Just Finished Reading: American Immigration – A Very Short Introduction (2nd Edition) by David A Gerber (FP: 2021) [136pp] 

It is hardly controversial to say that America is built on immigration. Every man, woman and child presently living there either came from somewhere else or had ancestors who did so. For all of its more recent history, at least since its ‘discovery’ in the late-15th century, immigrants from all over the world have flocked to its shores. For a good part of this time, they were welcomed with open arms – or at least without any great restrictions. The ‘New World’ needed strong backs and productive people to populate and dominate the seemingly endless Frontier. Only in the 19th century did the government start restricting who could, and more importantly who could not, enter the USA to stay. Rather inevitably, the early bans were based on race and the colour of skin with restrictions on Chinese immigrants in California – those same immigrants who had assisted with the building of the trans-continental railway. Rather oddly after the Mexican War had added vast amounts of territory in the south and west the local Mexican population were classified as ‘white’, whilst on the east coast the seemingly endless wave of Irish immigrants were classified as ‘black’. Colour, it seemed, was more political than actual. 

For well over a century argument about immigration and immigration control into the USA have become more fractious and more polarising than ever. Quotas from non-European countries – and particularly non-northern European – have waxed and waned over the decades. Debate on the status of Jewish refugees from Russian pogroms and Nazi extermination still cast a shadow over present debates. Children of immigrants decry policies they see as too lenient on those who want the same as their ancestors, debates over pathways to citizenship and ‘illegal’ aliens erupt in government and in the media. The issue is, depending on their position, requires a simple solution or a national debate on what it means to be American. The only thing that’s certain is that the arguments around the issue are not going away any time soon. 

I learnt a lot from this short but detailed look at American Immigration. In many ways it’s a complicated and divisive subject. It has philosophical and political depth and isn’t a subject that can be easily dismissed with either a handwave or the stroke of a pen. At heart it's about identity. It’s about who you are and who THEY are. It’s also a question as old as time – or at least as old as the idea of nationhood – and is unlikely to go away as long as the nation-state exists. Informative as always and definitely recommended to anyone who has wondered where to start reading up on the subject.   

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