1
Clayton Montgomery
Richard Gelm, Ph. D
PLSC301
10/8/17
Immigration Reform: Solutions Not Barriers
The history of the United States’ immigration policy is marked by five distinct eras: from
the formation of the United States to the nineteen hundreds, first half of the nineteen hundreds,
mid-nineteen hundreds to 9/11/2001, 9/11/2001 to 2016, and the current administration. The
current United States Presidential administration is adamant that building a wall at the southern
border, banning certain nationalities’ entrance to the United States, and reducing overall
allowance of immigration and refugees will improve the security and economics of the United
States. However, the Presidential administration’s strategy ignores the contrary experience of
previous eras. Permissive policies improved economics in the earlier times. If the desire is for
workers to be citizens, then an increase in immigration will naturalize more foreign workers.
Policies that target specific nationalities, ethnicities, or religions are discriminatory, as learned
after times of turmoil, and are contrary to the American ideal of the melting pot.
From foundation to the 1900’s, the topic of immigration was largely an issue of labor.
The Constitution gives Congress the right to regulate naturalization.
1
Initially, Congress largely
ignored the issue of immigration and left the states to their own policies. In 1876, with the
decision in Chy Lung v. Freeman, the U.S. Supreme Court established the right of Congress to
make policy on immigration, taking the authority away from the States.
2
California had
1
U.S. Const. art. 1. sec. 8. cl. 4.
2
Chy Lung v. Freeman, 92 U.S. 275 (1876).
2
restricted immigration while Federal policy was to encourage it.
3
The 1885 Alien Contract
Labor Law outlined regulations for immigration focused on encouraging the migration of foreign
workers.
4
The Immigration Act of 1891 formally established the Immigration Service to manage
immigration to the United States.
5
The act amended criteria that would bar entry.
6
These early
administrations designed Federal policies that encouraged immigration and improved economic
growth of the country.
7
Areas of significant immigration during the nineteenth century continue
to see benefits in the present, experiencing “significantly higher incomes, less poverty, less
unemployment, more urbanization and higher educational attainment.”
8
In 1886, the positive trend for immigration ended due to a shift in public opinion after an
act of terrorism in which anarchists threw a bomb at police in Haymarket Square in Chicago
during a labor dispute.
9
The court convicted members of the International Working People’s
Association of the attack.
10
The group had a published manifesto advocating violent
3
Ibid.
4
1885 Alien Contract Labor Law, ch. 164, 23 Stat. 332.
5
Immigration Act of 1891, ch. 550-551, 26 Stat. 1084.
6
Ibid.
7
Ibid.
8
Kopf, Dan. 2017. “Places in the US that took in more immigrants in the 19th century
still benefit economically from it.” Quartz, June 3.
9
David, Henry. 1980. The history of the Haymarket affair: a study in the American
social-revolutionary and labor movements. New York: Russell & Russell.
10
Ibid.
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revolution.
11
All those arrested were immigrants or first generation Americans.
12
Congress
began the process of enacting tougher immigration law. At the turn of the century, immigration
policy caught up to the anti-immigrant public opinion initiated around the Haymarket Square
Riot that continued to the mid-nineteen hundreds when the first laws designed to curtail
immigration passed. The Immigration Act of 1903 increased the exclusion criteria
13
and the
Immigration Act of 1917 required a literacy test.
14
In 1921, Congress finalized the quota system
for immigration to include a numerical limit.
15
In 1924, Congress reduced the quota even
more.
16
Congress essentially left the system unchanged until the 1960’s. The reactionary
response to the Haymarket Square Riot set back the labor movement and hindered the potential
economic growth due to immigration.
17
The mid-nineteen hundreds to present represents the contemporary era of immigration
policy. By 1962, legislators changed course on immigration with the Migration and Refugee
Assistance Act of 1962, which established relief for refugees and migrants in urgent need.
18
In
1965 with The Immigration and Nationality Act, Congress ended the quota system and
11
Ibid.
12
Ibid.
13
Immigration Act of 1903, ch. 1011-1012, 26 Stat. 1213.
14
Immigration Act of 1917, ch. 27-29, 39 Stat. 874.
15
Emergency Quota Act, Pub. L. No. 67-5, 42 Stat. 5 (1921): 874–898.
16
Immigration Act of 1924, Pub. L. No. 68–139, 43 Stat. 153 (1924).
17
See note 9 above.
18
Migration and Refugee Assistance Act of 1962, 22 U.S. Code § 2601 (1962).
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eliminated racial and national barriers that public opinion found to be discriminatory towards
non-northern Europeans.
19
In recent history, the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986
placed a requirement on employers to attest to the immigration status of employees and outlined
penalties for knowingly hiring or recruiting illegal immigrants.
20
Signed by President Ronald
Reagan, the law also provided for seasonal agricultural workers and established amnesty for
illegal immigrants that could prove residency and had a clean criminal record.
21
President
George H.W. Bush signed the Immigration Act of 1990.
22
It authorized an increase in the
number of immigrants.
23
It allowed for family-based immigration and expanded employment
visas based on occupation.
24
It also created a lottery system to improve diversity for countries
with lower admittance rates.
25
The Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility
Act of 1996, signed by President William J. Clinton, established stricter rules for deportation and
authorized the Attorney General to enhance border barriers between Mexico and the United
