Unit Plan Utilizing the Lithuanian Cultural Garden of Cleveland, Ohio

Joseph Houser & Shane Dennison

7/19/05

** Shaker Heights High School & Warrensville Heights High School

**Course: American History (1877-Present), Grade: 10^th grade

History of Immigration Legislation

Outlined below are thumbnail sketches of immigration-related legislation adopted between 1790 and 1990. More detailed information on the most recent legislative changes, beginning in 1952, are also available separately.

1790—In an area previously controlled by individual states, an act was adopted that established a uniform rule for naturalization by setting the residence requirement at two years.

1819—Congress enacted the first significant federal legislation relating specifically to immigration. Among its provisions, it: (1) established the continuing reporting of immigration to the United States; and (2) set specific sustenance rules for passengers of ships leaving U.S. ports for Europe.

1864—Congress first centralized control over immigration under the Secretary of State with a Commissioner. The importation of contract laborers was legalized in this legislation.

1875—Direct federal regulation of immigration was established by a law that prohibited entry of prostitutes and convicts.

1882—The Chinese exclusion law curbed Chinese immigration. Also excluded were persons convicted of political offenses, lunatics, idiots, and persons likely to become public charges. The law placed a head tax on each immigrant.

1885—Admission of contract laborers was banned.

1888—Provisions were adopted--the first since 1798--to provide for expulsion of aliens.

1891—The Bureau of Immigration was established under the Treasury Department to federally administer all immigration laws (except the Chinese Exclusion Act).

1903—Immigration law was consolidated. Polygamists and political radicals were added to the exclusion list.

1906—Procedural safeguards for naturalization were enacted. Knowledge of English was made a basic requirement.

1907—A bill increased the head tax on immigrants, and added people with physical or mental defects or tuberculosis and children unaccompanied by parents to the exclusion list. Japanese immigration became restricted.

1917—Added to the exclusion list were illiterates, persons of psychopathic inferiority, men as well as women entering for immoral purposes, alcoholics, stowaways, and vagrants.

1921—The first quantitative immigration law was adopted. It set temporary annual quotas according to nationality. A book review of Not Like Us: Immigrants and Minorities in America, 1890-1924, which discusses this period is available here.

1924—The first permanent immigration quota law established a preference quota system, nonquota status, and consular control system. It also established the Border Patrol.

1929—The annual quotas of the 1924 Act were made permanent.

1943—Legislation provided for the importation of agricultural workers from North, South, and Central America--the basis of the "Bracero Program." At the same time the Chinese exclusion laws were repealed.

1946—Procedures were adopted to facilitate immigration of foreign-born wives, fiance(e)s, husbands, and children of U.S. armed forces personnel.

1948—The first U.S. policy was adopted for admitting persons fleeing persecution. It permitted 205,000 refugees to enter the United States over two years (later increased to 415,000).

1950—The grounds for exclusion and deportation of subversives were expanded. All aliens were required to report their address annually.

1952—The multiple laws which governed immigration and naturalization to that time were brought into one comprehensive statute. It (1) reaffirmed the national origins quota system, (2) limited immigration from the Eastern Hemisphere while leaving the Western Hemisphere unrestricted, (3) established preferences for skilled workers and relatives of U.S. citizens and permanent resident aliens; and (4) tightened security and screening standards and procedures.

1953—The 1948 law was increased to admit over 200,000 refugees above the existing limit.

1965—The national origins quota system was abolished. But still maintained was the principle of numerical restriction by establishing 170,000 Hemispheric and 20,000 per country ceilings and a seven-category preference system (favoring close relatives of U.S. citizens and permanent resident aliens, those with needed occupational skills, and refugees) for the Eastern Hemisphere and a separate 120,000 ceiling for the Western Hemisphere.

1976—The 20,000 per-country immigration ceilings and the preference system became applied to Western-Hemisphere countries. The separate Hemispheric ceilings were maintained.

1978—The separate ceilings for Eastern and Western Hemispheric immigration were combined into one world-wide limit of 290,000.

1980—The Refugee Act removed refugees as a preference category and established clear criteria and procedures for their admission. It also reduced the world-wide ceiling for immigrants from 290,000 to 270,000.

1986—The Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA) was a comprehensive reform effort. It (1) legalized aliens who had resided in the United States in an unlawful status since January 1, 1982, (2) established sanctions prohibiting employers from hiring, recruiting, are referring for a fee aliens known to be unauthorized to work in the United States, (3) created a new classification of temporary agricultural worker and provided for the legalization of certain such workers; and (4) established a visa waiver pilot program allowing the admission of certain nonimmigrants without visas.

Separate legislation stipulated that the status of immigrants whose status was based on a marriage be conditional for two years, and that they must apply for permanent status within 90 days after their second year anniversary.

1989—A bill adjusted from temporary to permanent status certain nonimmigrants that were employed in the United States as registered nurses for at least three years and met established certification standards.

1990—Comprehensive immigration legislation provided for (1) increased total immigration under an overall flexible cap of 675,000 immigrants beginning in fiscal year 1995, preceded by a 700,000 level during fiscal years 1992 through 1994, (2) created separate admission categories for family-sponsored, employment-based, and diversity immigrants, (3) revised all grounds for exclusion and deportation, significantly rewriting the political and ideological grounds and repealing some grounds for exclusion, (4) authorized the Attorney General to grant temporary protected status to undocumented alien nationals of designated countries subject to armed conflict or natural disasters, and designated such status for Salvadorans, (5) revised and established new nonimmigrant admission categories, (6) revised and extended through fiscal year 1994 the Visa Waiver Program, (7) revised naturalization authority and requirements, and (8) revised enforcement activities.

Push and Pull factors

Push Factors:

Throughout Europe, political persecution, the heavy-handedness of reactionary regimes established after the defeat of Napoleon, agrarian unrest, and repressive legislation were all political push factors encouraging emigration across the Atlantic. General overpopulation caused by a high birth rate was also a demographic push factor. The land was overpopulated, and increasing industrialization was causing widespread job shortages in urban centres.

The late 1840s saw a renewed wave of migration from Europe to the New World. A series of revolutions and political crackdowns occurred throughout Europe, resulting in forced and voluntary exiles.  The New World accepted German, Czech, and Hungarian democrats, Chartist labor reformers from Britain, and evacuees from Ireland.

From the last half of the nineteenth century to the eve of World War One, migration to North America increased dramatically in volume. This was caused in part by undesirable conditions in Europe at the time.  Throughout Europe labor unrest and religious persecution existed. The first of the anti-Je wish pogroms occurred at this time as well. From 1845 to 1848 the Great Famine in Ireland resulted in 85,000 émigrés to North America in a single year. All of these were push factors, encouraging large numbers of people to depart the Old World in search of something better.

Pull Factors:

Negative forces, or push factors, which encouraged increasing emigration from Europe in the late nineteenth century, were balanced by positive pull factors related to conditions in North America. A combination of factors enticed Europeans towards the New World. They were encouraged by liberalization in attitudes towards Catholics in North America. Trans-Atlantic shipping fares also became less expensive. Land was available to virtually anyone willing to work it. There were plenty of jobs for industrial laborers. Another pull factor was that many people knew friends or family who had migrated earlier.  This process is known as chain migration, and resulted in distinct pockets of ethnic groups or nationalities in the New World. It meant that would-be immigrants were not simply sailing into the unknown; instead they had a support system already established across the Atlantic.