IMMIGRATION THURSDAY, MARCH 4, 1965 U.S. SENATE, SUBCOMMITTEE ON IMMIGRATION AND NATURALIZATION Washington, D.C. The subcommittee met, pursuant to recess, at 10 a.m., in room 457, Old Senate Office Building, Senator Kennedy of Massachusetts presiding. Present: Senators Kennedy, Ervin, and Javits. Also present: Fred M. Mesmer, staff director, Drury H. Blair, staff member; William A. Stevens, minority staff member. Senator KENNEDY of Massachusetts. The subcommittee will come to order. The first witness this morning is Senator Robert Kennedy of the State of New York. Senator, this subcommittee welcomes your testimony. We invite you to proceed in your own way. I should say that Senator Kennedy has appeared earlier before this subcommittee as the Attorney General of the United States. He was extremely active in the drafting of the pending legislation. Therefore, he brings an unusual competence to this subcommittee especially on the detailed technical aspects of this legislation. The subcommittee is looking forward to his testimony. You may proceed. STATEMENT OF HON. ROBERT F. KENNEDY, A U.S. SENATOR FROM Senator KENNEDY of New York. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman and members of the subcommittee, it gives me great pleasure to appear today to voice my support of the administration's immigration bill, S. 500. This bill distills the accumulated experience and wisdom of 40 years the years since the institution of the discriminatory national origins systems. That system was imposed during the postwar crisis. in Europe, when many in the United States feared that a continuance of unlimited immigration would lead to the coming here of tens of millions of unlettered, poverty-stricken refugees-and of hundreds of thousands of revolutionaries. Those fears proved unfounded. regretted the excesses of that day. cluding every President for the last And ever since 1924, we have Presidents of both parties-inquarter century—have deplored the presence in American law of discriminations directly opposed to the assumptions of our Constitution. Both political parties, for many years, have called for the repeal of this system. They have done so because the follies and the random cruelties the system imposes have become too clear to be ignored. Last year, I spoke to the Subcommittee on Immigration of the House of Representatives. I told them about a widely known Turkish physician and scientist who sought to come to this country to pursue important research in treatment of heart attacks. An American medical school was anxious for his services; he was anxious to come. But because our immigration law considers Turks as less worthy than Englishmen, or Irishmen, or Germans, this doctor could not come. The United States had then been waiting a year and a half for the valuable services of this man. We are still waiting. I spoke then of others equally qualified, equally likely to make a major contribution to the welfare and culture of this country-a Korean radiation specialist; a Japanese microbiologist; a Greek chemist. We are still waiting for them. Last year I noted that a maid or an unskilled laborer from a northern European country can enter this country within a matter of weeks, while scientists or doctors or other highly skilled persons from less favored countries wait for months and years. Since I spoke then, about 3,000 more housemaids and unskilled laborers from northern Europe have come here. And the doctors and chemists and biologists are still waiting. And others are waiting as well-American citizens, waiting for their parents and brothers and children. An American citizen whose mother is Greek must wait more than 5 years before she can get a visa. An American citizen whose brother, or sister, or married son or daughter is Italian or Australian, Spanish or Portuguese, Japanese or Korean, Indian or Filipino, cannot expect a visa for them until Congress passes a special bill. The last such bill, passed in 1962, admitted all such relatives who had first applied more than 8 years earlier. A system which allowed an American citizen to bring to this country a maid or a gardner overnight-but forces him to wait 8 years for his sister—makes no sense at all. It makes even less sense when we realize that every year, tens of thousands of authorized quota visas go unused-because the principal beneficiaries of our discriminatory system neither want nor need the numbers allotted to them. England and Ireland are assigned 83,000 numbers over half our total-but only 32,000 come from these countries each year. The other 51.000 numbers are lost. This fact demonstrates the absurdity of any argument that the national origins system preserves the "ethnic balance" of the United States. The immigration law says that Englishmen-with a quota of 65,361-are to come here in a ratio of two-and-a-half Englishmen to one German. And it says that twice as many Irishmen, with a quota of 17,756, are desired as are Poles, with a quota of 6.488. Yet as many Germans enter as Englishmen; and more Poles enter than Irishmen. In fact, the distribution of limited quota immigration can have no significant effect on the ethnic balance of the United States. Total quota immigration is now 156,782; under the proposed bill, it would rise to 164,482. Even if all these immigrants came from Italy, for example, the net effect would be to increase the number of Italo-Americans by one-tenth of 1 percent of our population this year-and less as our population increases. Americans of Italian extraction now constitute about 4 percent of our population; at this rate, considering our own natural increase, it would take until the year 2000 to increase that proportion to 6 percent. Of course, S. 500 would make no such radical change. Immigration from any single country would be limited to 10 percent of the total-16,500-with the possible exception of the two countries now sending more than that number, Great Britain and Germany. But the extreme case should set to rest any fears that this bill will change the ethnic, political, or economic makeup of the United States. What, then, will the bill do? It will eliminate from the statute books a form of discrimination totally alien to the spirit of the Constitution. Distinctions based on race or national origin assume what our law, our traditions, and our commonsense deny: that the worth of men can be judged on a group basis. Our ancient struggle for due process of law, for equal protection and individual rights, is the story of the struggle for individual treatment-for the proposition that no disability may be imposed on men as members of a class. Our law allows men to be judged only on a finding that an individual has commited some act, or has some characteristic, which bears a reasonable relation to some legitimate governmental end. It is reasonable to attempt to preserve the United States from immigration which would result in unemployment for citizen workers; that is why we bar immigration by those individuals who would compete for jobs for which the supply of labor is adequate for the demand. It is reasonable to preserve the United States from the burden of supporting immigrants who cannot support themselves, or who cannot be supported by their relatives; that is why we bar immigration by individuals likely to become public charges. It is reasonable to insist that immigrants adhere to our fundamental precepts of political freedom and democratic government; that is why we bar immigration by individuals who have demonstrated that they do not hold such allegiance. ✓ But in each of these cases, the finding is an individual one each man is judged on his own merits. Only in the quota immigration system and nowhere else in our law-are individuals judged on the supposed propensities of a group to which they belong. Neither should immigrants be judged as a group. Any individual test is acceptable; no group test can ever be. This, in my judgment, conclusively answers one argument that has been raised against this bill: That in eliminating the discrimination of the national origins system, and substituting a system based on individual merit and family ties, the bill discriminates against the unskilled and unlettered. What I have said, I believe, demonstrates the critical difference between these two discriminations. The law now "discriminates" against the illiterate, and criminals, and those who would unduly burden the United States. I do not understand anyone to argue against these kinds of discrimination. What is objectionable in present law-and what I do object toare group discriminations, from which no individual can escape because no one can change his place of birth, and which too often are blind to the individual facts before us. If it is true that those from northern Europe, as individuals, can make greater contributions to this country than can others, then this legislation will bring them here. If the legislation does not bring them here, then the assumptions on which defenders of the present system rely are wholly false. A second major effect of the bill will be the reuniting of families now separated by the harshness of our law. Immediately upon its enactment, parents of American citizens will be able to join their children. All unmarried sons and daughters of citizens, and all spouses and children of resident aliens will have joined their loved ones within 3 years of its passage. And quotas for married sons and daughters of citizens, and parents of resident aliens, will be current in all countries but one by the end of the fourth year. The bill will do other things as well; in my judgment, all urgently needed: It will abolish the special discriminations against Asians; It will enable families with retarded or mentally ill children to bring them here, under carefully set safeguards; It will give equal treatment to all independent nations of the Western Hemisphere; It will facilitate the entry of skilled specialists by allowing them to establish their qualifications without the assistance of a U.S. employer. On these matters, I know that other witnesses have spoken at length; and I will not repeat their testimony. I would, however, ask that my testimony of last year, which goes into these matters in some detail, would be inserted into the record at this point. Senator KENNEDY of Massachusetts. Without objection, it is so ordered. (The information referred to follows:) Mr. Chairman and members of the subcommittee, it is a privilege for me to appear today to testify in support of H.R. 7700, the administration's immigration bill. It is my conviction that there are few areas in our law which more urgently demand reform than our present unfair system of chosing the immigrants we will allow to enter the United States. It is a source of embarrassment to us around the world. It is a source of anguish to many of our own citizens with relatives abroad. It is a source of loss to the economic and creative strength of our Nation as a whole. I come here, on the first anniversary of the submission of this bill by President Kennedy, to urge the correction of these faults by the speedy enactment of H.R. 7700. As you know, President Kennedy took a special interest in immigration matters throughout his public life. He considered this bill sound and felt that the reforms it would make in our immigration laws were urgently needed. President Johnson shares deeply in this concern. He gave his emphatic support to the reforms proposed by this bill in his state of the Union message. Since then, he has several times declared this bill to be one of the most significant measures now before Congress. Mr. Chairman, this measure is simple. It is fair. And, when its provisions are understod, it is uncontroversial. The most remarkable thing is that we did not insist on these reforms long ago. This measure would make it easier to bring to the United States persons with special skills and attainments that we need and want. It would reunite thousands of our citizens with members of their families from whom they are now needlessly separated. It would remove from our law a discriminatory system of selecting immigrants that is a standing affront to millions of our citizens and our friends abroad. It would provide for the needs of refugees and serve our traditional policy of aiding those made homeless by catastrophe or oppression. And, finally, H.R. 7700 would accomplish all these necessary goals without damaging the interests of any person or group, either here or abroad. I. BACKGROUND Mr. Chairman, the central fact with which our immigration policy must deal is that there are far more people who would like to come to the United States than we can accept. At the present time, there are approximately three-quarters of a million people who have applied for admission to our country. Over the next 5 years, another three-quarters of a million will apply. There are differing views of how many immigrants the United States can absorb. But none of us, I am sure, believe we can admit them all. As a result, the basic problem for our immigration policy is to choose fairly among the applicants for admission to this country. When this bill was in preparation, President Kennedy felt that it was essential to concentrate on this basic problem, and to avoid confusing the issue by proposing any substantial changes in the amount of authorized immigration. Therefore with one minor exception-an increase in the minimum national quota from 100 to 200-this bill leaves the present ceiling on authorized quota immigration. The question posed by the bill is not whether quota immigration should be susbtantially increased, but simply how we are to choose those who are admitted. Since 1924, our standard for choice has been the national origins quota system. Under this system, quotas are assigned to each country on the basis of the national origins of the population of the United States in 1920. The goal was to preserve he racial and ethnic composition of the population of the United States as it was then. There are a great many objections to this system. A simple one is that it does not work, even on its own terms. One reason is that this system assumes each country will fully use its quota. But not all countries do so. England and Ireland, for example, are assigned 83,000 numbers-over half our immigration total-and yet these countries send only about 32,000 immigrants each year. The unused numbers are lost. At present, if quota numbers assigned to one country are not used by that country, there is no provision for their transfer to other countries. Consequently, more than a third of the authorized quota goes unused each year, even though thousands of otherwise eligible immigrants in other countries are eager to be admitted. The failure of the national origins system is also shown by the continual changes special legislation has made on the pattern of immigration over the years. That pattern so poorly reflects the needs of our own citizens and of our foreign policy that inevitable pressures build up and must be relieved by humanitarian special bills. As a consequence, our actual immigration over the past 15 or 20 years has been further altered from that purportedly imposed by our permanent immigration law. A second major objection to the national origins quota system is that it fails to serve the national interest. No matter how skilled or badly needed a man may be, if he was born in the "wrong" country he must wait to come here, while others who are less qualified come at will. An Italian scientist-or a skilled Portuguese workman, or a Greek chef, or a Polish craftsman with special skills-obviously brings more to this country than an unskilled laborer who happens to come from a northern European country. But now, the unskilled immigrant, even without relatives here and with no claim on this country, comes first. There is no good reason for this result. It takes only a brief look through the files of the Immigration and Naturalization Service to learn how damaging this system is to the United States. Let me cite a few representative cases. One involves a widely known Turkish physician and scientist who sought to come to this country to pursue important research on treatment of heart attacks. An American medical school was anxious to have him. He was |