Speech #870077072

I recognize that no one Congress is capable of meeting every national need and priorities of importance must be established. This does not mean. however. that the majority leadership in the Congress should with impunity. year after year. relegate to the legislative cellar subjects which are not to their particular liking. Immigration and refugee legislation are among such subjects. Immigration reform is long overdue. Our refugee legislation is woefully inadequate. The majoritys inaction in these fieldseven worse. its refusal to actcan no longer be excused. The archaic restrictions that bind our immigration policies reflect a provincialism that ill befits us. We give the impression. both at home and abroad. that we are obsessed with a xenophobia that is neither reasonable nor sensible. I am concerned particularly with the national origins quota systema system which purports to preserve the ethnic composition of quota immigrants and concomitantly the ethnic and racial balance of the country. The McCarranWalter Act bases its quota system upon the white population of the United States in 1920. divided uparbitrarily at thatbetween ethnic groups. In rewriting the law we must depart as far as we can from this system. The total population according to the 1960 census should be used as a base. not just the white population as it stood in 1920. Quotas should be divided up. insofar as possible. according only to U.S. needs and priorities of applications. Our refugee law is inadequate. It is confined to a very limited number of Europeans. It excludes all others. and does not give us a base upon which we can exercise real leadership in the world refugee problem. The McCarranWalter Act discriminates against naturalized citizens. It contains unnecessary penalties which makes them secondclass citizens. Reform immigration legislation must be considered now. The Eisenhower administration recommended legislation to liberalize our immigration laws in the 84th. 85th. and 86th Congresses. Congress refused to act. In this Congress I have waited expectantly for a message from the new administration on the subject of immigration. and to date there has been silence. Can this be another subject. like civil rights. that the administration wants shoved into the legislative cellar? Is this yet another broken campaign promise? The 1960 platform of the Democratic Party states: The national origins quota system of limiting immigration contradicts the founding principles of this Nation. The platform calls for an end to discrimination in immigration policies. revision of the quota system. removal of the distinctions between nativeborn and naturalized citizens and admission of a fair share of refugees. It expresses confidence "that a Democratic President in cooperation with Democratic Congresses will again implant a humanitarian and liberal spirit in our Nations immigration and citizenship policies." This is high sounding language my friends. But it becomes clearly apparent that these are just words. full of sound and fury before the election. but signifying nothing after the election. What a cynical approach to the public welfare this is. In contradistinction. the Eisenhower administration repeatedly called for legislative reform of our immigration and refugee policies. A Democratic Congress refused to act. The Republican platform calls for basic amendments of the McCarranWalter Act. I and others on the minority side have introduced omnibus reform legislation. which I shall talk about in greater detail. An integral and essential facet of overall immigration policy is the refugee problem. In the years since World War II over 40 million human beings have been involuntarily uprooted from their homes and have crossed frontiers. artificial or traditional. in search of asylum. The tragic proliferation of refugees all over the world is one of the legacies of an era convulsed by two World Wars and many smaller wars. revolutions. civil conflicts. and surging nationalist movements. Refugees are both the product of political tensions and the cause of new unrest. Wherever refugees exist two elements are present: human misery and political tensions. The refugee is the pawn of power politics. a source of conflict between the state of origin and the asylum state. With dismal regularity in the postwar world. the immediate political issues generated by refugees have become caught up in the larger issues of the cold war. Wherever there is an unsolved refugee problem. there is thus a tragic human situation and a potentially explosive political situation. Refugee problems do not solve themselves. on the contrary. they are selfexacerbating. When neglectedas they all too often have beenhuman misery abounds and political tensions are aggravated. Consider for a moment the human dimensions of the "refugee problem." In the course of a world tour of refugee camps last autumn. I observed thousands of children and adults living without hope. without the barest material comforts. and above all. without the conditions of human dignity which we Americans have come to accept as our birthright. My first onsite experience with an exploding refugee situation occurred in the autumn of 1956 when I served as the representative of the Attorney General of the United States in Austria and Germany for purposes of setting up machinery under which almost 40.000 refugees from the Hungarian revolution might be brought into the United States. Many an early dawn I stood on the Austrian side of the bridge at Andau and watched Hungarian refugees come over the freezing swamps and canals. It was a sight and an experience that I shall never forget. Anyone who has witnessed the chaos. the fear. and the suffering of human beings in mass flight from their homes and their homelands can never again think of the plight of uprooted populations as anything less than an urgent demand on conscience and compassion. The United States can scarcely press for solutions to world refugee problems without offering to accept some of the refugees themselves. I do not suggest that we must open our doors to massive immigration. but I do maintain that we are under the strongest moral obligation. in advancing an overall resettlement plan. to participate in such a plan by offering homes within our own country to at least a reasonable number of refugees. Such action would require certain basic reforms in our immigration legislation. Another concept currently imbedded in our immigration policy is the system of involuntary loss of nationality by naturalized citizens through residence abroad. In this area we have witnessed a shift from a rebuttable presumption of voluntary expatriation to a conclusive establishment of expatriation. Historically expatriation was the act of the citizen. not the state. Simply by a change of abode for a period of time a naturalized citizen is conclusively presumed to have renounced his allegiance to the United States. This distinction creates a broad gap between the rights of native born and naturalized citizens and no system of exceptions. as are currently contained in the law. can rectify such a discrimination. The current expatriation provisions are arbitrary and repeal is warranted. Mr. Speaker. I am today introducing immigration legislation designed to make necessary and workable revisions to the Immigration and Nationality Act. Included in my bill are the following major features: First. in order to eliminate the current obsolete quota system formula based on the 1920 census my bill establishes an annual quota computed on the basis of the total U.S. population according to the 1960 census. This would result in an annual quota of about 300.000 instead of the present quota of 154.000. The quota for each minimum quota area would be raised from 100 to 200. This would include the countries in the "AsiaPacific triangle." In fact my bill abolishes that classification. Second. my bill provides that all unused annual quota numbers will be placed in a general quota pool. without distinction between areas. which will be available for allocation to the quota areas whose quotas were oversubscribed during the previous fiscal year. Each such oversubscribed area will receive a percentage of the number of visas in the quota pool in the ratio that its assigned quota bears to the aggregate quota of all oversubscribed quota areas. Third. the bill contains provisions which would allow new political entities an immigration quota of not less than the subquota or minimum quota for the area previously comprised. Fourth. refugees are defined in the bill as including persons forced to flee from Communist territory or from a country in the Middle East because of persecution or fear of persecution. The definition also includes persons who are victims of war. political upheaval. or natural calamity who are unable to return to their former homes. Fifth. where the President finds that an emergency situation such as the Hungarian revolt has arisen causing the creation of large classes of refugees. he may. by proclamation. direct the Attorney General to parole into the United States. refugees as selected by the Secretary of State. Furthermore. the Attorney General is authorized to parole into the United States refugees selected by the Secretary of State in any fiscal year up to 10.000 per year. Sixth. my bill provides for the subsequent adjustment of the status of such parolees. within prescribed procedures. to that of permanent residence. The Congress will retain veto power over such admissions. Seventh. the bill further provides. that during the next 2 years a total of 20.000 special nonquota immigrant visas will be authorized for refugees and their spouses and children if accompanying them. Up to 10.000 of these special nonquota visas will be available for unsettled hardcore refugees now in refugee camps under the auspices of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. The provisions of the Immigration and Nationality Act with reference to exclusion because of tuberculosis will be waived as to such unsettled hardcore refugees in United Nations camps. Eighth. my bill authorizes the Secretary of State to make grants to public and private agencies in the United States for the purpose of financing the resettlement of refugees in the United States for the next 2 years in conjunction with the special 20.000 nonquota visas that would be authorized. These grants would include some assistance for the care and rehabilitation of the nonsettled. hardcore refugees. Ninth. the bill eliminates the requirement .that an alien furnish information as to his race and ethnic classification in an application for an immigrant or nonimmigrant visa. Tenth. my bill eliminates the current discriminatory provisions in the law under which naturalized citizens can be deprived of their citizenship because of sustained residence abroad in excess of 3 years in their country of origin and 5 years elsewhere. Mr. Speaker. the need for prompt and effective action in the area of immigration policy appeals to our conscience and to commonsense. I know of no one who is satisfied with the law as it now stands. And yet few are willing to press for positive reform.