WASHINGTON—Another effort will be made during the present congressional session to pass the drastic alien deportation bill, the adoption of which was attacked in the last congress as certain to bring about a virtual reign of terror among the 5,000,000 adult aliens resident in the United States.
The bill already has been given another hearing before the house immigration committee, although it has not yet been reported to the house, such a report is deemed certain, however, inasmuch as the same committee reported it out last year with only two dissenting votes.
The measure, in fact, passed the house vote of 213 to 39, and was prevented from becoming law primarily because it became lost in the senate’s legislative jam.
At this session, however, it is expected to get an earlier start, and consequently a better chance of passage.
Dangers Pointed Out.
In spite of the lack of general public attention the bill received during the last congress, and so far in the present one, it has been as the most sweeping legislative measures ever aimed at the immigration sailed in various quarters as one of problem. Under its terms, according to opponents, practically every alien in the United States would be laid open to the machinations of blackmailers corrupt officials and technical applications loading to deportation.
Those alleged dangers would apply not merely to aliens recently admitted, but could be invoked against men and women resident here for a lifetime, and whose ties with their native lands had been completely severed.
Must Prove Innocence.
This is only one of the sweeping changes in the present immigration law which the bill proposes. At present, deportations for most deportable offenses cannot be enforced if the offenses are more than five years old.
In addition, however, the measure greatly increases the offenses punishable by deportation. Furthermore, in most cases the burden of proof in any charge made against an alien is not on the government, but instead it lies against the accused man to “show affirmatively” that such charges are not true. In other words, under this statute, all accused persons would be considered guilty until they can affirmatively prove themselves innocent. The widespread opportunity which this offers for the blackmailing of aliens ignorant of legal procedure, or even those better equipped, was pointed out during the last congress, but apparently made no impression on most members of the committee or of the house.
Has Vicious Features.
Violation of the Volstead act, or of any state prohibition statutes, is singled out for particular drastic punishment. Thus, while the bill provides for the deportation of any alien who receives a jail sentence or sentences totaling more than a year and a half; if such sentences are for violation of any prohibition statute, they need total only one year to make deportation mandatory.
Minority members of the immigration committee pointed out last year that in the case of aliens, this elevates violation of prohibition laws to a greater crime than theft or burglary.
Another provision requires deportation of any alien who “admits the commission, prior to entry, of an offense involving moral turpitude.” Representative Dickstein, New York, and Sabath, Illinois, who submitted a minority committee report against the bill at the last session, cited this as a particularly vicious section of the measure.
What It Would Mean.
“Twenty years after coming to this country,” their report said, “it might be claimed that an alien who had become the father of a family and had gained an excellent reputation, had admitted that while a boy in England, Ireland or Germany, he had committed a theft. And yet under this clause he would be subject to deportation. Is it intended to convert this deportation act into a royal road for the accomplishment of the vile purposes of blackmailers?”
It has also been pointed out that the penalties invoked by the proposed law as well as the alleged opportunities it offers for blackmailing and grudge work would hang continually over at least two or three million persons. Even with restricted immigration there are always that many in the country who have not been here long enough to acquire citizenship.
“If the bill becomes law,” the Dickstein-Sabath report asserted, “immigrant hunting as a sport will take the place of witch hunting and heresy hunting.”
The Milwaukee Leader, Milwaukee, WI, January 24, 1926
See Also
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