548.F1/21
The Secretary of State to
the Chargé in Switzerland (
Hawks
)
No. 3119
Washington
, August 12,
1935.
Sir: The Department has received the
Legation’s despatch No. 3970 of July 22, 1935, with its enclosure,
circular letter No. 111 of July 19, 1935, addressed to the Secretary of
State by the Secretary General of the League of Nations, requesting
information regarding the possibility of settling Russian, Armenian,
Assyrian, Assyro-Chaldean and Turkish refugees in the United States.
You are instructed to transmit to the Secretary General of the League the
attached note with enclosed memorandum, prepared by the Visa Division of
the Department.
Very truly yours,
For the Secretary of State:
Wilbur J. Carr
[Enclosure]
The Secretary of State
to the Secretary General of the League of Nations
(
Avenol
)
Washington
, August 12,
1935.
The Secretary of State of the United States of America has received,
with appreciation, the note of the Secretary General of the League
of Nations, dated July 19, 1935, asking the Government of the United
States for information regarding the possibility of settling
refugees in the territory of the United States, and has the honor to
transmit, in reply, a memorandum for submission to the Nansen
International Office.
[Page 500]
[Subenclosure]
Memorandum With Reference to Circular Letter
No. 111, Dated July 19, 1935, From the Secretary General of the League of
Nations Concerning the Possibility of Settling Refugees in the
United States
In discussing the question of settling refugees from foreign
countries in the United States, it should be stated at the outset
that the authority of the Secretary of State is limited to the
determination, by the Department’s consular officers abroad, of the
question whether or not individual aliens are admissible under
existing immigration laws. The actual admission of aliens at the
ports of the United States is in the hands of the immigration
officials of the Department of Labor, but no alien may successfully
apply for admission as an immigrant without being in possession of a
consular immigration visa.
The Secretary of State is not in a position to express any views as
to the disposition in the United States of such aliens as may be
admitted into the country for permanent residence. There are a
number of welfare, social service, Americanization, and foreign
language organizations in the United States which deal with such
problems and to which individual cases might be referred for helpful
advice.
The issuance of immigration visas, which is the basic determining
factor of the character and extent of foreign immigration into the
United States, is placed by law upon American consular officers
abroad. These officers are guided by the various immigration laws
enacted by Congress. The two most important laws of this character
are the Act of February 5, 1917,3 which enumerates some forty classes of aliens who
are inadmissible on various grounds, principally physical, mental
and moral; and the Act of May 26, 1924,4 which imposes numerical limitations on
immigration from the various countries of the world.
Neither the Secretary of State nor any other United States authority
is empowered to make arrangements for group immigration, since the
tests to be applied are individual in character and the various
cases must therefore be treated individually rather than in
groups.
During the recent years of increased unemployment in the United
States a very large proportion of immigration visa applicants have
been refused visas in view of the excluding clause of the Act of
February 5, 1917, covering “aliens likely to become a public
charge”. This clause has operated to reduce immigration to very
small figures, immigration now being less than one-tenth of what it
was in 1929 and [Page 501] previous
years, although the basic laws themselves have not been
fundamentally changed since that time.
Another excluding clause of the Act of February 5, 1917, which might
have a bearing upon requests for the immigration of foreign groups
is that clause which includes within the inadmissible classes
“persons whose ticket or passage is paid for by any corporation,
association, society, municipality, or foreign government, either
directly or indirectly”.