This brings us to one of the most extraordinary provisions of the law--that regarding the proof of eligibility by witnesses and depositions--a provision responsible for the exclusion of thousands of perfectly fit persons, and for a vast deal of wholly unnecessary hardship and injustice. During the eleven years 1908-1918 inclusive, according to the statistics given in the annual reports of the Commissioner of Naturalization, of 107,484 petitions for naturalization denied, more than one in four--28,262, or 26.3 per cent--were denied on the ground of “incompetent witnesses.” The percentage in many states is very much larger than that: Illinois, 38.3; New Jersey, 37.2; Michigan, 36.5; Iowa, 36.4; Nebraska, 36.0; Kansas, 35.9; Colorado, 32.8; Arkansas, 32.4; Oregon, 32.2; North Carolina, 31.9; Indiana, 31.1; Wisconsin, 31.0; Missouri, 29.5; New Mexico, 29.3; Kentucky, 28.8; Montana, 28.4; Utah, 27.0. The low states in this respect are few--Rhode Island, 5.9; New Hampshire, 8.0; Connecticut, 9.0; Vermont, 9.1; Massachusetts, 9.2; South Carolina, 11.4; Florida, 11.5. Now, what does this mean in human terms? To begin with, a petitioner for naturalization may not prove his eligibility, as he would prove any other set of facts in court, by such an exhibit of evidence of various kinds as would satisfy a reasonable judge or jury. He cannot bring a group of neighbors who have known him; his employer, his priest or pastor; the village school-teacher who teaches his children; a sheaf of affidavits from people who have known him in various places where he has lived in the state. His exhibit of evidence is rigidly and most absurdly restricted, and the restriction is of no benefit to anybody--except, perhaps, the Naturalization Service in somewhat simplifying their work of investigation.