that already applies to others. When I worked here in 1943 to get a quota for the Chinese whose hip and loyalty and understanding we needed during the war. and then when we made Filipinos and natives of India eligible in about 1946. some said. "This is only a beginning. Little by little you will chip away our immigration barriers. These are the camels nose under the tent. and one by one you will tear down our immigration laws and our country will be thrown wide open to immigration from countries with cultures and standards widely different from those on which this Nation was founded." and all that sort of thing. I said. "I will resist efforts to do that." And to remove racial discrimination from our immigration laws does not destroy them. it improves them. It does not abandon the principles on which they are based. it merely extends them to people now wholly excluded because of race.