WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF MEDICINE SAINT LOUIS DEPARTMENT OF MICROBIOLOGY GUCLID AVENUE AND KINGSHIGHWAY November 13, 1958. Dr. Joshua Lederberg Department of Medical Genetics University of Wisconsin School of Medicine Madison, Wisconsin Dear Josh: Iam very sorry to be bothering you with a pressing problem at a time when you are probably up to your ears in all sorts of moving quest ons, I have a Japanese scientist who has been working with me for the past five years. He is at present faced with a visa problem and we are try- ing to arrange it as best we can. The lawyer has suggested that I try to get a number of letters from people who might be familiar withbur work on antibody and enzyme synthesis to write stating that this work is of importance to the welfare of the community, and that Mr. Kengo Horibata is contributing an important to the development of this work. I have known Kengo for ap- proximately 13 years, since we worked together in Japan at the end of the war. He is truly an exceptional person or I would not be asking you to write a letter for him. Kengo arrived in this country on an Exchange Visitor's visa at a time when it would not have been too difficult to change this visa to an Im- migrant's Visa. The law has changed in the meantime and made this problem quite complex. His request for an Immigrant's Visa was accepted, but he must leave the country for 2 years before this visa becomes valid, and this is really a very great waste of time and talent. His request then is to change the Exchange Visitor's Visa to an Immigrant's Visa without the waiting period, and this involvet#a waiver of a public law which is done under exceptional circumstances for individuals whose talents are not equalled in the United States, As you know, it is impossible to prove that somebody is essential, but this is essentially what the law is forcing us to do. I hope you won't mind if I make a suggestion as to what the letter should contain. (1) That you are familiar with/ur work, and that this work is a credit to the United States and important for our scientific welfare; (2) that Mr. Kengo Horibata is working with me on this project, ani that I feel that he is of critical importance to the development of this work; (3) that Iam a person of high moral integrity and, therefore, my evaluation of his essentiality to this work is a correct one. In essence then, the whole Dr. Joshua Lederberg -2- November 13, 1958. point is to prove that I am evaluating this man fairly. If you feel that you can write such a letter, it should be addressed to the United States Depart- ment of Justice, Immigration and Naturalization Service, St. Louis, Mo., and it should be sent to the attorney handling the case, Mr. Paul Raya, 705 Olive Street, St. Louis 1, Mo, The deadline on this letter is November 22. Il anvery so ry to be burdening you with this problem, but I am trying my best to see that a very solid case is presented to the immigration officials who might have grave reserves, especially in the case of an oriental person against whom most of our immigration laws are directed. At present Iam up to my ears in microdrops and I am trying to extend the observations I told you about. To my great surprise commercial tissue culture medium does not allow the same level of antibody synthesis that the hand-made, fancy medium that we have been using up to now has allowed. This finding is quite embarrassing since I have no idea why commercial and home-made medium are different. In any case, there are factors of 10 to 50 involved. When I get to the good control experiment, I'll tell you about it so that you can get an idea of our present status. Best, “bak MC/McK Melvin Cohn.