Whom Shall We Welcome: Truman’s Six Immigration Principles

President Harry Truman ordered a commission to recommend a new immigration system for America in 1952. A year later, his commission issued a report, titled Whom Shall We Welcome. It’s available as “open source” material from the University of Michigan, here https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.39015076202954;view=1up;seq=53.

The Commission’s Six Guiding Principles are stated briefly and idealistically:

“1. America was founded on the principle that all men are created equal, that differences of race, color, religion, or national origin should not be used to deny equal treatment or equal opportunity. 2. America has historically been the haven for the oppressed of other lands. 3. American national unity has been achieved without national uniformity. 4. Americans have believed in fair treatment for all. 5. America’s philosophy has always been one of faith in our future and belief in progress. 6. American foreign policy seeks peace and freedom, mutual understanding, and a high standard of living for ourselves and our world neighbors.” Id. at xii-xiii.

The Commission’s report was heavily criticized.

Consider Sen. Patrick McCarran’s stunning rejection of the report’s principles:

However, we have in the United States today hard-core, indigestible blocs which have not become integrated into the American way of life, but which, on the contrary are its deadly enemies. Today, as never before, untold millions are storming our gates for admission and those gates are cracking under the strain. The solution of the problems of Europe and Asia will not come through a transplanting of those problems en masse to the United States. ... I do not intend to become prophetic, but if the enemies of this legislation succeed in riddling it to pieces, or in amending it beyond recognition, they will have contributed more to promote this nation's downfall than any other group since we achieved our independence as a nation.

McCarran won. His legislation abolished overt racial exclusion of immigrants from Asia—but it also set incredibly low quotas for admission of Asians, Jews and other "undesirable" people.

President Truman vetoed the law, stating that the bill was "un-American" and discriminatory. He said, in his veto message: “Today, we are ‘protecting’ ourselves as we were in 1924, against being flooded by immigrants….  We do not need to be protected against immigrants from these countries–on the contrary we want to stretch out a helping hand,…. These are only a few examples of the absurdity, the cruelty of carrying over into this year of 1952 the isolationist limitations of our 1924 law.” President Truman’s veto was overridden.

In 1965, his vision of immigration became the law. Today, this law is targeted for abolishment by President Trump.