174 WESTERN HEMISPHERE IMMIGRATION

on this proposition, that if men go once across the river, when they
come back it is a new entry; and since the 1926 bill they exclude
them any place they want to. Why? In order to make a good showing
 here in Washington of the enforcement of the law in there; and
we have really this condition, that men who have bought homes and
have their wives there and have American-born children, have been
deported and put on the other side of the river, leaving their wives
and their children and their homes on this side. Why? Because
maybe, in one instance, the man was unable to read or write, and he
has been in this country since 1889.
We tried that case and presented the facts, and they put a stamp
over here saying “Affirmed,” and out they go. Now they are on
the other side. We can not get into the courts because there is no
way that I know of that you can have a habeas corpus or a mandamas
 under those conditions.
Now, I will take up and review one case in which a man has been
excluded.” His name is Diego Robles. He came into this country
in 1896. He brought his wife here. He is a worker who gets from
83 to $5 a day.
He bought himself a home; he had an automobile, and took good
care of his family.
Then one beautiful Sunday he went to pay his respects to his aged
parents in San Carlos. When he was there one of his friends said
to him, ‘“Here, Robles, 1 have a present for you,” and he gave him
two bottles of wine. He put them in his automobile and returned
not through any surreptitious way, but over the international bridge,
and the inspector went through his baggage, and of course he did
not declare that he had this wine, and they found it in there. They
fined him $5 for each one of those things. He paid the fine, and after
he paid the fine they said, “Where are your papers?” ‘‘Here it is.”
And they said, “You are excluded because you are likely to become
a public charge.”
His wife and children are here, and his home and everything is
on this side, and he is on the other side in Matamoras.
He appealed that case, and he showed the decision of the circuit
court of appeals from our own district that such a man is not likely
to become a public charge, and that if he is fined for a misdemeanor
he is not likely to become a public charge; in one case even where a
murder was committed in Italy and the man was afterwards pardoned.
 We showed that to the local officer and sent over here, and
he went through here in Washington, and it came over there
“Affirmed.”
Then we made a new effort to review this situation, showing how
it is, and the construction that our courts had placed upon the very
law that you made, that it is incompetent for an executive department
 to make an interpretation of the law; and that power has been
placed by the Constitution not in the Department of Labor, but in
the courts of this country, the judicial power of this country; but they
say, ‘‘ We have our rules, and we go by our rules and not anything else. ”’
That man is on the other side, and his wife and family are here,
and that is the condition.
My time is limited, but I want to go into this situation which is
really interesting to you all, and it is a situation that can be remedied
bv this committee. This abuse of power can be remedied so that