Speech #890010763

Mr. President. our national immigration policy has produced an incredible epic of broken lives. divided families. case after case of anguish. despair. and frustration. Surely the time has come to end the piecemeal approach to reform of this policy. The administration bill introduced by the Senator from Michigan . of which I am a cosponsor. is dedicated to the elimination of the discriminatory national origins quota system. I support this principle of S. 500 wholeheartedly. I believe. however. that since that bill provides for the elimination of discrimination in the AsiaPacific triangle in the year following enactment. the abolition of the national origin quota system should be dealt with just as decisively. and not phased out over the 5year period provided. The bill I am introducing. therefore. provides for the elimination of the national origin quota system at the beginning of the first fiscal year after enactment. instead of permitting the discrimination to operate during the 5year transition period proposed by the administration. To replace the national origin quota system. my bill would transfer all former quota numbers to a reserve pool. and would permit pooling of unused quotas and their allocation to those on waiting lists on the basis of the existing statutory preference system. which is based primarily on skills and close relationships to U.S. citizens. First priority on the first 50 percent would then be given to persons whose admission due to exceptional skill or training would be especially advantageous to the United States. First priority on the next 30 percent. plus any part of the first 50 percent not issued to skilled specialists. is given to unmarried sons and daughters of U.S. citizens. First priority on the remaining 20 percent. plus any part of the first 30 percent not taken by the first two classes. is given to spouses or children of aliens lawfully admitted for permanent residence. The existing preference system permits any remaining portion to be issued to other qualified immigrants. such as brothers. sisters. sons. or daughters of citizens of the United States. Under the existing immigration law. the preference provisions determine only priority between individual nationals of the same country. Under my bill. they would determine priority between nationals of different countries in the world. To prevent unfair benefits to applicants from one country. no more than 10 percent of the total quota numbers could be issued to any area. The other principal features of my bill are: First. It establishes a Board of Visa Appeals in the State Department to review questions involving the denial of visas and the application or meaning of State Department regulations applying to immigration. Second. It establishes a statute of limitations whereby no alien may be deported by reason of conduct occurring more than 10 years prior to the institution of deportation proceedings. Third. It affords judicial review of citizenship questions and of both exclusion and deportation orders rather than of deportation orders only. and eases restrictions on review procedure. Fourth. It would allow Cuban refugees to adjust their status to permanent residence without leaving the United States. as is now required for aliens from countries contiguous to the United States or from adjacent islands. Fifth. It would afford nonquota status to parents of U.S. citizens. The bill I am introducing today is similar in many ways to the bills I introduced in January 1961 and July 1963 which incorporated and which presently includes. many of the recommendations recently set forth in President Johnsons immigration message. These include the pooling of unused quotas. the elimination of the discriminatory AsianPacific triangle provisions. abolition of discrimination against the newly independent countries of the Western Hemisphere by providing nonquota status for immigrants from Jamaica. Trinidad. and Tobago and adjacent islands which may become independent countries. and the removal of restrictions on the immigration of refugees. Under present laws our national immigration policy opens our national doors wide for many people who do not care to come in. and slams them in the faces of people who would cherish the opportunity to be U.S. citizens. Like most spite walls it is as harassing to those within as those without. It is so offensive to fairminded Americans. whom it is presumably designed to protect. that it has produced a flood of backdoor finagling and occasional circumvention by Congress itself. Each week scores of families stream into congressional offices to appeal for help. Private immigration bills make up a major portion of our Federal legislation. It has been a decade since our immigration wall was perpetuated by the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952. better known as the McCarranWalter Act. Time and experience have more than dramatized the fact that. as its opponents contended 13 years ago. it is perhaps as unique a law as vie have on our statute books. But these 13 years have also produced an atmosphere of political helplessness to exasperate even the most determined immigration reformers. so that today most as resigned to the now annual practice of settling for piecemeal revisions or temporary relief rather than an effective overhaul of our entire policy of immigration. The backdoor methods Congress has used to cover up deficiencies in the basic law is the greatest proof of the laws inadequacies. Since the McCarranWalter Act was enacted. Congress has passed special. shortterm immigration and refugee legislation which has had the cumulative effect of admitting into the United States more than twice as many persons as permitted under the basic McCarranWalter Act. But even this piecemeal legislation has represented no relief to the thousands of American families with relatives in countries with heavily mortgaged and oversubscribed immigration quotas. This tragic situation is the result of that section of the McCarranWalter Act which is admittedly based on national and racial discriminationthe national origins quota system. which remains today a target for Communst propaganda and making our effort to win over the uncommitted nations more difficult. It is based on the rejected racist assumption that people of one ethnic origin are superior socially and culturally to those of another. It was designed and is administered not to admit as many immigrants as we can readily absorb. but to exclude as many as possible. The time has come to end this blot on our national image with meaningful reform of our immigration policies. I urge prompt congressional action in this field so that we can fashion an immigration policy of which the country can be proud. not ashamed.