IMMIGRATION

Immigration

Immigration

Between the 1850's and the 1870's more than 2 million migrants came to America every ten years. During the 1880's more than 5 million people came to live in the United States. Even in 1882 alone, 788,992 migrants arrived in America, which is more than 2,100 people per day. Immigrants that came before the 1880's were usually from the British Isles and from Western Europe, mainly Germany and Scandinavia. They were mostly Anglo Saxon and Protestant. Also many were very intelligent and had a high literacy rate. They were also used to a representative government. Many of these immigrants came to America to farm. Basically these immigrants were easily able to adapt to American life. The immigration of this time, known as old immigration, was very different from the immigration that occurred from the 1880's and later (Warikoo, 2009)

People who immigrated during the 1880's and in later time periods were known as old immigrants. These new immigrants came from southern and eastern Europe. They were Poles, Greeks, Slovaks, Croats, and Italians. Also they worshipped in synagogues or in orthodox churches. "They came from countries with little history of democratic government, where people had grown accustomed to cringing before despotism and where opportunities for advancement were few (569). The new immigrants were also illiterate and poor. Instead of coming to America to work on a farm, many of the new immigrants came to acquire industrial jobs in the cities. These people also grouped together and created "Little Italy's" and "Little Poland's" in which they live in. These areas were like little cities within a much larger city such as New York. (Warikoo, 2009)

At first the federal and state governments would not help out the immigrants. However after an amount of time, the nation began to notice the problems that were occurring with the huge numbers of immigrants. People then began to help out the new immigrants. They tried to teach them the Christian religion. Other American also set up settlement houses; the most famous was called the Hull House. Jane Addams, one of the first generation of college-educated women, created this. She bought a house in Chicago and turned it into Hull House. Here immigrants could be taught English, could be helped through adaptation process, could use the childcare services, and could participate in a cultural activity. (Warikoo, 2009)

Many Americans still believed in "anti-foreignism" or "nativism." The people who believed this were worried that the new immigrants, who had many children and quickly multiplied, would soon outnumber the Anglo-Saxon race. Soon restrictions were being placed on immigration. Also laborers were against the new immigrants; "labor leaders argued, not illogically, that if American industry was entitled to protection from foreign goods, American workers were entitled to protection from foreign laborers"

The New immigrants were basically different from the old immigrants because of where they came from. This difference in birthplaces then caused differences in religion and in language. Some Americans were welcoming toward the new immigrants, however many went strongly against ...