Letter Asking the President to Not Allow Emmeline Pankhurst into America
9/16/1913
Add to Favorites:
Add all page(s) of this document to activity:
Add only page 1 to activity:
Add only page 2 to activity:
In this letter to President Woodrow Wilson, Charles H. Requa describes the action of Mrs. Harriot Stanton Blatch, to directly contact the president before the appropriate subordinates, as "brazen" and suggests that Mrs. Blatch would not have been allowed in the United States if she had committed similar crimes to those of Emmeline Pankhurst.
Requa claims that America has enough people and foreigners like Pankhurst, and thus they should not let in any more. It comes from an appeal of English suffragette Mrs. Emmeline Pankhurst for admittance.
Requa claims that America has enough people and foreigners like Pankhurst, and thus they should not let in any more. It comes from an appeal of English suffragette Mrs. Emmeline Pankhurst for admittance.
Transcript
[stamped] THE WHITE HOUSE RECEIVED SEP 17 1913RECEIVED BUREAU OF IMMIGRATION SEP 20 1913
RESPECTFULLY PRESENTED FOR ACKNOWLEDGEMENT AND CONSIDERATION Secy. to the President.
NEW YORK PRESS CLUB
ORGANIZED DECEMBER 4TH 1872
21 SPRUCE STREET
Sept 16th 1913.
His Excellency
Woodrow Wilson,
President U.S.A.
Dear Sir: May I venture to suggest, [illegible] the attempt of Mrs. Harriet Stanton Blatch to step over the heads of the legally appointed and duly qualified officers of your able and honest administration, in the brazen effort to get you to assume and discharge their duties for them, that had she been as flagrantly guilty of crime and infractions of the laws of a friendly nation as the Pankhurst, she would not only have failed in the immunity of which she prates, but would herself have been denied admittance to a country which, while free to all but criminals, is not and
2
never can be free to them?
We have enough of the domestic brand already, reinforced by such foreigners as have evaded our laws and been smuggled in, without importing any more. Our own Thaw, et id omnes genus, is about all we can stand at present; for God's sake save us from Pankhurst!
Respectfully yours,
Chas. H. Requa.
This primary source comes from the Records of the Immigration and Naturalization Service.
National Archives Identifier: 18503928
Full Citation: Letter from Charles H. Requa to President Woodrow Wilson, Asking the President to Not Allow Emmeline Pankhurst into America; 9/16/1913; 51728/017; Appeal of Mrs. Emmeline Pankhurst for admittance for visit, English Suffragette; Subject and Policy Files, 1893 - 1957; Records of the Immigration and Naturalization Service, Record Group 85; National Archives Building, Washington, DC. [Online Version, https://www.docsteach.org/documents/document/requa-president-wilson, April 23, 2024]Rights: Public Domain, Free of Known Copyright Restrictions. Learn more on our privacy and legal page.