Excerpt:
In 1979, Deng Xiaoping arrived here on an official visit. China was emerging from the Cultural Revolution, and poised to embark on the capitalist road. When President Carter sat down with Mr. Deng, he told him he was concerned over the right of the Chinese people to emigrate. The Jackson-Vanik amendment, Mr. Carter said, prohibited granting most favored nation trade status to regimes that did not allow their people to emigrate.
“Well, Mr. President,” Deng cheerfully replied, “Just how many Chinese do you want? Ten million. Twenty million. Thirty million?”
Deng’s answer stopped Carter cold. In a few words, the Chinese leader had driven home a point Mr. Carter seemed not to have grasped: Hundreds of millions of people would emigrate to America in a eyelash, far more than we could take in, far more than our existing population of 270 million, if we threw open our borders. And though the U.S. takes in more people than any other nation . . .
Patrick J. Buchanan Speach:
“To Reunite a Nation”
January 18, 2000
Richard Nixon Library