Selective immigration thus became a political issue in 1892, partly under the stimulus of labor unions, which feared an over-supply of labor, and partly because of the growing popular belief that many undesirable foreigners were entering the country.  No adequate and just criteria for any process of selection have been discovered.  In 1896 Senator Lodge introduced an immigration bill, which contained the famous literacy test, excluding all persons between fourteen and sixty years of age “who cannot both read and write the English language or some other language.”  The bill was simultaneously introduced into the House of Representatives by McCall of Massachusetts.  The debate on this measure marks a new departure in immigration policy.  A senatorial inquiry made among the States in the preceding year had disclosed a universal preference for immigrants from northern Europe.  Moreover, a number of States through their governors, had declared that further immigration was not desired immediately; and the opinion prevailed that the great influx from southeastern Europe should be checked.  Fortified by such solidarity of sentiment, Congress passed the Lodge bill with certain amendments.  President Cleveland, however, returned it with a strong veto message on March 2, 1897.  He could not concur in so radical a departure from the traditional liberal policy of the Government; and he believed the literacy test so artificial that it was more rational “to admit a hundred thousand immigrants who, though unable to read and write, seek among us only a home and opportunity to work, than to admit one of those unruly agitators and enemies of governmental control who can not only read and write, but delights in arousing by inflammatory speech the illiterate and peacefully inclined to discontent and tumult.”  The House passed the bill over the President’s veto, but the Senate took no further action.

In 1898 the Industrial Commission was empowered “to investigate questions pertaining to immigration” and presented a report which prepared the way for the immigration law of 1903, approved on the 3rd of March.  This law, which was based upon a careful preliminary inquiry, may be called the first comprehensive American immigration statute.  It perfected the administrative machinery, raised the head tax, and multiplied the vigilance of the Government against evasions by the excluded classes.  Anarchists and prostitutes were added to the list of excluded persons.  The literacy test was inserted by the House but was rejected by the Senate.

This law, however, did not allay the demand for a more stringent restriction of immigration.  A few persons believed in stopping immigration entirely for a period of years.  Others would limit the number of immigrants that should be permitted to enter every year.  But it was felt throughout the country that such arbitrary checks would be merely quantitative, not qualitative, and that undesirable foreigners should