The immigration into the United States

There have been four phases of immigration to the United States. Protestant immigrants from North Western Europe made up the majority of the first group. Between 1830 and 1880, the second group primarily included Germans, Irish Catholics, Chinese, and Scandinavians. The Third Wave, which included immigrants from the British Isles and more German and Scandinavians, occurred between 1880 and 1920. The Fourth Wave, which began in the mid-1990s, is the most recent. As soon as the country gained freedom, immigration regulations were in place. The formulation and the change of the rules have been in keeping with the politics, refugee concerns, terrorism, and the flow of migrants in the United States.

The immigration laws all through the history have had an evolving and redefining of the term citizen. From independence when one would only be a white who possess a moral character that is good to qualify. In the mid-1800s, United States experienced the second wave of immigrants from Ireland and Germany In search of economic opportunity. The Congress passed a law to illegalize bringing of slaves into America. The New York state came with a policy of replacing Philadelphia, the then chief entry port for immigrants. In the middle of the second wave, Know-Nothing Party demanded more restrictions. This coupled with the economic depression, the push to flush out the immigrants rose with many calls coming from California State. In 1870, the term of citizenship in the immigration laws was extended to include persons of African Origin. Only five years later in 1875, more immigration laws were enacted. The effect of the enactments was to restrict immigration. Specifically, the Asian immigrants were on the rise, and therefore, immigrants from most of the Asian countries were banned. In 1882, the Chinese Exclusion Act was enacted by the Congress. The limitations in the Act were expanded to include a ban on persons with contagious diseases, beggars, anarchists, importers of prostitutes, and polygamists.

By 1900, most immigrants were arising from Southern and Eastern Europe. The laws passed then introduced a nationality perspective by introducing quotas and capping of national immigrant annually. By Mid-1990’s, the restriction on the Chinese was lifted, the ban on the Asian visas was lifted, and race scrapped as a ground of excluding an immigrant.

In the year 1965, Immigration and Nationality Act was passed with the focus on nationality, favoring skill, and reunification of families. For the first time, restrictions were imposed on Latin Americans. The focus soon changed to refugees with passing of Displaced Persons Act and Refugee Relief Act. The refugees were fleeing wars such as in Nicaragua and most importantly the grant of status of ‘temporary protective.’ The impact of this status was to ensure that the immigrants from countries that are faced with disasters, armed conflicts, and other extraordinary conditions are immune. In 1987, US Congressional House passed Immigration Reform and Control Act to legalize unauthorized immigrants meeting set conditions and to sanction employers of illegal immigrants.

The late 1990s trends have shown a rising concern for terrorism. The focus of the policy was the control of borders, sanctions for hirers and tight eligibility criteria. Several actions like the Deferred Action for Childhood were formulated to protect unauthorized parents of U.S born children from certain limitations used against other classes of immigrants.

The decision-making underlying the above laws and policies has proceeded on ethical rationales. The logic is evidently informed by the geopolitical and the social factors prevailing at various times in the United States. Meaning, the laws captured the current moods of citizens and international happenings relating to immigration. Some reason for the incident has to underpin ethical reasoning with particular challenges. Top on the reasoning is the protection of human rights with high specifications to carter for victims of extreme conditions, ensuring historical continuity of the nation’s identity as the county of immigrants and enhancement of family unity through grant of visa on family relationships. Another ethical rationale is the notion of fairness to either expand or and limit immigration of persons.

On the other hand, the decision to degrade the immigrants, calling them names, and putting the limitations on their employment is seen to be a result of extremism. The resentments were majorly premised on a class as the immigrants were mainly foreign and inferior. Also, the limitations were based on the cultural theories of the century such as the widespread ‘The Yellow Peril’ prejudice against Chinese and understanding of job stealing. Contrary to this almost absolute belief, immigrants were participating in the economic development of the United States, a developing country, and had justifiable reasons for immigrating including persecutions.

The ethical rationales are however without inherent challenges. For example, the resentment that the immigrants were too difficult to Africanize was too flimsy to deprive the already sea-sick and poor immigrants of the full realization of the potential of human rights. Immigration in the United States has had a lot of development effects on the economy of the United States. The second wave immigrants majorly Scandinavians, Germans, Irish Catholics, and Chinese contributed to the growth of industries in the United States. Chinese immigrants in their over 100 000 numbers by 1880 had engaged in working on the construction of Transcontinental Railroads, expansion of American brewing industry, manufacturing g industries in piano and pencil making as well as canning. Additionally, they are associated with the increase in employment visas, auctioning of visas and amnesties and rise in visa processing fees.

The immigration in the United States has also led to the development of many social processes. Immigration of the Irish Catholics resulted in the spread of Christianity and development of priesthood. Additionally, the laws have led to the enhancement of family unity. Secondly, the immigration into the United States revitalized cities in the state through creating a diversity of the ethnic and racial composition and thus the ethnic demography of the population. It is this demographic change that influenced the dynamics of markets, politics, environment and social assimilation processes in response to the changes.

In conclusion, it is evident that the immigration laws of the United States have developed over time. At each particular time in history, there was a significant influencing social or a geopolitical factor for formulating a less or more restrictive immigration laws and policies. However, it is evident that what was cutting across all the historical times are the ethical rationales underpinning the decisions of policy formulation and implementation. It can also be said that despite the constant resentment from different quarters, the immigration alone of the person into America has led to various social and economic development.

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Schuck Peter, “Morality of Immigration Policy.” San Diego Law Review 45, (2008): 874

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