The Iraqi Regional Branch could either approve or disapprove of marriages between party members and in a party document, party branches were ordered "to thoroughly check the Arabic origin of not only the prospective wife but also her family, and no approval should be given to members who plan to marry [someone] of non-Arab origin." During the war with Iran, the party began to confront members who were of non-Arab, especially Iranian origin. One memo which was directly sent from the party Secretariat to Saddam read that "the party suffers from the existence of members who are not originally Arabs as this might constitute a danger to the party in the future". The Secretariat recommended that people who were of Iranian origin should not be allowed to become party members. In his reply to the document, Saddam wrote: "1) [I] Agree with the opinion of the Party Secretariat; 2) To be discussed in the [Regional] Command meeting". All of those who were denied membership, and all of those whose memberships were revoked, were loyal Baathists. For instance, one Baathist of Iranian origin whose membership was revoked had been a member of the party since 1958, had also participated in the Ramadan Revolution and had even been imprisoned by the authorities in the aftermath of the November 1963 Iraqi coup d'état because he supported the Baathist cause. Later, the authorities began to specifically look for people of Iraqi origin and any contact which they had with Iran and/or Iranians functioned as a good enough reason to deny them party membership.