Hias Urges Congress to Pass Bill Liberalizing U.S. Immigration Policy

A resolution calling upon Congress to pass a pending bill which would abolish the national origins quota system for admitting immigrants to this country, and substitute instead another allocations system which “reflects American democratic concepts concerning the dignity and worth of the individual, was adopted here today at the 79th annual meeting of United Hias Service. The resolution was passed unanimously by more than 1, 000 representatives of fraternal, community, religious and labor organizations who attended the meeting.

A highlight of the meeting was the reading of special messages lauding HIAS work from President Kennedy, Gov. Rockefeller and New York Mayor Robert F. Wagner. Rep. Emanuel Celler and Sen. Jacob Javits. United States Senator Kenneth B. Keating, New York Republican, who is one of 35 Senators co-sponsoring the bill in the Upper House, was one of the principal speakers at the session and urged that the immigration and nationality law of the United States be liberalized.

The HIAS resolution called the old, national origins quota system for immigrants a system which implies that “some nations are superior to others. It described the present pending legislation as a system “designed to infuse the basic U.S. immigration and nationality law with the cherished humanitarian and democratic principles of the nation” which would “set an example of leadership in the free world.”

The pending legislation would authorize, among other things, the annual issuance of 250, 000 visas, instead of the present 156, 000. It would allow the admission of 50, 000 refugees or escapees regardless of quota restrictions; allocate 120,000 visas among countries on the basis of a proportion of immigration to the United States during the last 15 years, and 80, 000 to be divided among countries in proportion to the size of their population, it would set a ceiling of 3, 000 per country and would also include provisions for use of unused numbers each year.

GURFEIN, RICE REPORT ON ACTIVITIES; ENVISAGE PROBLEMS TO BE FACED IN 1960’S

Murray I. Gurfein, president of United Hias Service, reported that, in 1962, “51,900 Jewish men, women and children were assisted by the agency with vital migration and related services. Of this number, 9, 300 migrants and refugees were assisted to resettle primarily in the United States, Canada, Australia and Brazil. ” He pointed cut that the number of assisted migrants rose 30 percent above the previous year as a result of the “Jewish migration explosion” in 1962 which “drove more than 200,000 Jews from their homelands in a frightened, and sometimes frantic, search for survival in the free world. ” He declared:

‘We are confronted with the sad fact that Jewish communities in Cuba, Algeria and Egypt have all but disappeared. The pre-Castro Cuban Jewish population of 10, 000 now numbers only 2, 500, the 130, 000 Algerian Jewish population of a year ago has dissolved to a mere 7,500, and the pre-Suez crisis Egyptian Jewish population of 50, 000 has dwindled to fewer than 10, 000. ” Viewing the intensified pace of United Hias Service operations as “a barometer of distressing events which are the tragic heritage of World War II and the intervening years, ” he said, “it is all too painfully clear that rescue through migration has been, and will continue to be, the challenge of the ’60’s.”

James P. Rice, HIAS executive director, told the session that, of the more than 3, 000, 000 Jewish persons aided by the agency and its predecessors during the past 79 years, “close to 500,000 victims of the Nazis and other oppressive groups have been rescued and resettled since Hitler came to power. ” Recalling that the vast majority of the Jews killed by the Nazis came from Eastern Europe, he said “it is only natural that organizations like ours give the highest priority to family reunion and resettlement in lands of the free world.”

Mr. Rice reported that two-thirds of the 3,500 Jewish refugees from Cuba whom the agency assisted have been resettled in 79 communities in 27 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico. “This remarkable record was accomplished, ” he said, “through arrangements the agency worked out with local Jewish community organizations.”