Immigration
Printable Version
Digital History ID 3821
Immigration Interpreting Primary Sources
What class of our citizens most strenuously resist the moral restrains of the community....who among our population give unrestricted and unregulated license to the ten thousand drinking places in the city, which are the chief receptacles of drunkenness, debauchery, villainy, and disease? It is the residuum or dregs of four millions of European immigrants, including paupers, felons, and convicts that have landed at this port within the last twenty years. Twenty-fourth Annual Report of the New York Association for the Improvement of the Condition of the Poor, 1867 The best reason that could be given for this radical restriction of immigration is the necessity of protecting our population against degeneration and saving our national peace and quiet from imported turbulence and disorder. I cannot believe that we would be protected against these evils by limiting immigration to those who can read and write in any language twenty-five words of our Constitution. In my opinion it is infinitely more safe to admit a hundred thousand immigrants who, though unable to read and write, seek among us only a home and opportunity to work, than to admit one of those unruly agitators and enemies of governmental control, who can not only read and write but delights in arousing by inflammatory speech the illiterate and peacefully inclined to discontent and tumult. Violence and disorder do not originate with illiterate laborers. President Cleveland's veto of immigration restriction bill Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore, Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed, to me: I lift my lamp beside the golden door. Emma Lazarus, "The New Colossus" There is no room in this country for hyphenated Americanism...The one absolutely certain way of bringing the nation to ruin, of preventing all possibility of its continuing to be a nation at all, would be to permit it to become a tangle of squabbling nationalities. Theodore Roosevelt, 1915
Questions To Think About
1. What social evils do critics associate with mass immigration? 2. Which is the goal of American immigration--a "melting pot" or cultural pluralism? 3. What kind of immigration policy is most consistent with the nation's needs and ideals?
Immigrant America
Interpreting Statistics
Number of Immigrants | 1820 | 8,385 | 1830 | 23,322 | 1840 | 84,066 | 1850 | 369,980 | 1860 | 153,640 | 1870 | 387,203 | 1880 | 457,257 | 1890 | 455,302 | 1900 | 448,572 | 1910 | 1,041,570 | 1920 | 430,001 | 1930 | 241,700 | 1940 | 70,756 | 1950 | 249,187 |
Questions To Think About
1. During which period was immigration greatest? 2. Has wartime or depression increased or decreased immigration?
Impact of Immigration Quotas
Interpreting Statistics
Average Annual Inflow | | Immigrants from Northern and Western Europe | Other Immigrants | 1907-1914 | 176,983 | 685,531 | Quotas under 1921 Act | 198,082 | 158,367 | Quotas under 1924 Act | 140,999 | 20,847 |
Questions To Think About
1. What impact did quotas have upon immigration? 2. Which groups suffered the most restriction?
Interpreting Statistics
Family Characteristics of Major Immigrant Groups, 1909-1914 | Group | Percentage Returning to Europe | Males Per 100 Females | Percent Under 14 | Czechs | 5 | 133 |
19 % | English | 6 | 136 | 16 % | Finish | 7 | 181 | 8 % | Germans | 7 | 132 | 18 % | Greeks | 16 | 170 | 4 % | Hebrews | 2 | 117 | 25 % | Hungarians | 22 | 141 | 16 % | Italians | 17 | 320 | 12 % | Poles | 13 | 188 | 10 % | Slovaks | 19 | 162 | 12 % |
Questions To think About 1. Which immigrant groups were most likely to leave the United States and return home? 2. Which groups had the most even sex ratio? the least even? 3. Which groups included the largest number of children?
Interpreting Statistics
Age of Marriage for Women | | 15-19 | 20-24 | 25-29 | 45-54 | German | 10 | 49 | 77 | 96 | Irish | 2 | 18 | 46 | 85 | Italian | 29 | 74 | 93 | 99 | Japanese | 51 | 85 | 87 | 93 | Polish | 15 | 66 | 89 | 99 | Russian | 7 | 55 | 90 | 99 | Urban Blacks | 16 | 57 | n.a. | 94 | Native Whites | 13 | 53 | 77 | 91 |
Questions To Think About
1. Which immigrant groups married earliest? latest? 2. Explain why some groups married earlier than others and why this is significant.
Child Labor
Interpreting Statistics
Proportion of Children 10-15 in Labor Force | | | Boston | Philadelphia | Pittsburgh | Boys | Native | 7 | 20 | 20 | | 2nd generation | 8 | 24 | 20 | | 1st generation | 19 | 39 | 30 | | Black | 10 | 17 | 19 | Girls | Native | 3 | 12 | 5 | | 2nd generation | 6 | 18 | 8 | | 1st generation | 13 | 39 | 18 | | Black | 4 | 14 | 7 |
Questions To Think About
1. Which groups were most likely to have children in the labor force? 2. Which groups were least likely?
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