Race and Immigration Restriction

Immigration Waves in US History

• antebellum, 1840-1860—largely northern European, especially England, Ireland and Germany—approx. 4.5 million

• late 19th-early 20th century, 1900-1920—largely Southern and Eastern European, including Polish and Russian Jews, Italian, Greek—approx. 14.5 million

• also Asian immigrants in the late 19th-early 20th century, in much fewer numbers (for example, Chinese immigrants built US railroads)

Immigration Waves > photograph of “immigrants” returning to Europe, 1907

Immigration Waves > Construction of Racial Difference

What is this man’s ethnic background?

Immigration Waves > Construction of Racial Difference

Naturalization Law and Race in US History

• 1790 - Congress limits naturalization to white persons

• 1870 - Congress adds African Americans (naturalization limited to “free white persons” and “persons of African descent”)

• 1952 - racial prerequisite for naturalization eliminated

Naturalization Law and Race > Cartoon on the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882

Naturalization Law and Race > U.S. v Bhagat Singh Thind, 1923

Immigration Restriction > Ku Klux Klan Marching in DC

Immigration Restriction > Cartoon on the Literacy Test

Immigration Restriction > Cartoon on the Quota Act of 1921

Immigration Act of 1924 (The Johnson-Reed Act)

• Based ceilings on the number of immigrants from any particular nation on 2 percent of each nationality recorded in the 1890 census

• Was directed against immigrants from Southern and Eastern Europe who arrived in large numbers after 1890

• Barred all immigrants ineligible for citizenship on racial grounds, including all south and east Asians (including Indians, Japanese, and Chinese)

Immigration Act of 1924 > Annual Immigration Quotas

• Germany - 51,227

• Great Britain - 34,007

• Ireland - 28,567

• Italy - 3,845

• Hungary - 473

• Greece - 100

• Egypt - 100

Immigration Act of 1924 > Map of Europe, Literary Digest, 1924

Immigration Act of 1924 > Mae Ngai’s article

• What is the main argument of the article?

• Does the author present sufficient evidence to support her argument?

• What author’s insights did you find the most original and useful?

• In what ways do you think the author might have done things differently?

• Ngai says that the law “constructed race.” What does she mean?

• What role statistics and the Census played in the development of this legislation?