Essay Sample on President Truman's Veto of the McCarran-Walter Act

Introduction

The McCarran-Walter Act represents the new policy that revises the existing United States immigration laws in 1951. This law was welcomed by the supporter who embraced it as a step relevant in preventing the subversion of communists in the United States. On the other hand, the opponents criticized the legislation by considering it racist and discriminatory. In the period between 1951 and 1952, the immigration policies ensured that the sub verse groups were barred from entering the United States. This has steered the various opinions regarding the need to implement rigid immigration rules to reduce the influx of immigrants to America. Majority of the conventional immigration strategy entails that foreigners ought to assimilate the native culture and study the national language. The continued heated arguments have seen the introduction of various bills to handle the underlying problem including the McCarran-Walter Act of 1952. In this case, therefore, the paper focuses on analyzing the McCarran Act and the reasons why President Truman vetoed this act as well. The paper focuses on the primary events that occurred during the 1951 to 1952 period that saw the establishment of the McCarran-Walter Act of 1952.

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During this time various key players in the US government has various perceptions regarding the status of immigration in the country. In the debate, most of these players including the Congress, President Truman, and the presidential candidate believed that the economic factors did not have a significant impact in relation to immigration in the United States economy. The primary argument was that the amended policies favored some groups which could lead to increased criminals in the countries. In addition, it was evident that as more people entered into the United States, it was possible that they would compete as snatch jobs from the American citizens and eventually lead to a decrease in their living standards.

Overview of the McCarran-Walter Act of 1952

The McCarran-Walter Act is named after two prominent people including Senator Patrick Anthony McCarran who was a Democrat from Nevada and a United States Senator between 1933 and 1954 and Francis Eugene Walter who was a Democrat from Pennsylvania and a member of the United States House of Representatives. In the years between 1951 and 1963, Walter was a prominent member of the House Un-American Activities where he served as chair of this particular committee for the nine years tenure. Despite the deceptive nature of the quota system, McCarran and Walter had shown relatively little effort to alter the quota system in the United States. Notably, this quota system of immigration had been established through the Immigration Act of 1924.

Particularly, in the quota system of immigration, the immigrants from Germany, Great Britain, and Ireland were allocated two-thirds of the approximately over 150, 000 slots that were available annually. Nonetheless, the act has specifically eliminated the racial barriers that had been previously established to exclude immigrants from various states such as China and Japan. In the new immigration act, these two countries were now assigned small quotas in the United States. Therefore, the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952 thus upheld the quota system that was established by the Immigration Act of 1924. It hence contributed to strengthening the controversial system of immigration that sought favor in the immigrant selection procedure.

Despite maintaining the quota system, the McCarran-Walter Act of 1952 marked the end of the Asians exclusion that was previously barred from immigrating into the United States. Instead, the McCarran-Walter Act introduced a system where the immigrant preference would be based on the skills held by the immigrants and the family reunification aspect.

The debate regarding the need to revise the United States immigration laws dates back to the early years of the cold world war that demonstrated a division between two major groups. It includes those individuals that were interested in the relations between the immigration and the foreign policy while the other group comprised of the individuals who linked immigration to national security concerns. From the two groups, it is clear that the first group was in support of immigration while the second group condemned immigration significantly as they considered it has to serious problems to the national security of the country.

The former group was led by people such as Emanuel Celler who was a Congressman and a Democrat from New York. Celler showed his favor on the liberalization of the immigration laws. In this argument, Celler expressed his concern on the procedure through which the restrictive quota system has shown significant favor on the immigration from Northern and Western Europe. This favor has thus created bitterness against the United States from other parts across the world. Celler believed that this law ignited the sense that Americans perceived that people from the Eastern Europe were less desirable and the Asians were also inferiors as compared to other individuals from the Northern and Western Europe ancestry.

The latter group was led by Senator and Democrat Patrick McCarran and the Democratic congressman, Francis Walter. They were against liberal immigration rules as they feel that it would bring communism penetration into the United States. Also, they assert that through immigration the un-assimilated aliens would create threats to the foundations of the American life. For this reason, McCarran and Walter considered that a limited and selective immigration system would hence be the most appropriate technique in preserving the national interest and the entire national security system.

The debate concerning immigration took a new turn where the Jordan Commission was proposed the reduction of legal immigration by a third and eradicating illegal immigration through the use of new workplace enforcement measures. Despite the commission, immigration into the US is at its highest in history, more than a million annually. The current immigration policies are mainly driven by business interests and the need for more workers, both skilled and unskilled without considering immigration legalities. This has somehow gotten out of control, mostly because the low levels of unemployment, high economic growth, and personal income has led the Congress into neglecting the recommendations of the Jordan Commission.

The Chair of the Federal Reserve of the United States praised immigration by saying that it has affected positively on the economy, but he then added that unskilled immigrants were being exploited and not assimilated correctly, forming an immigrant "underclass." Further research also showed that skilled immigrants reduced the wages of native citizens' skilled labor hence shifting resources from American education.

Majority of the American citizens want the ending of illegal immigration and the slowing down of legal immigration. This is evident through the results of various polls conducted over the past years. This is because the current policies predict future dangers to the Americans such as what will be their fate when the economy slows down in future. Robert Bach states that "We will have to create another miracle economy to absorb everybody," something which is short of a miracle since wages, will fall, welfare and unemployment will rise which will result in outbreak social conflicts, similar to the one witnessed in California six years.

Furthermore, it was evident that the continual immigration will exceed the carrying capacity of the United States and may end exerting incredible stress on the housing. The critics further argue that the increased regular immigration of the illegal Mexicans would significantly damage their environment by way of increased dumping of trash, the fear of wildfires, and the issue of trampling of endangered species of plants. Over the years, the aspect of illegal immigration in the history of the United States has been heated debate since it contributes substantially to the increased crime in the country.

The issue of illegal immigration has in many cases stood as a reference to violence and crimes. The reference of crimes and violence to crimes has seen many Americans push and protest for the rectification of the crisis. Many have suggested that this is done through deportation, and the other measures to include patrol of the borders and in the introduction of sanctions that will bar the immigrants from getting into the country. While a large number argue that the illegal Mexicans should be deported back to their country, some see the immigrants as essential to the economy of the United States. Many view the immigrants to be able to perform specific duties best that the Americans can.

Notably, the economic factors were relatively insignificant in the heated debate of the new immigration rules. In the past arguments, the immigration debate focused on the effects the subject matter had on the United States economy based on the labor force. The individuals that supported in favor of restrictive laws argued that immigration would lead to overpopulations which would later lead to the excess supply of labor. As a result, the immigrants would compete for jobs with the American citizens leaving some of the Americans unemployed. These people felt that the government has the noble role of safeguarding the Americans from such competitiveness in the labor market.

On the other hand, those supporting that immigrants should not be deported argue that in the situation that the economy needs cheap labor; the illegal immigrants can be useful in this view. The assimilation of the illegal Mexicans immigrants thus is considered at this point. The United States in most cases cannot steadily support or afford the labor demands mostly in the agricultural, manufacturing, and food industry sectors. Therefore, some advocate that illegal immigrants should be assimilated in the cultural values and their society for their services which the economy will someday require of them. It is a debate that has left the political arena of the country at loggerheads as most view them as a danger if left to be a part of American society. In support of the assimilation aspect of the illegal Mexican immigrants, research has shown that illegal immigrants have very minimal effects on the wages of the United States. It is worth noting that both the illegal and legal immigrants in Mexico compose long-term importance economically to the United States, this is so because most of the illegal immigrants are unskilled and thus low-wage are supposed to get back to their nations in ten years leaving only the skilled in the United States.

Although the new debate does not incorporate the economic factors, the labor factors are relevant to the McCarran-Walter Act of 1952. It is because this Act favors immigrants based on their skills and expertise. Therefore by hiring and having the immigrants assimilated to the culture of the Americans, paves a chance to keep up with the labor demands for the attainment of a healthy economy in the long run. Besides, regardless of where the immigrants work and what they do, California employers have benefited from immigrants' lower costs and their relatively high productivity and entrepreneurial spirit. Similarly, the illegal and legal immigrants both pay more money in taxation than what they consume in the sectors of education and the social service sector; they are mostly the victims of political slander in the process of votes haunt, this the politicians do by antagonism against the immigrants.

Despite the various arguments, it was noted that the American Federation of Labor and the Congress of Industrial Organizations exhibited opp...