To cite another example. applications from Turkey are presently being processed which were first filed in 1945. It is estimated that there is a backlog of some 200.000 people who daily crowd the offices of our consulates abroad and unless this conversion is made from quota to nonquota. the numbers will grow and the pressures will increase. It must be kept in mind that this backlog is due primarily to our national origin quota system. which gives such pitifully small quotas to the countries of southern Europe and Asia and gives to Great Britain 65.361 of our total annual quota of some 152.000. Yet Britain uses only 10 percent of this quota allotted her. and the rest are wasted. Does it not. then. make sense that we rectify in small measure this inequality of opportunity to migrate to the United States by focusing on the desirability of reuniting families? I am. therefore. introducing a bill which. following the precedent established by the act of September 11. 1957. will provide for the conversion of the fourth preference category registered up to July 1. 1959. to nonquota immigrant status. I believe firmly that this is the just and humane thing to do in the interest of the United States.
Keywords matched
immigrant national origin quota