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About The commoner. (Lincoln, Neb.) 1901-1923 | View Entire Issue (Feb. 1, 1915)
"SBBFw &""' s. V'- The Commoner FEBRUARY, 1915 President Vetoes the Immigration Bill Undtfr a Washington date of January 28, a stall correspondent of the Chicago Herald sends the following: President Wilson today sent to the house of representatives a veto of the literacy test restric tive immigration bill. In a special message he based his veto on opposition to an educational test for alien immigrants and the destruction of the "right of asylum" in this country of the op pressed of other nations. TEXT OF MESSAGE President Wilson's message was as follows: "It is with" unaffected regret that I find myself constrained by clear conviction to return this bill (H. R. 6060, an act to regulate the immigra tion of aliens to and the residence of aliens in the United States), without my signature. "Not only do I feel it to be a serious matter to exercise the power of veto in any case, because it involves opposing the single judgment of the president to the judgment of a majority of both houses of the congress, a step which no man, who realizes his own ability to error, can take with out great hesitation, but also because this par ticular bill is in so many important respects ad mirable, well conceived and desirable. "Its enactment into law would undoubtedly enhance the efficiency and improve the methods of handling the important branch of the public service to which it relates. But candor and a sense of duty with regard to the responsibility so clearly imposed upon me by the constitution in matters of legislation, leave me no choice but to dissent. CLOSES GATES OF ASYLUM "In two particulars of vital consequence, this bill embodies a radical departure from the tra ditional and long established policy of this coun try, a policy in which our people have conceived the very character of their government to be ex pressed, the very mission and spirit of the nation in respect of its relations to the peoples of the world, outside their borders. It seeks to all but close entirely the gates of asylum which have always been open to ihose who could find no where else the right and opportunity of constitu tional agitation for what they conceived to be the natural and inalienable rights of men; and it excludes those to whom the opportunities of elementary education have been denied without regard to their character, their purposes, or their natural capacity. "Restrictions like these adopted earlier in our history as a nation would very materially have altered the course and cooled the humane ar dors of our politics. The right of political asylum has brought to this country many a man of noble character and elovated purpose who was marked as an outlaw In his own less fortunate land, and who has yet become an ornament to our citizen ship and to our public councils. RADICAL-CHANGE IN POLICY "The children and the compatriots of these illustrious Americans must stand amazed to see the representatives of their nation now resolved, in the fullness of our national strength and at the maturity of our great institutions, to risk turning such men back, from our shores without test of quality or purpose. It is difficult for men to believe that the full effect of this feature of the bill was realized when it was framed and adopted, and it is impossible for men. to assent to it in the form in which it is here cast. "The literacy test and the tests and restrictions which accompany it constitute ..n even more rad ical change dn the policy of the nation. Hither to we have generously kept c ur doors open to all who were not unfitted by reason of disease or incapacity for self-support or such personal rec ords and antecedents as were likely to make them a menace to our peace and order or to the wholesome and essential relationships of life. , In this bill it is proposed to turn away from tests of character and of quality and to impose tests which exclude and restrict, for the new tests here embodied are not tests of quality or of character -or of personal fitness, but tests of opportunity. Those who come seeking opportunity are not- to be admitted unless they have had one of the chief opportunities they seek the oppor tunity of education. The object of such provi sions iff restriction, not selection. "If the neonlo of this country have made up their minds to limit the number of immigrants by arbitrary tests and so rcverso the policy of all the generations of Amoricans that havo gone before them, it is their right to do so. I am their servant and havo no liconso to stand In their way. But I do not believe that they havo. I respectfully submit that no one can quoto their mandate to that ofTect. "Has any political party over avowed a policy of restriction in this fundamental matter, gone to the country on It and been commissioned to control its legislation? Does this bill rest upon the conscious and universal assent and desire of the American peoplo? I doubt It. It Is becauso I doubt it that I make bold to dissent from it. I am willing to abide by the verdict, but not until it has been rendered. Let the platforms of par ties speak out upon this policy and tho peoplo pronounce their wish. Tho matter Is too funda mental to bo settled otherwise. "I have no pride of opinion on this question. I am not foolish enough to profess to know tho wishes and Ideals of America bettor than the body of her chosen representatives know thorn. I only want instruction direct from those whoso fortunes with ours and all men's are involved." REQUIRES ABILITY TO READ The much disputed literacy test would provide that "all aliens over 16 years of ago, physically capable of reading, who can not read tho English language or some other language or dialect, in cluding Hebrew or Yiddish, shall bo excluded from the United States." Exempted, however, are those who prove they emigrated to escape religiouB persecution, and any admissible alien might bring in his father or grandfather over 55, his wife, mother, grand mother or unmarried or widowed daughter, who can not read. Aside from various other restrictions tho bill proposes that any immigrant who advocates destruction of property or resistance to law and order in short, revolutionary tendencies might bo barred or deported within five years of his admission. To that feature, opposition no less determined than that to the litoracy test, was conducted by those who contended it would bar men who struggled to throw off tho yoke of despotic governments. THE MICHIGAN TEMPERANCE CLUB The December number bf The Commoner gave a report of the Ann Arbor me. ting at which Mr. Bryan presented a total abstinence pledge and asked the young men present to sign with him. The boys who attended the meeting havo been circulating tho pledge, and up to February 8th ten thousand signers had been secured. It is hoped that the book of pledges, when forwarded to Mr. Bryan, will contain many more signers. What an army of boys! A grand army It will be; and what a power for good in Michigan. Why not have a similar army in every state? The Commoner has already a great many enroll ed 6n its books, and the plan has been taken up by the Lincoln Y. M. C. A. for use in Nebraska. The value of the pledge is illustrated by tho letter of one of the Michigan boys, who in send ing In his list, wrote: "I am returning the pledge sheet. One of the fellows who signed this sheet last month told me that two or three times since he bas been kept from drinking wine because he signed It. He wasn't very anxious to sign it at first, but now he says that he is glad that he did." Let tho good work go on. W. J. BRYAN. Secretaries McAdoo and RedfieU gave to the senate a statement of facts relating to the extor tion being practiced by the owners of ocean freighters. This showed that rates had been advanced from 50 to 900 per cent. The answer of the republicans to the effort of the democrats to relievo this situation by providing an effective competition at the hands of the government was a filibuster. This was equivalent to saying, we have no plan of our own, but we don't like yours. Henry Ford told the New York reporters who interviewed him the other day that- he is a re publican because his father was one. Mr. Ford has overcome so many natural obstacles in hia career that he should not find It a difficult task to leap this one... jfc The preponderance of distinctively foreign names among the Hats of those wounded in riots in industrial strikes is fair testimony as to the manner in which protection to American labor works out under the republican theory of tariff-making. TAFT OPPOSED TO CURR ON EXPORTS A press dispatch to tho Washington Poit from Now Haven, Conn., dated Fob. 0, nayst William Howard Taft mado public today a letter ho wrote on January 26 to Prof. Edmund von Mach, of Harvard University, in which tho former pres ident opposes tho enactment of a law forbidding tho supply of munitions of war from this coun try to tho bolllgeront nations. Tho letter nvas in answer to a roquent from Prof, von Mach, asking Mr. Taft to write a lottor, to bo read at a "neutrality mooting," favoring passage of tho bill Introduced by Senator Hitch cock, providing for such interdiction. Tho lotter, which was not read at tho meeting, Mr. Taft says, follows: "My Dear Prof, von Mach: I have yours of January 24. I can not wrlto to a neutrality meet ing such a lottor as you would wish. I think that to interdict tho supply of ammunition and. arms from this country to tho bolligorcntn in the war would bo to adopt a policy that would se riously interforo with our own welfare, should wo over bo drawn Into a war against our will by tho unjust Invasion of some power who was fully prepared, and who would always find us unpre pared. "Such a policy as that you Indicate would mean that tho power who is armed cap-a-pie would always havo at a disadvantage thoso countries that wcro not In such a state of prepar ation. It would, therefore, lead to even greater pressure upon all tho countries of tho world, than that wo have seen In tho last two decades, to in crease their armaments, a result which we would all deplore. "For this reason, I can not think that it would bo wise to pass a law changing all the rulea of international law heretofore prevailing with ,ro spnet to the sale of ammunition and arras to. belligerents by neutral countries. Nor do I think that in tho present exigency It would be an act of neutrality to do so, because it would inure only to the boneflt of o'nc of the belliger ents. Sincerely yours, WILLIAM H. TAFT." . ENDORSING PRESIDENT WrLSOX In tho lower house of tho Texas legislature, Mr. Boner offered tho following resolution, which, was adopted: Bo it resolved by tho house of the thirty-fourth' legislature of tho state of Texas, that wo hearts ily endorse the administration of President Wil son and commend him for the statesmanlike manner in which he has conducted the affairs of, this nation; bo it further -t Resolved, That we commend him for the wis dom shown in his policy adopted concerning Mexico, and for the strict neutrality maintained with the belligerent nations of the eastern con tinent; bo it further Resolved, That a copy of these resolutions be; sent to President Wilson. ' IF LINCOLN WERE PRESIDENT If Lincoln were president during this Euro pean war, could anybody doubt ho would confine himself strictly to the proper rights and unde niable duties of tho United States? Would ho not again bo tactful, patient, just? Would he not be cold to agitators of all. nations, and es pecially to agitators of American birth or natur alization, and to newspapers and politicians whe urge departures planned to obtain partisan sup port? How can thoso who trust the genius oi Abraham Lincoln best celebrate his birthday? Not better than by dedicating their support to the foreign policy that since last July the Amer ican government has pursued. Harper's Weekly, The perennial attempt to lead the people back into the convention system of making nominar tions is being made In various state legislatures under tho guise of strengthening the primary by making it easier for1 the voters to choose be tween candidates whose worth is guaranteed by a convention. The plan might have a greater appeal if there was anyone to guarantee the in dependence of the convention from secret control. Many people who pride themselves on being progressive are really only possessed of an im pressionable mind which absorbs every new Idea without any thought of its value. Such pcola would throw away all of the past accumulation of knowledge just because it is old, and would accept all the new just because it is novel.- Roger W. Babson. I & i I Ik