By Simi Mehta
Immigration has been the historical foundation of the American nation and has remained the most persistent and all-encompassing influence in the development of the American society, economy and politics. Over the years, a massive stream of humanity, speaking every language and representing every religion, nationality and race, crossed every ocean and continent to reach the United States. It is this heterogeneity of immigrants that sets apart United States from all other nations that have been settled by immigrants. The United States is the only major world power today that owes its existence primarily to the phenomenon of immigration. America is a nation of immigrants? is an incontrovertible fact.
As each new wave of immigrants reached America, they were faced with problems, not only the problems that come with making new homes and learning new jobs, but, more important, the problems of getting along with people of different backgrounds and habits. Throughout the history of America, myriad groups have welcomed and scorned immigrants at the same time, which has been determined to a large extent by their race, nationality, economic backgrounds and skills they brought to the United States.
The official policy on immigration only began after the American Revolution, in the late eighteenth century. The United States immigration policies can be divided into five phases, depending on the official standpoint regarding the coming of the immigrants. It ranged from the initial open door era of easy and unrestricted immigration, to the barring of Chinese immigrants from entering America in 1882. From 1920-1965 was the era of restrictive legislation, with many acts being passed in this period to curb immigration (especially southern and eastern European immigration). The 1921 Immigration Act for the first time established numerical immigration quotas for every nationality fixed at 3% of the population already present in the United States. The 1929 Immigration Act made it a felony for immigrants to enter the US by fraud. The 1952 Immigration and Nationality Act eliminated racial bars to citizenship allowing entry for a small number of Asians as well.
The revolving door era of immigration lasted from 1965 to 2001. The 1965 Immigration Act abolished the restrictive national origins quota system. In its place the law established much less restrictive hemispheric and national quotas. It also opened the “golden door” (relatives of the citizens of the US were given a priority to immigrate) for immigrants. The 1980 Refugee Act established a general policy towards granting refugee status to the immigrants. The 1896 Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA), focused on curtailing illegal immigration. It legalised hundreds of thousands of illegal immigrants. The 1986 Immigration Act introduced the employer sanctions program which fined employers for hiring illegal workers. The Immigration Act of 1990 established an annual limit for certain categories of immigrants. The Illegal Immigrant Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act (IIRIRA) 1996, created the notion of “unlawfully present persons” and it strengthened deportation laws.
The ongoing storm- door era in US immigration began in 2001, in the wake of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. The 2001 USA PATRIOT Act, increased the authority of the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) to track down illegal immigrants with terrorist ties. In 2002, the INS was abolished and its responsibilities were handed over to the newly constituted department of Home land Security. This period has witnessed many strict laws coming in to curb illegal immigrants and made even entry to the United States a lot more cumbersome, because of the fears of terrorist attacks.
The Immigration Issue Today
The immigration issue today is largely centered on the Hispanic immigrants, especially the menace of illegal immigration from Mexico. Illegal immigration into the United States is massive where more than 10 million undocumented aliens currently reside in the U.S., and that population is growing every year. On one hand, the presence of so many aliens is a powerful testament to the attractiveness of America. On the other hand, it is a sign of how dangerously open its borders are. The immigration issue today raises concerns of assimilation, bilingualism, multiculturalism, economics and national security. Americans of every generation have been frightened that newcomers would subvert established customs and undermine the traditions of society. So what is happening today is just a revalidation of the old phenomenon. What is of importance here is that this time the voices against immigration are not coming from the traditional nativist organizations, but are coming from many environmental groups, etc. who are concerned about the increase of population and ill-effects on the climate and resources of the US. United States, in the words of Nathan Glazer, is “an unfinished country”, and one of the hallmarks of its unfinished state is the constantly changing mix of peoples who go there.
America has often been called a “melting pot” where different ethnic cultures came together and assimilated and melted together to form a new culture. Although this is true to an extent, it is only a partial truth. Many ethnic and racial groups despite the “Americanization” have maintained and preserved their own rites and culture. Thus new terms like “salad bowl” and “mosaic” are now being used to explain the immigrant culture in America, which seem more apt for a multicultural society like United States. Immigrant populations within the United States are not being blended together in one “pot”, but rather they are being transforming American society into a truly cultural mosaic. United States continues to have a dynamic cultural pluralism and can justifiably be called the “first universal nation.”
In the immigration issue in America, we can witness the contradicting forces of both globalization and nationalism at play. Globalization is increasing the demand for both cheap labor and skilled labor, which at times results in losses of jobs for the home country. On the other hand, nationalism creates fear and resentment against „outsiders? or those considered different, arguing that immigrants are ruining the American way of life. Immigration will continue to be a burning topic in American politics for a very long time to come, because it impacts every walk of American life.
(The author is a Ph.D scholar in the American Studies Program at the Centre for Canadian, United States and Latin American Studies, School of International Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, and can be reached at simi@manavdhara.org).
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