Broad Patterns in American Immirgation

The Naturalization Act was passed, which gives immigrants the ability to apply for citizenship under the conditions that they are a free white person, have a good character, and have lived in the United States for 2 years or more.

A new law called the Alien and Sedition Acts was passed that changed naturalization laws such that it requires 14 years of US residency. Deportation of dangerous aliens was also a provision of this new law.

Federal legislation now requires that immigration is documented and also sets rules for US passengers going to Europe.

Congress passed the Contract Labor Law, which provisions for the recruitment of labor from foreign countries.

The decision of Henderson v. Mayor of New York invalidated all state laws regarding immigration and gave Congress the power to regulate “foreign commerce”. Congress used this power to prevent the immigration of foreign convicts and prostitutes.

The Chinese Exclusion Act was passed, which barred the immigration of Chinese people for 10 years and prevented Chinese people from getting U.S. citizenship. Convicts, lunatics, and people unable to care for themselves were not allowed to immigrate. A 50 cent tax was also imposed on every immigrant.

The Contract Labor Law made it illegal to use unskilled immigrants as laborers. This regulation did not apply to immigrants crossing over land borders.

The U.S. Treasury Department created the Office of Immigration. New immigration laws include barring people who need monetary assistance for their transit and the obligation of steamships to return ineligible immigrants.

Congress renewed the Chinese Exclusion Act indefinitely.

The tax for immigrants is raised again, and entry is denied to people with mental defects, tuberculosis, and unaccompanied children.

A new Immigration Act required literacy tests for immigrants older than 16 and excluded all immigrants from Asia.

The Quota Act was passed, which limited immigration to 350,000 people annually.

The Border Patrol was established to combat illegal immigration and smuggling of alcohol.

Asian immigrants were barred again and reduced the immigration limit to 150,000 people through the National Origins Act.

The Chinese Exclusion Act was repealed for the purpose of our alliance in WW2, but it only allowed for 105 aliens per year.

Procedures were adopted that allowed the immigration of foreign spouses and children of members of the military.

The Displaced Persons Act was introduced during WW2 to allow 400,000 refugees into the US. These refugees were admitted as part of the quota. Jews and Catholics were discriminated against by this act.

The ability of the government to deport and exclude aliens is expanded, and immigrants are required to report their address to the government annually.

Race was removed as a bar for immigration by the Immigration and Nationality Act.

The law passed in 1948 that allowed for refugees was expanded to admit an additional 200,000 people.

The quotas for separate countries were abolished by the Hart-Celler Act, which created caps for the eastern hemisphere (170,000 people) and western hemisphere (120,000). Immigrants with critical skills, artistic excellence, and refugee status were preferred.

A global cap for immigrants of 290,000 people was established.

Refugees were processed separately from immigrants with the Refugee Act, and the global cap on immigrants is reduced to 270,000 people annually.

President Ronald Reagan endorsed and passed the Immigration Reform and Control Act, which allowed undocumented immigrants an opportunity to gain legal immigration status. This also gave 3 million undocumented immigrants amnesty.

The Immigration Act limits immigration of unskilled workers to a maximum of 10,000 people annually. This also created a lottery system of “diversity” to encourage less people from represented countries to immigrate. The cap for immigrants was raised to 700,000 people annually.

After terrorist attacks on the US, the Department of Homeland Security was created and bore the responsibilities of customs and immigration.

Over 1,000 km of fencing along the US-Mexico border is authorized by the Secure Fence Act.

President Barack Obama signed an executive order that allowed several hundred thousand undocumented immigrants to remain in the country without worrying about deportation.

• Immigrants came to US because of different political, religious, and economic reasons. Also slavery was a big reason why immigrants migrated to the US.
• Immigrants were English, Scots, Scots-Irish, Germans (made way to Pennsylvania for freedom of religion), Dutch, French, Spanish (made way to southwest and Florida for Christian converts), Puritans (went to Massachusetts in order to create a community that was restricted to only people of their faith).
• Disease, starvation, and shipwreck resulted in 1 of 10 immigrants to die before they reached America.
• English immigrants took up 60% of the US citizens in 1790.

• Immigrants came to US because they wanted new opportunities that they were not receiving in Europe because peasants displaced from agriculture and artisans were losing their jobs due to the industrial revolution.
• Some immigrants would receive “American Letters” which were letters from friends and family encouraging them to join them in America.
• Immigrants that came to the US were German (escaping economic issues and looking for political freedom), British, Irish (emigration was encouraged due to poverty and famine).
• In 1845-1850, 500,000 Irish immigrated to the US because of a potato famine killing one million.
• In 1849, the first abundance of Chinese immigrants began to immigrate due to the California Gold Rush.
• In 1850, in the US the Roman Catholic church became the single largest religion.
• In 1860 people from Poland and Russia began to immigrate because of Poland's religious and economic standing. By 1914, two million people had immigrated because of this.
• In 1868, Japanese workers began to migrate to Hawaii to do labor in sugar cane fields.
• Railroad and steamships started to enlist immigrants as customers.
• Around 40% of immigrants in the second wave emigrated from Ireland.

• Immigrants came to US for jobs and religious freedom.
• Immigrants were Chinese, Japanese, and from other asian countries (they went to the western states).
• In 1880, Italy's struggling economy, failing crops, and political conditions made the immigration of Italians go up by four million.
• In 1876-1879, there was the Northern Chinese Famine, which killed close to 13 million people and resulted in many people trying to escape and find safety in the US.
• In 1886, a large yellow fever outbreak occurred in China, killing millions, but due to the exclusion act, the people could not escape it
• From 1882-1912, Russia began to restrict the working and living of Jews in Russia, prompting more than three million Russians to immigrate to the US.
• Immigrants made of over half of the operatives in steel, meat-packing, and mining.
• In 1910, the population was 15% immigrants and the labor force was 24% immigrants.
• 1.2 million immigrants had come to the US by 1914.

• US admits 205,000 refugees running from persecution within their homelands

1948 policy is amended and 200,000 more refugees are let in.

• Immigration flow altered a bit due to a new law that changed the selection of immigrants from the country they originated from, and started giving priority to people who had family already within the US or to people who had labor related skills.
• Immigrants were Europeans, Asians, Hispanics (Mexico).
• There were many Mexican immigrants because of Mexico's struggling economy and lack of jobs. The US need for labor workers was going up, so they saw this opportunity.
• In 1961-1981, admit 700,000 Cuban refugees because of Fidel Castro's Cuban revolution.
• ⅓ of the immigrants coming to the US were Asians in the 1980s and 1990s.
• ½ of the immigrants coming to the US were Hispanic in the 1980s and 1990s.
• Less than 20% of immigrants coming into the US were Europeans in the 1970s and only around 10% in the 1980s.