Thursday, January 04, 2007

Have You No Sense of Decency, Sir, At Long Last?

An interesting fact I was not aware of until today: immigration form I-485 - the application to apply for permanent residence in the U.S. - asks applicants, "Have you ever been a member of, or in any way affiliated with, the Communist Party or any other totalitarian party?"

An immigration attorney assures me that despite the sizable number of individuals from China and the former Soviet Union who apply for permanent residence, nobody checks the "Yes" box.

1 comment:

Bill said...

My maternal grandparents immigrated to the US around 1910 from Estonia. A few years ago, while trying to track down information about them at the Ellis Island web site, I came across a declaration that had to be signed by the captain, first or second officer, or master of each ship arriving with immigrants. The signer swore that each of the "aliens" he delivered was not "an idiot, or imbecile, or a feeble-minded person, or insane person, or a pauper, or is likely to become a public charge, or is afflicted with tuberculosis or with a loathsome or dangerous contagious disease, or is a person who has been convicted of, or who admits having committed a felony or other crime or misdemeanor involving moral turpitude, or is a polygamist or one admitting belief in the practice of polygamy, or an anarchist or under promise or agreement, express or implied, to perform labor in the United States, or a prostitute, or a woman or girl coming to the United States for purpose of prostitution, or for any other immoral purpose, .... The question I came away with was, what happened to those individuals who could not be so verified?