Immigration Act of 1903

The Immigration Act of 1903, also called the Anarchist Exclusion Act, was a law of the United States regulating immigration. It codified previous immigration law, and added four inadmissible classes: anarchists, people with epilepsy, beggars, and importers of prostitutes. It had little impact and its provisions related to anarchists were expanded in the Immigration Act of 1918.

Background

Anarchism came to public attention in the United States with the Haymarket Affair of 1886. On May 4, a policeman was killed and several others were wounded, of which six later died, after a bomb exploded in Chicago's Haymarket Square. Eight members of the recently formed International Working People's Association (IWPA) were found guilty of the bombing. The IWPA's 1883 manifesto called for the "destruction of the existing class rule, by all means, i.e., by energetic, relentless, revolutionary and international action".

The idea of excluding anarchists from immigrating was first mentioned at a Congressional hearing in 1889. A bill introduced on July 20, 1894 sought to restrict the entry of anarchists by requiring potential immigrants to visit an U. S. consulate for a political review before immigrating. A substitute bill proposed a system within the United States to detect, question, and deport immigrants accused of anarchism. Both died in committee.

Immigration Act of 1924

The Immigration Act of 1924, or Johnson–Reed Act, including the National Origins Act, and Asian Exclusion Act (Pub.L. 68–139, 43 Stat. 153, enacted May 26, 1924), was a United States federal law that limited the annual number of immigrants who could be admitted from any country to 2% of the number of people from that country who were already living in the United States in 1890, down from the 3% cap set by the Immigration Restriction Act of 1921, according to the Census of 1890. It superseded the 1921 Emergency Quota Act. The law was primarily aimed at further restricting immigration of Southern Europeans and Eastern Europeans. In addition, it severely restricted the immigration of Africans and outright banned the immigration of Arabs and Asians. According to the U.S. Department of State Office of the Historian the purpose of the act was "to preserve the ideal of American homogeneity". But though the Act aimed at preserving American racial homogeneity, it set no limits on immigration from Latin American countries.Congressional opposition was minimal.

Immigration Act of 1990

The Immigration Act of 1990 (Pub.L. 101–649, 104 Stat. 4978, enacted November 29, 1990) was signed into law by George H. W. Bush on November 29, 1990. It was first introduced by Senator Ted Kennedy in 1989. It was a national reform of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965. It increased total, overall immigration to allow 700,000 immigrants to come to the U.S. per year for the fiscal years '92–'94, and 675,000 per year after that. It provided family based immigration visa, created five distinct employment based visas, categorized by occupation, as well as the diversity visa program which created a lottery to admit immigrants from "low admittance" countries or countries where their citizenry was underrepresented in the U.S.

Besides these immigrant visas there was also changes in nonimmigrant visas like the H-1B visa for highly skilled workers. There were also cutbacks in the allotment of visas available for extended relatives. The Temporary protected status visa was also created where Congress established a procedure by which the Attorney General may provide TPS to immigrants in the United States who are temporarily unable to safely return to their home country because of ongoing armed conflict, an environmental disaster, or other extraordinary and temporary condition. It specifically benefited citizens of El Salvador.

Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965

The Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 (Pub.L. 89–236, 79 Stat. 911, enacted June 30, 1968), also known as the Hart–Celler Act, abolished the National Origins Formula, which had been in place in the United States since the Emergency Quota Act of 1921. Representative Emanuel Celler of New York proposed it, Senator Philip Hart of Michigan co-sponsored it, and Senator Ted Kennedy of Massachusetts strongly promoted it.

The Hart-Celler Act abolished the quota system based on national origins that had been American immigration policy since the 1920s. The new law replaced the quota system with a preference system that focused on immigrants' skills and family relationships with citizens or US residents. The bill set numerical restrictions on visas at 170,000 per year, with a per-country-of-origin quota, not including immediate relatives of US citizens or "special immigrants" (including those born in "independent" nations in the Western Hemisphere, former citizens, ministers, and employees of the US government abroad).