Immigration in the United States 1865-1915 13.5 million immigrants arrived in America

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Immigration in the United States1865-1915 13.5
million immigrants arrived in America

• S ee handout

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Immigration

• Reasons for immigration to U.S.
• Post Industrialization era led to overcrowding in
  many European countries.
• Mechanization ?Less jobs
• 80 came from Europe gt1840-1920 37,000,000 came
  to U.S.

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Why Get out ?

• 1. Overcrowding Europe (Industrialization)
• 2. Natural Disasters
• 3. Economic opportunity
• 4. Political unrest in homeland (Political
  Refugee)/Wars
• 5. Religious Persecution
• Romance Adventure

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Why U.S.?

• Cheap land (Oklahoma Giveaway)
• Myths/legends of U.S.
• Fast Growth in Cities
• Religious Tolerance
• Rules for harmony.
• Economic Opportunity
• Last Hope

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Many Immigrants brought the entire family, some
would send just 1 or 2 family members in hope
they would make it and then send for the rest.
Many times they spent their entire lifes savings
to get to America. Most came steerage class (3rd
class) cheap, uncomfortable, unsanitary, and
crowded disease and even death was not uncommon.
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Ellis Island, New York City (1892-1954) 12
million immigrants would come through here. 70
of all European immigrants passed through Ellis
Island. 2 were rejected.
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Travel to America

• In 1905 an extra 20 would buy you the status of
  cabin class. That would exempt you from being
  processed in America.
• 3rd class passengers quickly learned that money
  caused you to be treated differently in America.
• Isnt it strange that we are coming to a country
  where there is equality, but not quite so for the
  poor newly arriving immigrant. Quote from 3rd
  class passenger

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Inspection Center

• The inspection was often the most anxious part of
  the whole trip as this is where you found out if
  you were accepted or rejected

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Inspection Station Ellis Island

• Long Lines 2 minutes per inspection, marked with
  chalk and seperated by the ailment they were
  suspected to have.
• 32 questions
• Lines divided into languages the immigrants
  spoke.
• Names were often changed as the spelling was a
  struggle

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Old Immigrants - Northern European Prior to 1880

• English/German/Irish
• W.A.S.P White Anglo-Saxon Protestant
• Owners/Bosses
• Superior attitude
• Know Nothing party designed to discriminate
  against Roman Catholic immigrants.
• Believed they were a superior race.

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New Immigrants -Southern and Eastern Europe
After 1880 Beginning of the clash

• Italians, Slavs, Greeks and Jews.
• Different in beliefs and ideals.
• Long-stem hatred from ancestry in Europe.
• Different beliefs and customs.
• Competition for work also fueled the resentment.

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Discrimination

• The immigrants are an invasion of venomous
  reptiles long haired, wild eyed, bad smelling ,
  reckless foreign wretches, who never did a days
  work in their lives

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Discrimination

• Literacy Tests
• Low wages, unsafe conditions, paid for mistakes
  or behavior.
• No Overtime, worked Sundays.
• Uneducated and had no way out.
• No civil rights.

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Immigration and Politics

• Creation of political machines.
• Ward Bosses
• Supplied money, jobs, advice and favors votes.
• City councils dominated by Bosses

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Cities/Slums

• First low income housing
• Inadequate sanitation and ventilation
• Overcrowded, crime filled, and disease infested
• By 1900 4 out of 5 residents of New York City
  were immigrants or children of immigrants.
• 1,231 people in a 120 room apartment.
• New York City had twice as many Irish as Dublin,
  More Italians than Naples, more Germans than
  Hamburg.

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Cities

• Established ethnic neighborhoods little Italy,
  Chinatown
• New York City built of Immigrants. Still today a
  city of diversity. People felt more comfortable
  with people of similar values and customs. This
  also made it easier for stereotypes to exist.

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5 cents a spot Immigrant tenement housing
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Immigrant Working Conditions

• Took jobs nobody else wanted and for a fraction
  of the pay textiles mills, steel mills,
  stockyards, and coal mines.
• Average pay 10 cents per hour? 55 hours a week.
• Between 1880 1900 35,000 people were killed on
  the job.

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Child labor at a textile mill.
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Child Labor at a Lumber Mill
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Newsies
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Child Labor at a textile mill
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Chinese Immigrants Settled on the West CoastThey
came through Angel Island in San Francisco.

• Many escaping the same problems facing the
  European immigrants, famine, overpopulation,
  civil warfare but also romance of Gold.
• 1877 17 of CAs population was Chinese.
• 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act forbade Chinese to
  immigrate.

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2 Cultural Theories of Immigration

• Melting Pot
• Assimilate into American culture.
• English Language must be spoken and American
  traditions observed.

• Salad Bowl
• Keep own native culture.
• Customs and traditions are kept alive and
  nurtured.
• Native language spoken

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U S. Immigration Laws 1740- 1998
1740 naturalization act for America required
residence for seven years, sworn loyalty to the
Crown, evidence of Christianity Catholics were
excluded from applying. 1774 immigration to the
colonies prohibited 1790 naturalization
restricted to "free white persons." Required
two-years residency. 1795 residency extended to
five years 1798 Alien and Sedition Acts.
Resident aliens suspected of being subversives
could be expelled. Residency extended to fourteen
years. 1802 reinstated five-year waiting period
1808 federal government made slave trade illegal
1819 Steerage Act regulated conditions on ships
entering American ports 1862 American vessels
forbidden to transport Chinese immigrants to the
U.S. 1868 Passage of the Fourteenth Amendment,
"All persons born or naturalized in the United
States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof,
are citizens of the United States and of the
State wherein they reside."
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Immigration Laws Cont.

• 1875 Page Law. Prohibited transporting convicts
  and prostitutes to America. Strict interpretation
  barred Chinese wives as well as prostitutes.
• 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act (repeal 1943) not
  even for family reunification. Ten year exclusion
  period for Chinese laborers.
• 1882 general immigration act barred paupers,
  criminals, insane levied a tax on each immigrant
  arriving by vessel at a U.S. port
• 1884 all Chinese travelers carry official
  documents showing profession and destination
• 1885 87,88,91 Alien Contract Labor Laws prohibit
  people from entering to work under contracts.
  1888 no reentry for Chinese laborer or former
  resident without wife, children, parents, or
  property
• valued over 1000 in the U.S.
• 1891 Immigration Act--medical inspection of
  immigrants and exclusion of polygamists, those
  suffering from a dangerous disease, or convicted
  of moral turpitude.
• 1892 Chinese Exclusion Act extended for another
  ten years Chinese laborers in U.S. required to
• have certificate of residence
• 1902 Chinese Exclusion Act extended indefinitely
• 1903 Immigration Act barred anarchists and those
  who believe in the overthrow by force or violence
  of the government.

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Immigration Laws Cont.

• 1908 unwritten diplomatic agreement, Japan would
  not issue passports to Japanese laborers wishing
  to come to the U.S. There would also be no
  immigration from Japan's protectorate in Korea
• 1917 Immigration Act. Set literacy test for
  reading English "or some other language or
  dialect, including Hebrew or Yiddish." Created
  Asiatic Barred Zone which excluded immigrants
  from India, Indochina, the East Indies,
  Polynesia, parts of Russia, Arabia, and
  Afghanistan. Kept out anyone likely to become a
  public charge.
• 1918 Anti-Anarchist Act excluded subversive
  aliens
• 1920 Anti-Anarchist Act--deportation of those
  with materials advocating violent overthrow of
  government
• 1921 National Origins Act-separate quotas for
  people from each nation based on 3 of the total
  foreign-born population in the U.S. in 1910.
  Excluded from quota tourists, diplomats, minor
  children of citizens, and Asians already
  excluded. There was no restriction on those from
  the Americas.
• 1924 Amendments to National Origins Act--No
  persons ineligible for citizenship (including
  Japanese) were allowed to enter. Quotas were
  revised downward to 2 of the foreign-born
  population. Still no restriction on the Americas.
  Fully implemented in 1929, 82 of the visas went
  to northern and western Europe, 16 southern and
  eastern Europe, and 2 to the rest of the world.
  Persons ineligible to become citizens were
  barred.

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Immigration Laws Cont.

• 1929 became possible for illegal entrants in the
  U.S. since
• 1921 to legalize their status
• 1940 Alien Registration Act--unlawful to advocate
  overthrow of the U.S. deport aliens who refuse
  to register and be fingerprinted.
• 1941 refuse visas to aliens who would endanger
  public safety
• 1943 repeal of Chinese Exclusion Act Chinese
  eligible for naturalization for first time.
• 1943 Bracero Program--temporary guest worker
  program allowed workers from Mexico in fields
• and railways, those from British Honduras,
  Barbados, and Jamaica in factories.
• 1945 War Brides Act allowed veterans to bring
  spouses and children above the quota numbers.
• 1946 allowed entry of those engaged to veterans
  immigration quotas for India and the Philippines
  
• Chinese wives of American citizens not part of
  quota
• 1948 Displaced Persons Act--preference to Baltic
  states while excluding more than 90 percent of
  displaced Jews those admitted to be deducted
  from future quotas
• 1950 eliminated racial impediment to American
  citizenship for those from Guam all born there
  since 1899 became U.S. citizens
• 1950 Internal Security Act--kept out present or
  past members of a Communist or Fascist party or
  their affiliates

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Immigration Laws Cont.

• 1952 Immigration and Nationality
  Act/McCarren-Walter Act repealed and codified
  earlier laws removed all remaining racial
  prohibitions, but retained quotas felony to
  bring in illegal aliens first 50 of quota to
  those with skills considered valuable to
  the'U.S., rest to relatives of citizens and
  residents.
• 1953 Refugee Relief Act-214,000 visas to victims
  of war and disaster, not counted against
  individual quotas
• 1958 permanent immigrant status for 30,000
  Hungarian refugees
• 1962 Migration and Refugee Assistance
  Act--facilitated resettlement of Cubans and other
  international refugees
• 1965 Immigration Reform Act--the amendments
  abolished quotas, also eliminated restrictions on
  Asians. Stressed family reunification. Allowed
  120,000 immigrants from the Western Hemisphere,
  170,000 from the rest of world outside the
  Americas no country was to exceed 20,000. A
  welcome for extended families from Latin America
  and Asia.
• 1966 Cuban Refugees Act established procedures
  for Cuban parolees to become permanent legal
  residents.

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Immigration Laws Cont.

• 1973 ended preference for the Western Hemisphere
  no country to exceed 20,000 at a time when 62,000
  were coming from Mexico each year.
• 1976 Immigration Act. Immigration limited to
  20,000 for each country in the Americas
• 1977 Indochinese Refugee Act allowed Indochinese
  refugees to become permanent resident aliens,
  rather than "parolees" under the Attorney
  General's emergency parole authority.
• 1980 Refugee Act. Routine admission for 50,000
  refugees annually. The number could be raised in
  consultation with Congress. Not just those
  fleeing communism or the Middle East, but anyone
  who fled because of a well-founded fear of
  persecution due to race, religion, nationality,
  political opinion, or social group
  membership--ifthey were deemed of "special
  humanitarian concern to the United States."
• 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act gave
  legal status to those in the U.S. since January
  1, 1982, making them eligible for eventual
  citizenship. Also, anyone who worked in
  "perishable agriculture" for ninety days prior to
  May 1986 qualified for legalization. The law
  prohibited employers from hiring illegal aliens.
  Authorized up to 5,000 supplemental visas
  annually for two years for countries from which
  immigration had dropped since 1965. Set aside
  10,000 visas for "adversely affected" countries
  36 countries were invited to participate in a
  lottery.

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Immigration Laws Cont.

• 1990 Immigration Act amended the Immigration and
  Nationality Act of 1952, which remains the basic
  law. The new law raised the total number of
  numerically limited immigrants entering the U.S.
  annually in FY 1992-94 to 700,000 (excluding
  refugees whose admission numbers are announced
  annually and some others not subject to
  limitation). The visas were distributed as
  follows 465,000 for family immigrants 55,000
  for the spouses and children of aliens legalized
  under IRCA Immigration and Control Act of 1986
  140,000 for employment- based immigrants 40,000
  for nationals from "adversely affected"
  countries. Beginning in FY 1995 the number
  dropped from 700,000 to 675,000. These visas were
  distributed as follows 480,000 for family
  immigrants 140,000 for employment-based
  immigrants 55,000 for "diversity immigrants."
  Under the latter category, the allotment of FY
  1995 visa numbers for each region was as follows
  Africa 20,200 Asia 6,837 Europe 24,549 North
  America (Bahamas) 8 South, Central, and
  Caribbean America 2,589 and Oceania 817.
• 1996. Strengthened border patrols, restricted
  judicial authority to review deportation cases,
  set greater penalties for the smuggling of
  immigrants and voting by noncitizens. 1997.
  Resident aliens with felony convictions may be
  deported.
• 1997. Refugees from civil wars in Central
  America exempted from deportation rules illegal
  immigrants on track to become legal residents are
  able to apply for visas in the U.S. without going
  home