Speech #890121010

Mr. Chairman and Members of the Committee. I rise in support of H.R. 2580 to amend the Immigration and Nationality Act. The reforms which this bill will bring to our discriminatory and antiquated immigration code are certainly long overdue. I am pleased to add my congratulations and gratitude to the Judiciary Committee for bringing out a measure as comprehensive and tothepoint as this one now before us. To anyone familiar with my record on this issue of liberalizing our immigration code. my enthusiasm and deep personal satisfaction over this bill will come as no surprise. I have advocated reform along these lines ever since I came to the Congress and was pleased to introduce a comprehensive bill of my own early in the current session. my bill being H.R. 741. introduced on January 4. 1965. Perhaps because my own parents were immigrants to this country. perhaps because I am proud to count a great many first and second generation immigrants among my constituency. and perhaps because this aspect of the American dream has always been most meaningful for me. this Nations immigration laws have been a special concern of mine. I have long been aware of the discriminatory. unjust. and arbitrary nature of the national origins quota system. I have had to deal firsthand with a great many heartbreaking situations involving separation of loved ones. broken families. and orphaned youngsters which have been the direct result of outdated and unresponsive immigration laws. The national origins quota system. of course. has been shown to be unrealistic and unsuited to the needs of this country and its citizens. We have in this body repeatedly supported legislation to circumvent the code and to provide socalled special humanitarian exemptions. It is certainly high time that we took the code apart and performed a major overhaul on it. That is the thrust of the bill now before us and it is my hope that it will prevail. The United States has been called a Nation of immigrants. National traditions and the ethnic mores of virtually all other peoples of the modern world are lost among the shifting sands of time. Only we Americans can trace our origins to a moment in recorded history. to a footstep upon Plymouth Rock. or a fleet of tiny Portuguese sailboats under command of an Italian navigator grounding on the shoals of the East Indies. or the crack of a musket across North Bridge. in Concord. Mass. These are our ethnic and national origins. and they are the distillate of the traditions and folkways of immigrant peoples who came to these shores aboard the Mayflower. the Santa Maria. the Mauretania. and the Queen Mary. How many times have we been introduced to people who pronounce our name and then ask: "What nationality is that? Is that English?