Presidential addresses and state papers, Volume 3 (of 7)Roosevelt, Theodore
History
Presidential addresses and state papers, Volume 3 (of 7)
Roosevelt, Theodore
Roosevelt, Theodore, 1858-1919; United States -- Politics and government -- 1901-1909
But the citizenship of this country should not be debased. It is
vital that we should keep high the standard of well-being among our
wage-workers, and therefore we should not admit masses of men whose
standards of living and whose personal customs and habits are such that
they tend to lower the level of the American wage-worker; and above all
we should not admit any man of an unworthy type, any man concerning
whom we can say that he will himself be a bad citizen, or that his
children and grandchildren will detract from instead of adding to the
sum of the good citizenship of the country. Similarly we should take
the greatest care about naturalization. Fraudulent naturalization, the
naturalization of improper persons, is a curse to our Government; and
it is the affair of every honest voter, wherever born, to see that
no fraudulent voting is allowed, that no fraud in connection with
naturalization is permitted.
In the past year the cases of false, fraudulent, and improper
naturalization of aliens coming to the attention of the executive
branches of the Government have increased to an alarming degree.
Extensive sales of forged certificates of naturalization have been
discovered, as well as many cases of naturalization secured by perjury
and fraud; and in addition, instances have accumulated showing that
many courts issue certificates of naturalization carelessly and upon
insufficient evidence.
Under the Constitution it is in the power of the Congress “to establish
a uniform rule of naturalization,” and numerous laws have from time
to time been enacted for that purpose, which have been supplemented
in a few States by State laws having special application. The Federal
statutes permit naturalization by any court of record in the United
States having common-law jurisdiction and a seal and clerk, except the
police court of the District of Columbia, and nearly all these courts
exercise this improper function. It results that where so many courts
of such varying grades have jurisdiction, there is lack of uniformity
in the rules applied in conferring naturalization. Some courts
are strict and others lax. An alien who may secure naturalization
in one place might be denied it in another, and the intent of the
constitutional provision is in fact defeated. Furthermore, the
certificates of naturalization issued by the courts differ widely in
wording and appearance, and when they are brought into use in foreign
countries are frequently subject to suspicion.
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