element becomes involved-and necessarily what you say strikes a responsive chord in everyone-how can you differentiate between the human element of the child, father, mother, and wife, and that of the brother and sister who are dependant minors or orphans? Mr. CURRAN. I don't think you can exactly map it out, Senator. I go along with you on that. In an indefinable way I think we always feel for them. But as a practical proposition I say that we must do it that way, because the minute that you let in one collateral, then the greater consideration is gone. The door is open then. Senator REED. We have a bill before us in the shape of an amendment to admit exquota financées of Americans. Everybody could get in by proposing to an American, under that provision, couldn't they? Senator MEANS. That has a peculiar appeal to the human heart. Mr. CURRAN. To my mind that is a ridiculous proposition. Somebody could go down to Bermuda and scrape up an acquaintance with an American or just go up beyond Rochester Point and ask a girl to marry him and by that consideration she comes nonquota. Senator REED. This would not require her to marry him. She would only have to promise the soldier to marry him and then she would come in outside the immigration quota. Mr. CURRAN. I am 48 years old and I can speak about this, and I want to say that every American citizen who can not find a helpmeet among American girls but wants an immigrant wife, need not come to me and ask me to help him. Everyone who sends abroad for a wife always states that he is 45 years old but looks 30. At times when the girl arrives in New York the man will come there in such a condition that he looks to be 70 and the girl will return on the same ship. There is the practical construction of it. The CHAIRMAN. I think you for your very interesting statement. May I ask you a question on another subject that may come up before very long? Are you familiar with those who come into the country unlawfully and how they come in and whether there are many or not? Mr. CURRAN. I do not know the number. I think it has been exaggerated quite often. My guess is that there has never been over 50,000 a year. I think it is less. The CHAIRMAN. Is there any considerable number that come here as deserters from ships? Mr. CURRAN. There are quite a number; yes. The CHAIRMAN. That is a loophole in the law at the present time? Mr. CURRAN. Yes; and I don't know how to plug it. It is there. Senator REED. It is from five to twenty thousand a year, isn't it? Mr. CURRAN. Yes. That is the surface figure. Some of them have sailed out again, being seafaring men. That is all, except that I have here the details of the four cases that I mentioned to you before, and I should like to have them inserted in the record, if possible. The CHAIRMAN. They will be inserted in the record. (The papers referred to are as follows:) [Letter written to Commissioner Curran by Pietro Latini, an ex-soldier] COMMISSIONER OF IMMIGRATION : With great sorrow I received the notice of deportation, surprising myself very much, because a man who served under the glorious flag of the United States for 14 months, and who took part in several actions on the field of battle, should not be treated as an undesirable; so much so that the other day I read of one Luigi Natale who was admitted to the United States under the same identical conditions as myself, and I herewith attach the newspaper clipping, hoping that you will have the kindness to take into consideration my pitiful case. I greet you respectfully, PIETRO LATINI. Upon receipt of this letter I sent for Mr. Latini, examined his Army discharge, talked with him. found him to be a very fine type of veteran who spoke excellent English, and was devoted to the United States as his adopted country. Thereupon I wrote the letter attached hereto, and within a day or two the response came admitting this soldier back into our country for which he had fought. If this effort had not been made, this American soldier would have been debarred, deported, and sent back to Italy. Even now, he can not, under the ordinary course of events, get his wife and babies over here until he becomes an American citizen. This may not happen for five years. It would be long after that before the turn of the wife and babies would be reached in the present very small Italian quota. Latini's only chance to get his family here is American citizenship. This takes time. He thought he had been naturalized while he was in the Army, but there was great confusion about that, and there are thousands of American soldiers who thought they were naturalized at that time who have since discovered that the papers were lost, or something went wrong in the hurry of war that prevented any responsible record being made of such naturalization. Hon. ROBE CARL WHITE, DEPARTMENT OF LABOR, Second Assistant Secretary of Labor, Washington, D. C. DEAR MR. WHITE: I write to beg your early and favorable consideration of the case of Pietro Latini, Bureau No. 55430/427, who is here at Ellis Island ordered deported, after exclusion by a board of special inquiry, on the ground of insufficient visa and physical defect of varicose veins, left leg. I am very anxious indeed that Mr. Latini be admitted, instead of deported. He was in this country from November 19, 1910, to July 21, 1918, which is more than seven years. He left this country as a private in the United States Army, going overseas. I know that neither you nor I are going to hold that a soldier in our Army thereby relinquishes his domicile in the United States, which in Mr. Latini's case had continued for more than seven years. Neither is it to be supposed that American soldiers going overseas intended to remain permanently overseas, unless they were killed. The expedition was a temporary visit as we all hoped-of the most temporary kind. A great many soldiers who have been born abroad, stayed abroad after their discharge from the Army, but I doubt if a single one of them intended to do other than come back to the United States, for which he had fought, as soon as conveniently possible. Certainly no soldier expected to be refused admission to the United States on such a return, no matter how long the return might be delayed. Overseas, Mr. Latini served as a private in the Fifty-eight Infantry of the Fourth Division, and I know myself of the hard and continuous service that this division saw at the front. In point of fact, my own division, the Seventyseventh Division, relieved Mr. Latini's, the Fourth, on the Vesle River, and it was on that hellhole of a river that both divisions suffered losses that were very serious indeed. I have some conception of what a private in our infantry in either of those divisions went through at that time. I do not know it as keenly as did the infantry privates themselves, but I do know something about it, and I am writing this letter to say so. Mr. Latini served, also, in the Argonne and at St. Mihiel, and was honorably discharged on the Rhine, after the armistice, with a clean record of a good American soldier who had been under fire continuously for many months. The varicose veins that Mr. Latini carried through the war in his left leg, in our Army, did not prevent him from carrying a heavy pack to the front, and carrying himself at the front in the regular work of American infantry on a firing line. I do not believe these varicose veins are going to prevent him from earning a living now in the piping times of peace, even though they be very, very varicose. The consul did his best with the visa. The visa itself is stamped on this soldier's honorable discharge from the United States Army. That looks to me like a pretty good kind of a visa. There is no indication on the record of Mr. Latini's res.dence in Italy, the land of his birth, subsequent to his discharge from our Army being such as might be considered a relinquishment of domicile in the United States. To my mind the record reads quite to the contrary. It seems to me that Mr. Latini can legally and immediately be admitted to the United States. More than that, it seems to me that he must be, if we Americans are going to be able to hold up our heads at all. We can not be discovered in the act of deporting an American soldier with a case as good as Mr. Latini's case, on all legal points, after the account of the service he gave at the front in France for the sake and for the protection of our country. I beg that you will send me a telephone or telegraph message authorizing his admission. Very sincerely yours, JANUARY 10, 1925. (Personal.) HONORABLE COMMISSIONER: I, Pietro Beggio, hereby declare that I arrived December 21, 1913, as a passenger in perfect order. On May 24, 1918, enrolled as a soldier in the American Army-Company C-Three hundred and fourteenth Regiment, Seventy-ninth Division. Went to France where I took part in several battles; was honorably discharged at Camp Dix, N. J., May 30, 1919. On December 8, 1920, my parents called me to Italy. There my mother kept me a little longer until one day I read in the newspaper that the immigration had been restricted. I succeeded to have a place in the quota and had to sail with the steamship Dante Alighieri November 17, 1923, but when I went to get my passport the officer refused to sign it because I had not served in the Italian Army; and he did not heed my statement saying that I had served in the Army of an allied country-America-and fought in France. This caused my missing the ship, because the American consul to whom I applied on November 16 told me that it was too late to be possible to sail with that ship. I had to wait for the year 1924, but last year I could not get my name in the quota, and then I decided to find some work in France. There I met that man who invited me to embark as a stowaway on the steamship Paris of the French line. I swear to you I never had the intention to come illegally. Misfortune wished that on me. I wished only to come as a passenger and to establish myself permanently as an honest citizen in the United States and am ready to give my life for America and protect her in every case. I beg you to recommend my case to the honorable President in order that he may forgive my error; and with the hope that you will take interest in a young veteran of the War, I remain, Respectfully, PETER BEGGIO. DEPARTMENT OF LABOR, IMMIGRATION SERVICE, (Personal and Immediate.) Hon. ROBE CARL WHITE, New York Harbor, N. Y., January 14, 1925. Second Assistant Secretary of Labor, Washington, D. C. MY DEAR MR. WHITE: On January 7 I sent you the record of appeal in the case of Pietro Beggio, our No. 98930/420, who arrived here on the steamship Paris January 4, as a stowaway. I am writing you now to plead for his admission to the United States. I shall not embark upon general considerations as to stowaways, save to point out that this is the first case of a stowaway in which I have suggested clemency in the year and a half since I have been in command at Ellis Island. You and I are both familiar with the stowaway situation. And yet I venture to hope that when you have looked into the case of this particular stowaway, you will agree that his plight constitutes a very shining exception to the general rule, and that you will find it in your instinctive patriotism to admit him. Pietro Beggio is 28 years old, able-bodied, modest, speaks excellent English, and looks more like an American than an Italian. He came to this country in 1913, worked in Pittsfield, Mass., until 1918, when he took his turn in the draft, joined the Seventy-ninth Division in our Army, went overseas, and served as a private in the Three Hundred and Fourteenth Infantry at the front in the Meuse-Argonne campaign. He came back here with his division and was honorably discharged in 1919. A year later, in 1920, he went to visit his old father and mother and the visit lasted two or three years. When he attempted to come back to the United States, he found great difficulty in obtaining an Italian passport. The local Italian chief of police told him that he was a slacker because he had not served in the Italian armies. He replied that he had served in the American Army at the front and that Italy and the United States were allies in the war; that he therefore did not look upon himself as a slacker, nor think he should be denied an Italian passport. Nevertheless he could not get the passport. At one time he thought he would get it, but it was delayed and he missed the last sailing that could get within the Italian quota for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1924. This sailing took place, as you know, in the latter part of 1923. He tried again in 1924 to come over here, but the Italian quota was so shot to pieces by the immigration act of 1924 that he got no place at all. Then, desperate, he went to France, boarded the Paris and came over here as a stowaway, was discovered and came peaceably enough to Ellis Island, he having made no attempt in collusion with anybody here in this port for his illicit landing from the ship upon his arrival. It may not be for me to criticize the action of Italian authorities in this case, but I shall go so far as to say that their treatment of this American soldier makes the case all the more pointedly one for our thorough consideration. It is extremely likely that Pietro Beggio is a United States citizen by naturalization while in the Army, but as you know, those records were scattered, lost, and wound up generally in a condition that could not be disentangled. Many of our soldiers have unwittingly lost their American citizenship acquired in the Army just because, in the hurly burly of war, the papers that proved such citizenship have gone astray. It would prove, in my opinion, an idle task to try to find such evidence. On top of that, Pietro Beggio was told by a local American official in Pittsfield that his discharge from the Army was the equivalent of American citizenship. This was in 1919 just after his return from France. The You will perhaps remember that the village of Montfaucon in the Argonne territory was one of the most bitterly fought points in the whole war. name of Montfaucon will be in time, if not already, as well known as that of Bunker Hill. My own division, the seventy-seventh, was only five miles to the west of this village at the time it was taken, and even in the course of our own work in the Argonne forest, the terrific strife at Montfaucon came to our knowledge. It was common talk in the Army. I did not see Montfaucon until this last spring of 1924, when I went there in June. It is on the top of a steep hill, and well-night impregnable. It is still in ruins. It was taken in Sepember of 1918 by the Seventy-ninth Division, of which Pietro Beggio was a member, a private of Infantry in the American attacking force that took Montfaucon. He is lucky to be alive. Most of those men are dead since that day. I inclose a copy of a letter written to me by Mr. Beggio after his exclusion by a board of special inquiry. I have had a thorough personal conversation with him. I know from my own Army experience that he tells the truth. I am pleading for the admission of this American soldier. In the records of our service, I am sure we will not wish to see our Government close up his case by deporting him back to Europe. Sincerely yours, (Personal.) Hon. JAMES W. WADSWORTH, Jr.. HENRY H. CURRAN, Commissioner. DEPARTMENT OF LABOR, New York Harbor, N. Y., January 22, 1926. U. S. Senator, Washington, D. C. DEAR JIMMY: Here is another case of a veteran, and this is the worst case, because this soldier did not get back into our country but was debarred and deported to Italy whence he came. He is Luigi Natale, who arrived here on the Steamship Conte Verdi, April 19, 1924, with a visa given to him by our consul at Naples as exempt from quota because returning from a temporary visit abroad. He came here first in 1907, lived and worked here as a farm laborer and in the manufacture of fireworks until 1918, when, having enlisted in our Army on April 1, at Newcastle, Pa., he sailed to France as a soldier on May 18, where he took part in four engagements, was gassed, honorably discharged after the armistice while in France, and went down to Italy to visit his father, who was sick. The illness of his father lingered on, and Natale stayed in Italy for five years until he came back here in the spring of 1924. He had also been sick himself, as a result of his wound by gas at the front. While in Italy he married, and upon coming over here in 1924, left his wife sufficiently protected from the world's adversities, by giving her the lease of a small farm, from the proceeds of which she would be able to get along until Natale could reestablish himself here in the United States and send for her to come right after him. When he reached here he was held and excluded on the ground that he had been so long in Italy that his stay there could not be looked upon as a temporary visit. He appealed to the Secretary of Labor who ordered him deported. This order reached Ellis Island on May 3, and the case did not come to my attention because it was on that very day that I sailed for Europe on immigration business to be gone for two months. On May 6 Natale wrote the following letter to the officials in charge here in my absence: "MAY 6, 1924. "MY DEAR LANDIS: I am sending you these few lines, telling you if I could please come and talk to you, Mr. Landis, because I am 16 days, and don't know anythings. I have received the paper to go back, but I am an American soldier, and don't know why they don't receive me. I have my discharge paper, showing that I am an American citizen. So please call me up, and you can ask me what you want, so that I could get an satisfaction of my case. I thank you very much; my name is Natale Luigi; come back with ship Conte Verdi; arrived April 19, 1924. "I am yours respectfully, "NATALE LUIGI." The reply was to the effect that nothing could be done for him because the Secretary of Labor had ordered him deported. Consequently, he was deported on May 31, 1924, back to Italy. Later on permission to reapply for admission to the United States within one year of his deportation was refused by the Acting Secretary of Labor. This soldier arrived here on April 19, the annivarsary of the battle of Lexington, and he was placed on board ship to be returned to the country whence he came, and turned away from the country for which he had fought on May 30, Memorial Dey, the day before the ship sailed. He must have a very curious impression indeed of our United States of America. Incidentally he enlisted in our Army on April 1, 1918-"April Fool's Day." |