Immigration In The 19th Century Essay

Immigration has always been a complex issue in the United States. Previous and current administrations have had great difficulties in setting policies and programs in place to address this problem. During the course of American history, laws were enacted to address such issues. There were numerous legislative milestones in regards to immigration in the United States. In order to understand the current issues regarding immigration, we have to look back at the policies that were in place along with the goals that they intended to serve. According to (Barusch, 2012), the United States had an open immigration policy; which means that anyone could relocate to this country. As a result of this policy, the government had to redefine

Globally, the United States has been known as "a nation of immigrants" almost from its inception. Beginning in the 1600s with English Puritans and continuing today, America is a melting pot of culture and ethnicity. In fact, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, immigration was the major source of U.S. population growth. Looking over our 200+ years we find that to clearly be true, with approximately 1 million immigrants coming to America during the 17th and 18th century. Almost 3 million arrived during the 1860s, and another 3 million in the 1870s. In the next four decades, the number of immigrants rose to over 25 million people, most from various European nations, most arriving in New York or one of the Eastern seaports (Damon, 1981). Despite the politicization, as of 2006, the United States actually was the number one country globally to accept legal immigrants into the country, with a current immigrant population of almost 40 million (Terrazas and Batalova, 2009). In fact, the peak of immigration was 1907, when over 1.2 million Europeans entered the country beginning a push towards legislation limiting immigration in the Immigration and Naturalization Act of 1924 and the 1921 Congressional Quota Act. These immigrants came for two sociological reasons: the push factor (wars, famine, persecution and overpopulation) and the pull factors (jobs and the promise of freedom). Most came by ship, and a passage often cost the equivalent of an entire life's savings causing many

Immigrants came to America with hopes to be accepted and make an honest contribution to the country’s advancement. Instead they were ostracized and segregated. Pietri states, “thirty-thousand dollar home, the first spics on the block proud to belong to a community of gringos who want them lynched” (106-108). Although some

When most immigrants move into America, they are greeted with much tension and conflict. There is still some discrimination between races, as much as American’s

In the United States, the cliché of a nation of immigrants is often invoked. Indeed, very few Americans can trace their ancestry to what is now the United States, and the origins of its immigrants have changed many times in American history. Despite the identity of an immigrant nation, changes in the origins of immigrants have often been met with resistance. What began with white, western European settlers fleeing religious persecution morphed into a multicultural nation as immigrants from countries across the globe came to the U.S. in increasing numbers. Like the colonial immigrants before them, these new immigrants sailed to the Americas to gain freedom, flee poverty and

One of the most defining traits for the United States of America is that the nation is one made up of immigrants, it is a basic building block that can not be overlooked, nor should it. That being said, it is important to countless citizens to be open when it comes to immigration, while keeping the country hospitable to its citizens for generations to come. However, this attitude to immigration is a fairly recent phenomenon in American history, especially in regards to immigrants coming in from non-Western European countries. With the introduction of the Immigration Act of 1965 and the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 (IRCA) came about the changes to immigration policy that would forever change the face of the nation and create the diversity that has become a point of pride. The sentiment is not felt nationwide, however, as the immigration patterns brought about with these two acts has brought hostility as well, especially from those who feel that immigration is a threat to the country as a whole, specifically illegal immigration. Immigration, and its illegal counterpart, is an issue that defines this period in American history, and while it did not necessary start off targeting Mexican and Latino immigrants, it has very much been immortalized within the communities and become the face of immigrants to the nation as a whole.

After the first wave of Chinese immigrants arrived in the United States in the early 1840s during the California Gold Rush, many Chinese people continued to travel across the Pacific, escaping poor conditions in China with hopes and ambitions for a better life in America. Many more Chinese immigrants began arriving into the 1860s on the Pacific coast for work in other areas such as the railroad industry. The immigrants noticed an increasing demand for their labor because of their readiness to work for low wages. Many of those who arrived did not plan to stay long, and therefore there was no push for their naturalization. The immigrants left a country with thousands of years of a “decaying feudal system,” corruption, a growing

The United States of America has the largest foreign-born population in the world. With nearly thirteen percent of the total population being foreign-born, one may find it hard to imagine an immigrant-free country (U.S. Bureau of the Census). Immigration has been an integral part of the United States’ overall success and the country’s economy since it was established and without it, would have never been founded at all. Although there are some negative issues associated with immigration and many native-born Americans believe to be more of a problem than a solution, overall it actually has a positive effect. Immigrants in America, among other things, fill jobs where native-born Americans may not want to work or cannot work, they contribute

Throughout American history, the Chinese were never talked about in great detail despite their impact. The first generation of Chinese that came to the U.S after the California Gold faced finding their identity in a new country. They defined themselves in american culture with the establishment of Chinatown and the construction of the continental railroad, but they also faced hardships of discrimination leading to the Chinese exclusion act. America talks about the blacks, the latinos, the Irish being discriminated but hardly ever about the Chinese. Since the moment they arrived, the Chinese adapted to the new land around them and strived to make America their new home despite constant setbacks employed by the United States government.

The United States of America to the rest of the world is a place of liberty, freedom and a land of opportunities. Thousands of people every year leave their Motherlands in search for better life, for political, religious, and economic reasons. In most of the world, citizenship is defined by race or ethnicity, but an American may belong to any ethnic group. Despite that the U.S. immigration policy have always favored those who came from Western Europe to the exclusion of other groups. In the beginning of the country there was an “open-door immigration policy” on immigration (White, 214). The first significant federal legislation restricting immigration was the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act law that suspended Chinese immigration for ten years and barred Chinese in the U.S. from citizenship. The Immigration Act of 1924 imposed the overall numerical quota to 165,000, and was passed in response to political and public opinion calling for restrictions on immigration from South-Eastern Europe following events such as 1919 recession and high unemployment, civil unrest and the Red Scare (Daniels, 47). In 1965, Congress passed the Immigration and Nationality Act, which ended quota system that favored Western European immigrants, and today, the majority of the country’s immigrants come from Asia and Latin America. Known as a nation of immigrants, many Americans still developed a strong hostile feelings toward immigrants. In contrast, the Founding Fathers were looking at immigration as at

Along with its economic classes, American is known for its freedom, its liberty, and the melting pot of ethnicity. This ethnic diversity comes form the immigrant population in the country. However this perfect country is a major falsehood. These untrue ideals of harmony, freedom, success, and equality are deceptive and do not show the struggles that immigrants face when coming to this class dominated country. The immigrants of today do not come from just Europe, but overwhelmingly from Asia and Latin America. “They are driving a demographic shift so rapid that within the lifetimes of today 's teenagers, no one ethnic group – including whites of European descent – will comprise a majority of the nation 's population’ (Colombo, Cullen, Lisle). These immigrants challenge the social myth that everyone has an equal chance in life. They

One of the top priorities in the U.S. is their immigration system. The United States has always seen their immigrants as a negative factor in society. During the 20th century, the opportunities given to Mexican immigrants were very few because the majority of the time instead of getting help, they got more limitations which made it harder for the immigrants to either stay in the country or migrate to the U.S.

Immigration in the first years of the twentieth century had a profound impact on American society, culture and the political landscape. The effect of this immigration helped to determine the United States’ global persona for the entire century. As larger groups of Western Europeans immigrated to the United States, in the first twenty years, they brought with them, their culture, traditions, and European (old world) mode of thought. These modes of thought were based on their social, political and religious views. The religious views were paramount, moreover with the Roman Catholics. Their social and political basis was more flexible and they were able to adapt it to the American way of life in somewhat of a manner. When they became vastly intertwined within the culture of the factory towns and metropolitan cities their influence can be seen and felt. These immigrants became the predominant workforce in the factory and mill towns that became the industrial revolution in America. Their influence on politics is most especially keen, as most of Europe is more of a social and left leaning society, their impact on the United States, which at the time was more center right, was to push the country decidedly left of center. As we will analyze, the change to the United States was not dramatic nor revolutionary, it took place over the entire century and is still continuing to change with modern immigration trends. This has become clearly visible during the middle and later

Then, the 20th century started and 8,795,386 new immigrants arrived (1901-1910). Still in the same decade there were more events. In 1901, after the death of the President William McKinley shot by a Polish anarchist, the Congress prohibited the entry of anarchists and political extremists. In the next year, in 1902 The Chinese Exclusion Act again but this time with no ending date. Then, The Naturalization Act of 1906 that normalized the naturalization procedures, the English language was a requirement for citizenship. 1907 was marked for a couple of episodes such as The Expatriation Act which announced that if an American woman would lose her citizenship if get married a foreign. Another one was the "Gentlemen's Agreement", an informal contract

Immigration is a controversial topic that has impacted our society for decades perplexed by policies media coverage, perceptions based on one’s own lack of knowledge, personal experiences and a host of other factors that influence how our society views immigrants and immigration policies. The United States is a diverse population of people and filled with experiences that come from various walks of life that contribute to enhancing our social culture, economic development, and cultural acceptance.