AN ACT
To revise the laws relating to immigration, naturalization, and nationality: and for other purposes.

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That this Act, divided into titles, chapters, and sections according to the following table of contents, may be cited as the "Immigration and Nationality Act".

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TITLE I I -IMMIGRATION

CHAPTER 1 - QUOTA SYSTEM

NUMERICAL LIMITATIONS; ANNUAL QUOTA BASED UPON NATIONAL ORIGIN;
MINIMUM QUOTAS

Sec. 201. (a) The annual quota of any quota area shall be one-sixth of 1 per centum of the number of inhabitants in the continental United States in 1920, which number, except for the purpose of computing quotas for quota areas within the Asia-Pacific triangle, shall the same number heretofore determined under the provisions of section 11 of the Immigration Act of 1924, attributable by national origin to such quota area: Provided, That the quota existing for Chinese persons prior to the date of enactment of this Act shall be continued, and, except as otherwise provided in section 202 (e), the minimum quota for any quota area shall be one hundred.

(b) The determination of the annual quota of any quota area shall be made by the Secretary of State, the Secretary of Commerce, and the Attorney General, jointly. Such officials shall, jointly, report to the President the quota of each quota area, and the President shall proclaim and make known the quotas so reported. Such determination and report shall be made and such proclamation shall be issued as soon as practicable after the date of enactment of this Act. Quotas proclaimed therein shall take effect on the first day of the fiscal year, or the next fiscal half year, next following the expiration of six months after the date of the proclamation, and until such date the existing quotas proclaimed under the Immigration Act of 1924 shall remain in effect. After the making of a proclamation under this subsection the quotas proclaimed therein shall continue with the same effect. as if specifically stated herein and shall be final and conclusive for every purpose, except (1) insofar as it is made to appear to the satisfaction of such officials and proclaimed by the President, that, an error of fact has occurred in such determination or in such proclamation, or (2) in the case provided for in section 202 (e).

(c) There shall be issued to quota immigrants chargeable to any quota (1) no more immigrant visas in any fiscal year than the quota for such year, and (2) in any calendar month of any fiscal year, no more immigrant visas than 10 per centum of the quota for such year; except that during the last two months of any fiscal year immigrant visas may be issued without regard to the 10 per centum limitation contained herein.

(d) Nothing in this Act. shall prevent the issuance (without increasing the total number of quota immigrant visas which may be issued) of all immigrant visa to an immigrant as a quota immigrant even though he is a nonquota immigrant.

(e) The quota numbers available under the annual quotas of each quota area proclaimed under this Act shall be reduced by the number of quota numbers which have been ordered to be deducted from the annual quotas authorized prior to the effective date of the annual quotas proclaimed under this Act under (1) section 19 (c) of the Immigration Act of 1917, as amended; (2) the Displaced Persons Act of 1948, as amended; and (3) any other Act of Congress enacted prior to the effective date of the quotas proclaimed under this Act.

DETERMINATION OF QUOTA TO WHICH AN IMMIGRANT IS CHARGEABLE

SEC. 202. (a) Each independent country, self-governing dominion, mandated territory, and territory under the international trusteeship system of the United Nations, other than the United States and its outlying possessions and the countries specified in section 101 (a) (27) (C), shall be treated as a separate quota area when approved by the Secretary of State. All other inhabited lands shall be attributed to a quota area specified by the Secretary of State. For the purposes of this Act, the annual quota to which an immigrant is chargeable shall be determined by birth within a quota area, except that — ...