Enacted on August 7, 1953, the Refugee Relief Act (RRA) authorized the granting of 205,000 special nonquota visas apportioned to individuals in three classes, along with accompanying members of their immediate family...
Read the full storyThe Refugee Act of 1980 formed the basis of refugee policy in the United States until 1996.
Read the full storyThe Oriental Exclusion Act, actually a special provision of the Johnson-Reed Act of 1924, excluded immigrants who were ineligible for U.S. citizenship from entrance to the United States, even at the new ethnic-based, lower levels.
Read the full storyThe Naturalization Act of 1790 was the first piece of U.S. federal legislation regarding immigration.
Read the full storyWhen Thomas Jefferson became president, there was a relaxation of the hostility toward immigrants that had prevailed during the administration of John Adams (1797–1801).
Read the full storyThe McCarran-Walter Act was an attempt to deal systematically with the concurrent cold war threat of communist expansion and the worldwide movement of peoples in the wake of World War II (1939–45).
Read the full storyUsually characterized as a kind of purity legislation against the interstate transportation of women for prostitution or “other immoral purposes,” the Mann Act was equally aimed at the increasing number of immigrants, averaging almost 900,000 per year in the first decade of the 20th century.
Read the full storyThe Manifest of Immigrants Act was the first piece of U.S. legislation regulating the transportation of migrants to and from America and the first measure requiring that immigration statistics be kept.
Read the full storyMaking permanent the principle of national origin quotas, the Johnson-Reed Act served as the basis for U.S. immigration policy until the MCCARRAN-WALTER IMMIGRATION AND NATURALIZATION ACT (1952).
Read the full storyIn the wake of massive refugee crises in Southeast Asia and Cuba, in 1981, a Select Commission on Immigration and Refugee Policy recommended to the U.S. Congress that undocumented aliens be granted amnesty and that sanctions be imposed on employers who hired undocumented workers.
Read the full storyThe Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) of 1965 marked a dramatic change in American immigration policy, abandoning the concept of national quotas and establishing the basis for extensive immigration from the developing world.
Read the full storyThe Immigration Act of 1990 was the first major revision of U.S. immigration policy since the Immigration and Nationality Act (1965), which had been passed in the midst of the cold war.
Read the full storyThe Immigration Act of 1917, popularly known as the Literacy Act, marked a turning point in American immigration legislation.
Read the full storyBoth the general increase in the number of immigrants and the assassination of President William McKinley in 1901 fueled a growing nativism in the United States and in Congress during the first decade of the 20th century.
Read the full storyIn the wake of the assassination of President William McKinley by anarchist Leon Czolgosz in 1901, Congress began a thorough review of American immigration policy.
Read the full storyResponding to dozens of petitions from states worried about the maintenance of indigent immigrants, Congress expanded the exclusion precedent set in the Page Act of 1875.
Read the full storyThe 1864 Immigration Act was designed to increase the flow of laborers to the United States during the disruptions of the Civil War (1861–65).
Read the full storyAs part of a 1996 initiative to curb illegal immigration, the U.S. Congress passed the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act (IIRIRA).
Read the full storySigned in May 1921, the Emergency Quota Act established the first ethnic quota system for selective admittance of immigrants to the United States.
Read the full storyBills to assist central European refugees were brought before Congress in 1937 and 1939, but it was not found necessary to pass new legislation because the number of refugees could be accommodated under existing legislation.
Read the full storyThe Chinese Exclusion Act was the first measure to specifically exclude an ethnic group from immigrating to the United States.
Read the full storyThe rapid influx of Irish, German, and Chinese immigrants into the United States after 1845 was accompanied by a series of steamship disasters and the prevalence of cholera, typhus, and smallpox among arriving immigrants.
Read the full storyPassed by the California legislature in 1913, the Alien Land Act prohibited noncitizens from owning land in California.
Read the full storyReflecting a growing concern about the effects of organized labor, Congress enacted the Alien Contract Labor Act, also known as the Foran Act, on February 26, 1885.
Read the full storyThe Alien and Sedition Acts is the collective name given to four laws enacted by the U.S. Congress in the midst of its undeclared naval war with France known as the Quasi War (1798–1800).
Read the full storyThe Tydings-McDuffie Act grew out of widespread opposition, particularly in California, to the rapid influx of Filipino agricultural laborers after annexation of the islands following the Spanish-American War in 1898.
Read the full storyThe Voting Rights Act, passed by the U.S. Congress and signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson on August 6, 1965, suspended literacy tests and nationally prohibited abridgment of the right to vote based on race or color.
Read the full storyThe War Brides Act was the first of several related measures to allow United States soldiers to bring their alien brides and families into the United States following World War II (1941–45).
Read the full storyMore formally the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act, the Welfare Reform Act reflected the anti-immigrant mood of the 1990s and frustration over the mounting costs of providing social services to both citizens and immigrants.
Read the full storyAmending the MCCARRAN-WALTER IMMIGRATION AND NATURALIZATION ACT (1952), the Immigration Marriage Fraud Amendments of 1986 specified a two-year residency requirement for alien spouses and children before obtaining permanent resident status.
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