WESTERN HEMISPHERE IMMIGRATION 395

attitude of the league on this particular phase of the problem, and
reads as follows:

According to authorities and experts, many thousands of aliens enter our
country illegally because of inadequate appropriations and consequent inadequate
snforcement of the existing laws that do not cover sufficient ground.
One step forward in the right direction was the enactment of the Blease Alien
Deportation Act, now Public Law No. 1018, which was enacted by the last
Congress, making it a felony for an alien who had been previously deported, to
reenter the United States and which provides for the deportation of alien criminals
 who have been pardoned or paroled. The latter provision in the Blease
law was made necessary by the fact that a governor of a great State would not
cooperate with Federal immigration authorities in deporting certain alien criminals
in the penitentiaries of his State and by the further fact that he even threatened
to pardon and parole alien criminals to prevent their deportation, subtly taking
advantage of the legal technicality that they had not served their full sentences
and thus defeating or nullifying the deportation provisions of existing laws.
On December 2, 1929, Congressman Dickstein of New York introduced a bill
‘H. R. 5647) that would amend the Blease law by making the ban upon reentry
apply only for one year from the date of deportation. The provisions of the
immigration act of 1917 and the act of March 4, 1929, which made aliens who
had thus been deported inadmissible, would be repealed.
Estimates of the number of aliens illegally in this country vary from 250,000
to 1,000,000. The average individual cost attached to deportations is $87 and
unless adequate appropriations are made to defray the expense attached to rounding
 up the undesirables illegally here, it will be impossible to do more than seratch
the surface.
The compensation given to those engaged in this branch of our immigration
service should be sufficient to prevent temptation by the influence of bribery by
those seeking to remain here unlawfully.
A special 1-page circular dealing with immigration from this
hemisphere and showing the league’s attitude in favor of some such
a bill as H. R. 8530 or H. R. 8523 is entitled “Seléction As Well as
Limitation Needed,” and reads as follows:
Congress resumed its labors on January 6, and once again we look forward
with expectancy to the enactment of laws that will place restrictions upon un-.imited
 immigration from countries in the Western Hemisphere; particularly upon
those aliens who are absolutely incapable of self-government and consequently
would lower the standards of our civilization:
Two bills designed to remedy the condition now existing were recently introduced
 in the House of Representatives.
H. R. 8530, January 13, 1930, by Hon. Albert Johnson, chairman of the House
Committee on Immigration and Naturalization, would set up a quota system
under which, for every American citizen who emigrates to reside permanently
in another country of this hemisphere, three immigrants from that country would
admitted into the United States. This bill is intended fo reduce immigration
from North, Central, and South America by approximately two-thirds, permitting
a total of little more than 50,000 instead of 150,000 or more we have been receiving.
H. R. 8523, January 13, 1930, by Hon. John Box, the ranking member of the
minority on the House Immigration Committee, would place the countries of
this hemisphere under a quota of not to exceed 3 per cent of the average number
of immigrants legally admitted from each of said areas during the five fiscal years
next preceding July 1, 1929, and limits the number annually from all countries
to 50,000. Provisions are made to make restrictions less onerous in the case of
English-speaking citizens of Canada. If enacted, this bill would place Canada,
Mexico, Central and South American, and adjacent island countries, such as
Haiti and Santo Domingo, under quota restrictions. The new measure will
accomplish mueh the same end as was proposed in the bill that Mr. Box presented
in previous Congresses. The proposition is given a new form because the national
origins provisions which went into effect in 1929 require that any amendment
to the quota laws be in different terms.
Immigration from countries of the Western Hemisphere, which are not included
in the present restrictive laws, would be greatly reduced. While the terms of
the bill apply to all of the countries on this hemisphere alike, it is proposed to
place restrictions against persons who are ineligible to citizenship and those who