Unit 4: Controlling Immigration: The U.S. Experience – Historical Perspectives

1. Unit 4: Controlling Immigration: The U.S. Experience – Historical Perspectives European immigrants at Ellis Island, 1910 Japanese “relocation,”California, 1942 Cuban refugees arrive in Florida, May 1980

2. Constants of U.S. immigration policy • The opening and closing door: periods of “free admissions” followed by restriction • Passage of “symbolic laws” that fail to address economic realities but respond to publicfears, prejudices • Drivers of policy changes: economic downturns, threats from abroad, catalytic events (World War II, Mariel boatlift, 9/11 attacks, etc.) • Selective treatment of immigrants according to nationality

3. U.S. immigration policy milestones • Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798: gave President discretionary authority to detain and deport aliens on national security grounds • Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 (repealed in 1943) • National Origin Act of 1924 (Johnson-Reed Act): country-specific quotas + Japanese exclusion clause (not repealed until 1952) • Border Patrol created in 1924 • Mass expulsion of Mexican workers, 1929-1935 • Forced relocation of Japanese immigrants, 1942-46 • “Bracero” contract-labor program, 1942-1964 • “Operation Wetback,” 1953-1954

4. Immigration & Nationality Act of 1965: country-specific quotas abolished, family-based admissions stressed • Mariel boatlift (from Cuba), 1980 • Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 (IRCA): “amnesty” + employer sanctions • Immigration Act of 1990 (the “Irish bill”): expanded permanent legal admissions • Concentrated border enforcement operations launched on U.S.-Mexico border, 1993 • Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996: denied federal benefits to illegal immigrants (and even LEGAL immigrants, for their first five years in the country) • Post 9/11 tightening of immigration controls, “special registration” program, other national security-based measures

5. U.S. went from open immigrationto nationalorigins quotas in 1924 Annual Legal Admissions (in 000s)

6. Aliens legally admitted and expelled from the U.S., by decade Expulsions (Source: M. Ngai,Impossible Subjects)

7. Compare: Mexicans today are 32% of all foreign-born living in U.S.

9. "The Usual Irish Way of Doing Things" (publishedSept. 2, 1871)

11. Irish attack police: “St. Patrick’s Day, 1867: Rum, Blood, The Day We Celebrate”

13. Family-sponsored immigration = More than 3/4 of legal permanent admissions to the U.S.

14. U.S. went from national origins quotas to a family-based policy in 1965 ImmigrationAct of 1990

15. Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882

16. Anti-Chinese cartoon from the 1880s

17. Editorial cartoon, ca. 1869.

18. Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 “Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That from and after the expiration of ninety days next after the passage of this act, and until the expiration of ten years next after the passage of this act, the coming of Chinese laborers to the United States…is hereby suspended; and during such suspension it shall not be lawful for any Chinese laborer to come, or, having so come after the expiration of said ninety days, to remain within the United States.”

19. Ad for celluloid collars,which will “put Chineselaundrymen out of business.”(ca. 1880)

20. U.S. “Flying Tiger” squadrons operated from bases in China to attack Japanese targets during World War II

21. Prelude to the Japanese exclusion (Published in theChicago Defender during 1920 alienland dispute)

22. Newspaper article,San Francisco, 1905 “The Japaneseimmigrant is farmore dangerousto the country Than the Chinese.”

23. Italian immigrant family arrives IN New York, 1903 Polish mother and children

24. European immigrants en route to U.S., early 20th Century

25. The 1920s

27. “The Great Red Scare,” post-World War I

28. Cartoons from the “Great Red Scare” era

29. Ellis Island, circa 1900“Island of Hope, Island of Tears”

30. Immigrants who passed through Ellis Island,by nationality

31. Between 1892-1954:Total foreign nationals processed: 16 million Would-be immigrants turned away: 250,000 (1.6%)

32. Angel Island“Ellis Island” for Asian immigrants, 1910-1940 Detention building on Angel Island

33. Men’s barracks on Angel Island Angel Island detainees Chinese detainees at Angel Island

34. Japanese femaleimmigrants(“picture brides”)arrive at AngelIsland

35. Anti-Japanese sign in a Los Angeles neighborhood, 1942

36. Forced relocation of Japanese immigrants and citizens, 1942-1946 • Executive Order 9066, signed by President Roosevelt on February 19, 1942 • Authorized evacuation of all “enemy aliens” from designated areas within U.S., including entire West Coast • “Enemy aliens” included Germans, Italians, and Japanese; but order was enforced only against Japanese-origin people

37. Within 6 months, federal government ordered arrest of 120,000 persons of Japanese descent • 70,000 of them were U.S. citizens by birth • Internees included 30 University of California faculty and research assistants, and 400 undergraduate students

38. Internees moved to camps in rural California, Arizona, Utah, Idaho, Colorado, and Wyoming Japanese internment camp, Butte, Arizona

39. Manzanar internment camp, California (1943)

42. perimeter of Japanese internment camp, Tule Lake, California (1942)

44. Dr. Seuss on the Japanese internment Waiting for the signal from home… (cartoon published in newspapers throughout U.S., February 13, 1942)

46. “I feel most deeply that when the war is over…we as Americans are going to regret the avoidable injustices that may have been done.” -- Milton S. Eisenhower, National Director, War Relocation Authority, to Agriculture Secretary Claude Wicard, April 1, 1942 “My friends in the War Relocation Authority…are deeply distressed over the effects of the entire evacuation and relocation program on the Japanese-Americans….It is hard for them to escape a conviction that their plight is due more to racial discrimination, economic motivations, and wartime prejudices than to any real necessity from the military point of view for evacuation from the West Coast.”-- Milton S. Eisenhower to President Roosevelt, April 22, 1943

47. Post-9/11 Immigration Control Measures-- “Special registration” (fingerprint and photograph) of nationals of specific Middle Eastern countries living in U.S., 2001-2002--multi-stage registration process, culminating in 2004 with registration of all foreign nationals in U.S.

48. “Group 1” Special Registration Countries Iran Iraq Libya Sudan Syria

49. “Group 2” Special Registration Countries Afghanistan Algeria Bahrain Eritrea Lebanon Morocco North Korea Oman Qatar Somalia Tunisia United Arab Emirates Yemen

50. -- immediate detention of all found to be “out-of-status” (500-1,000 arrested in Los Angeles-Orange County area alone, Dec. 16-18, 2002) Muslim immigrant woman sobs over the detention of her son in Los Angeles, December 2002