Year: 1869

NnssrohH~3ooo Hkuu0o-nOW - kvos


A Congressional committee has been in
session in this city for the last fortnight investi
eating the frauds alleged to have been COM
mitted at our last Presidential election. It's
sittings have been held with closed doors, SO
that none of its proceedings have been made
public. Enough Of them, however, is known
to authorize the statement that the inquiry has
turned almost exclusively on the point of the
fraudulent naturalization Of foreigners; and
as that subject was thoroughly ventilated
week or two prior to the election on the pre-
liminary examination Of one Rosenberg, who
kept naturalization mill in lager beer saloon
in Centre street, the public is probably as
familiar with the question as are the members
of the select committee after hearing the
testimony Of hundreds of witnesses.


It was in evidence in the Rosenberg case
that any number of certificates of naturaliza-
tion could be furnished on the briefest notice,
without the necessity Of going through any
forinalities before the courts, and without the
personal attendance or even the actual ex-
istence of the party who was to be nominally
admitted to participation in all the rights
and privileges Of an American citizen. All
that was requisite was to furnish the obliging
agent with the names, real or fictitious, of the
Germans or Irishmen on whom citizenship was
to be conferred and in few hours after
wards certificates Of naturalization, with the
genuine seal of the court and the genuine
signature Of its clerk, were forthcoming, at the
moderate charge of two dollars each for the first
hundred and dollar and half each for all over
was not proved; it could only be inferred; and
the inference was that it was done by means
of wholesale system of personating appli-
cants and their witnesses, there being such
rush Of that sort of business in the courts
that there was hardly any difficulty in the mat
ter All this was published to the world in the
HERALD reports of the Rosenberg trial; and
we really do not see that the Congressional
committee can throw much further light on
the subject, unless, indeed, it may succeed in
duplicating the judges or officers Of the courts
in guilty connivance with these frauds, which
is hardly probable.


There is but one practical way of putting an
end to them at once and forever, and that is
by abolishing the requirement of a five years
residence, or any other term Of residence, by
foreigners before they can be admitted to citi-
zenship. There is really no sense or reason in
that requirement. No one can sustain the
proposition that the German or Irishman or
Frenchman who comes here is improved in
morals, in religion or in political science by
his having lived in New York, Boston, Phila-
cases out Of ten the very contrary is the fact
The poor emigrant is much more likely to have
all his good qualities spoiled than he is to get
rid Of his bad ones; and the man who, on
landing in this country, is prepared to for
swear his former allegiance and to take the oath
to support the constitution should be per-
mitted to do so, and should be nthereupon in
vested with the rights Of citizenship.


The United States laws on that subject, which
are now, according to Judge Nelson's opinion
in the Rosenberg case, inapplicable to the
prevention or punishment Of such frauds,
should be at once repealed and statute en-
acted simplifying and facilitating naturaliza-
ton in the manner we have suggested. State
and municipal laws may then intervene, as
they do now, and require certain term of
residence in the State, county or district as
condition Of voting. That would meet any
possible objection that might be made in re-
gard to the political power that could be exer-
cised by emigrant runners, boarding house
keepers and all such classes of people. Laws
can easily be framed to obviate all difficulty on
that score; but it seems they cannot be
framed so as to prevent naturalization frauds
under our present system. We therefore put
it seriously to this Congressional committee
whether 1t should not recommend, and to Con-
gress whether 1t should not Immediately pass,
law by which foreigners who desire to be-
come citizens of this country can do so at
once on the simple condition Of residence.
We have absorbed all the negroes of the South
into this free community; is It worth while to
be extremely dainty in admitting to the same
equality the industrious, energetic and (by
comparison) highly intelligent men who leave
the countries Of Europe to seek homes among
us2 Let the committee return to Washington,
adopt our suggestion, and there will be no more
trouble about naturalization frauds.


-~ 20


Our Piers and wharves-A Message to the
Csnmou Ceancil.


Mayor Hall, very wisely and properly as we
think, has declined to make any recommends