When did imigration become a problem?

[Anonymous]

College student here trying to find out the roots of the immigration problem.
Natives from the land never asked the Pilgrims for their visas once they jumped out of the Mayflower.
Nobody in Central America asked Columbus for his visa either. When did immigration became an issue?
Please try to focus the discussion! TIA

[Anonymous]

Any suggestion of authors and websites is welcome.

[Anonymous]

You mean immigration restrictions? I imagine the native americans thought the pilgrims were a "problem."

I think restrictions (esp quotas) developed in the mid-1800s when people from the less "white" parts of europe started immigrating and also when many Chinese immigrants moved here.

I did a 3 second wikipedia search, which is always a great place to start. Just so you know, I have not hired people for demonstrating poor research skills, which asking a parenting website for a starting point is a good example of.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_immigration_legislation

Good luck,

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:College student here trying to find out the roots of the immigration problem.
Natives from the land never asked the Pilgrims for their visas once they jumped out of the Mayflower.
Nobody in Central America asked Columbus for his visa either. When did immigration became an issue?
Please try to focus the discussion! TIA

Some of us do not consider immigration a problem. If you are looking for an anti-immigration rant, I suggest you do a few searches on Lou Dobbs.

[Anonymous]

Doesn't your college have a library? And doesn't your computer have a search engine?

[Anonymous]

me thinks someone wants us to write her paper for her.

Tsk tsk tsk!

[Anonymous]

Check out the book How the Irish became White by Noel Ignatiev. It's controversial but a classic.

[Anonymous]

Ok, I shouldn't respond but I will:

I already have a lot of bibliography to work with but I think it wouldn't hurt to ask it here in case someone had already studied or debated the issue. I see people asking for CPAs, lawyers, diagnoses here all the time. Why not ask for advice regarding a school project? I have a 4.0 GPA so I guess I know very well how to research and write a paper. Thanks for your concern though.

I'm not looking for anti anything. I have to write a paper about immigration and I thought it would be interesting to find out when it became a "problem".
Different people have different points of view and I'm a strong supporter of brainstorming. I like looking at things from different POVs.

I thought it became an issue once people needed visas to enter the country but now I love the idea of thinking it started that early like the natives seeing the Pilgrims as a problem.

If you're willing to help with the brainstorm thank you. If you're not I bet you have more important things to do. Have fun with them.

[Anonymous]

Hey Jeff thanks for changing the forum to the right place, I didn't even notice I've posted on the wrong one.

[Anonymous]

I think it is simplistic to say that immigration became a problem but treating everything else as if it stayed static. Between the arrival of Columbus/pilgrims there was a world-wide political shift ... nationalization--the shift from kings etc. to nation-states. This affected the sense of 'citizens' about borders, nationality, language, identity etc. The immigration 'problem' today is different from the immigration 'problem' of yesterday--ie if you were a Roman during the last sack of Rome by barbarians, or a Native American being displaced on the Trail of Tears. Groups of people have always taken over, displaced people have always objected. However, we have since the 1800's relatively 'fixed' borders, and a counter-thrust called globalization. This creates a 'tension', and we look (mostly) to law to resolve it, even as it is belied by practice (ie people hiring, moving, despite 'law'). But that does not take a away from the fact that a sense of nation-hood exists, and (illegal) immigration may or may not be regarded as a 'problem'. Mexico, for example regards it so, with its militarized Southern border 'protecting' against an influx of Central Americans and the fact that non-Mexicans may not own property outright. Mexico is far more stringent in its sense of nationhood and inside/outside 'belonging' than say, the US.

Yes this is rambling--just some thoughts:

Context
compare
classic examples of influx/outflux
the rise of nations
globalization
declining birthrates in the West
language
law
practice
rhetoric

[Anonymous]

Reagan. 1986. Immigration bill. Amnesty.

[Anonymous]

OH yeah. What was that movie that came out and made everyone all sad? "El Norte"

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Check out the book How the Irish became White by Noel Ignatiev. It's controversial but a classic.

Not the most gripping writing within, but I agree it is a good and useful work!

[Anonymous]

Not an expert on this (and so welcome correction from others who are) but the massive immigration from Eastern and Central Europe 1880s through the 1920s (including much Jewish immigration and other folks not particularly welcomed by white anglo-saxon protestants) helped ignite a nativist backlash, resulting in an extremely limited immigration policy in, I think, 1924, which favored white people from Western Europe. This policy was in place when Jews were desperate to get out of Europe in the 30s to avoid the Holocaust so, no, we didn't do a lot to give safe harbor to Jews. (Something I learned only later in life -- as a kid I had always assumed WW II was about rescuing the Jews.)

[Anonymous]

I think the tide turned at some point after we joined the war--my mother, for example, came to America as a legal Eastern European refugee after the war. We continue to offer refugee and politically persecuted status and a LOT of legal immigrations (could stand to be expanded) world wide. FAR more than many countries. The 'problem' is illegal immigration-mostly from Mexico and central America (proximity based). Do we become one large country like the European Union? Is that the goal?