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Reading Guide |
9.
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Exclusion
| - | Immigration Restriction League, Publication 39, Extracts from "The Report of the Commissioner-
General of Immigration for the Year Ending June 30, 1903" |
| - | U.S. House of Representatives, Report of the Select Committee on Immigration, 1892, excerpt |
As noted above, the vast tide of immigrants that swept into this country in the late nineteenth-century engendered considerable fear among some native-born Americans. Anguish over disease, crime, filth, loss of national character, and subversion drove prominent citizens in Boston, many on the faculty of Harvard, to establish, in 1894, the Immigration Restriction League. Here we offer one of the League's publications, extracts from a 1903 report on immigration. The report calls for the exclusion of various categories of "undesirable" aliens, but the author's real argument is with the immigrants already here. He sees their concentration in the cities of the East as a threat to the nation's stability. The House Select Committee report takes up the problem on the West coast, where Chinese—not Italian, Russian, or Austrian immigrants—are the source of native discontent. 6 pages.
Discussion questions
- Compare the immigration commissioner's portrayal of immigrants with Riis's portrayal of the inhabitants of the Bend.
- What distinctions does the commissioner make among immigrants?
- How do both documents interpret past immigration?
- Compare the perceived threats that European and Chinese immigrants pose to the nation. What might account for the differences?
- Compare the ways in which the two reports propose to deal with immigrants already living in the United States. What might account for the differences?
- Compare Lee Chew's story to the House report's portrayal of Chinese immigrants.
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Topic Framing Questions
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How was the American cultural mainstream defined at this time? |
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What messages and strategies of socialization did the government and other culture brokers extend to immigrants, African Americans, and Native Americans during this period? |
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What benefits and costs for these groups were associated with a strategy of assimilation?
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How did the city function as a site of assimilation?
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