“Unwanted: Immigration and Nativism in America” by Peter Schrag (pp. 7-10)
How were the 1980s, 1990s and 2000s similar to previous historical periods when the United States experienced large waves of immigration. What are some of the takeaways of this article?
The 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s had the same problems previous historical periods had. It was basically as though history repeated itself later on in the century. Both time periods had times of mass deportation and significant anti-immigration movements that were detrimental to the immigrants in their respective communities. One thing that I liked about the article was that it continued to bring up the fact that America is famously a nation of immigrants and that everyone came from somewhere, but the minority came from here. This contradicting statement of fact clashing with the article’s evidence of anti-immigration makes for a very interesting article.
The article, “Unwanted: Immigration and Nativism in America”, addresses the bigotry that is apparent in the minds of U.S. citizens. The 1980s, 1990s and 2000s have experienced events similar to historical occurrences regarding immigration issues. The booming population “brought great waves of new faces” (7) into the United States. Many new races entered America; specifically Latino, Caribbean and Asian populations. The new surge caused immigrant children to appear at “schools, public clinics, and hospital emergency rooms and on the streets” (7). Due to this, many citizens became agitated with the number of migrants in the U.S. Many people didn’t want to spend their taxes on “[educating] a bunch of illegals” (8). During the 1800s, the government created doctrines that tried to keep immigrants out of the country. Creating these laws is similar to what is occurring in the 1980s-2000s. For example, the people of California ratified Proposition 187, this proposition “denied virtually all public services, including schooling and higher education, to illegal immigrants and their children” (8). This caused Latinos to move to the Midwest and Southeast. Through this shift, Latinos found comfort with the Democrats, whom let aliens vote. Throughout these events, California became Democratically inclined.
Currently, there has been a political debate the rights migrants should receive.“69 percent of U.S. adults said that the illegal resident population should be reduced” (9). The views Americans have on aliens is a major issue that needs more coverage. The two presidential candidates, Hilary Clinton and Donald Trump, both have vastly different views on immigration reform. Their views showcases the differing opinions of the American population. Yet, it is very important that there is a positive change toward immigration reform in America. “By 2042, […] a majority of Americans will be something other than non‐Hispanic white” (11). so the U.S. needs to represent todays minorities in the best manner starting now. I think the takeaways of the article is the rich yet troubling history of discrimination in America. It’s an interesting history to read, but it is deeply disheartening as well. Unfortunately, it is still apparent current affairs, and bigotry is still a major problem facing the United States. Yet, there seems to be positive immigration reforms entering the political sphere. Hopefully this change will occur soon.
The 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s were similar to previous historical periods when the United States experienced large waves of immigration. All three decades share periods of anti-immigrant sentiment and controversial issues in regards to immigration policies. Immigrants were regarded as “nuisances and often a burden on established residents” (7) and “a bunch of illegals” (8). Additionally, laws like Arizona’s SB1070, California’s Proposition 187, and the defeat of comprehensive immigration reform in 2007, were all enacted to drive out illegal immigrants.
The takeaways from this article the extent of the measures many state and local governments took; producing their own laws and regulation, imposing of fines or losses of licenses to businesses hiring undocumented workers and/or forbidding landlords from renting to them.
the 1980’s-2000’s had the same problems when dealing with large waves of immigration. The big picture painted is that the anyone of that decent is a part of an agenda of being criminals or taking jobs. Nothing about that has changed. As with most of history and leadership, only the tactics change. During the late 1900’s, there were laws trying to be passed about alienating the immigrants from public (health) care. Whereas now the plan is to “scare them away with numbers”; numbers being the amount of people who support the hatred.
Takeaways from this article would be the article shares instances that support how America is made up of different races so everyone is essentially an immigrant. Also I like how government corruption was mentioned because that is apparent today.
The article talks a lot about what we’ve been talking about with different years having the same things happen. Xenophobia and racism that aren’t just an American thing, it’s all over the world. It was really interesting that it was talking about how America is basically a nation full of immigrants and having immigrants stay in “back houses” instead of living in big houses is discrimination. I liked how the article touched a lot about what we’ve been talking about but went more in depth with analysis and explanation so that we can learn more.