ALIENS: Stigma Removed

This week all but 228 of the 600,000 unnaturalized Italians in the U.S. lost the stigma of being classed as enemy aliens. The 228 are those interned as “dangerous.”

This magnanimous gesture was made by birdlike, earnest Attorney General Francis Biddle. Italians in the U.S. are now free to travel as they will, need not get permission from the Government to move, may have in their homes guns, cameras and shortwave radios.

Italian aliens, said Francis Biddle, had met the test of patriotism. Largest group of enemy aliens in the country, they had the smallest number of internees among the big three (Germany, Japan, Italy). They are working hard on production lines; their sons are fighting in the armed forces. Francis Biddle promised another reward, which will permit about one-third their number to attain citizenship quickly: suspension of the literacy test for all aliens over 50 who have lived in the U.S. continuously since 1924.

Applauded in the U.S., Biddle’s ruling also became a potent weapon on the propaganda front. Its effect in the softening-up drive on Italy was noticeable in the violence of the Italian reply. Bleated the Rome radio: “We will only oppose these buffoon maneuvers with our contempt.”