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U.s. Immigration Policy Over Time

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Essay Two (US Immigration Policy Over Time)

1.

Essentially, the United States was built by immigrants, who sought to make a new life in a new land. In this case therefore, before the 1880s, almost anyone could move in to the United States. Immigration would only start to be controlled once the population began to grow. While the first Europeans from Britain arrived in America to avoid persecution, own lands, and work on agriculture etc, more would gradually follow for the same reason followed by the Dutch, Swedish and Germans. This was encouraged given that it was viewed as a means of getting the settlements to grow and become established. However, from the 1640s, African involuntary immigration began, where slaves from mostly West …show more content…

While the States only mostly complained at first with no real changes, these policies brought about real changes, and were impactful. These laws were aimed at ensuring that other nations did not send criminals to the various States, who would only make progress for these States more difficult. On the other hand, this was also meant to show Britain that the United States was independent and would not longer bend to any influence.

3.

From 1875, a number of laws had started being enacted creating restrictions on immigration. While a number of laws had been passed earlier (1862 and 69) to regulate Chinese labor (this was meant to deal with cheap Chinese labor), the Act of 1875 was implemented and outlawed the importation of women for prostitution purposes as well as prohibiting other alien convicts. In 1882, another immigration law was passed by Congress, imposing a federal tax (50 cents) on every passenger that arrived from foreign countries. This was also aimed at controlling the numbers of those who entered the United States. This law also prohibited convicts, lunatics and other people with contagious diseases from entering the States. In particular, in 1981, Congress passed another law to deal with the influx of immigrants. This law prohibited various people such as polygamists, those who did not pay for their

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