Since America’s founding, legal immigration has been debated, enforced, contested, and redefined. It runs through our national story and will continue to do so as we pursue our nation’s second 250 years. As we consider today’s immigration policies, it would be wise to appreciate that this issue has historically stirred both aspiration and anxiety. It reflects our perpetual debate, grounded in the economic realities of a given era and the state of our nation’s political discourse during that time.
As early as our colonial times, arriving religious sects were often spurned, even by those who worshipped the same God but in a different church. Immigrants from the Old World were often ostracized by countrymen whose families had arrived generations earlier. Federal legislation periodically imposed quotas, responding to fears that newcomers would take jobs at any price and displace American workers in the factories and farms.
