President Kennedy announced today that he will send to Congress next week detailed legislation for liberalizing and improving United States immigration laws.
The President said he had decided to initiate action to correct inequities and unfair distribution of quotas in the McCarran Walter Immigration Act. He declared that immigration policy had been “a matter of great interest” to him for 14 years. According to the President, the nation has a great deal of “unfinished business to correct inequities” in the immigration laws.
The President’s announcement follows by only a matter of days the death of Rep. Francis E. Walter, chairman of the House Immigration Subcommittee and co-author of the controversial law. Rep. Walter was regarded as an unpassable roadblock in the path of any liberalizing immigration amendments.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
