The Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 (Hart-Cellar Act, INS, Act of 1965, Pub.L. 89-236)[1] abolished the National Origins Formula that had been in place in the United States since the Immigration Act of 1924. It was proposed by United States Representative Emanuel Celler of New York, co-sponsored by United States Senator Philip Hart of Michigan and heavily supported by United States Senator Ted Kennedy of Massachusetts.
The Hart-Celler Act abolished the national origins quota system that was American immigration policy since the 1920s, replacing it with a preference system that focused on immigrants' skills and family relationships with citizens or U.S. residents. Numerical restrictions on visas were set at 170,000 per year, with a per-country-of-origin quota, not including immediate relatives of U.S. citizens, nor "special immigrants" (including those born in "independent" nations in the Western hemisphere; former citizens; ministers; employees of the U.S. government abroad).[1]
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Background
The 1965 act marked a radical break from the immigration policies of the past. The law as it stood then excluded Asians and Africans and preferred northern and western Europeans over southern and eastern ones. At the height of the civil rights movement of the 1960s the law was seen as an embarrassment by, among others, President John F. Kennedy, who called the then-quota-system "nearly intolerable". After Kennedy's assassination, President Lyndon Johnson signed the bill at the foot of the Statue of Liberty as a symbolic gesture.
In order to convince the American populace - the majority of whom were opposed to the act - of the legislation's merits, its liberal proponents assured that passage would not influence America's culture significantly. President Johnson called the bill "not revolutionary", Secretary of State Dean Rusk estimated only a few thousand Indian immigrants over the next five years, and other politicians, including Edward Kennedy, hastened to reassure the populace that the demographic mix would not be affected; these assertions would later prove wildly inaccurate.[2]
Congressional consideration
The House of Representatives voted 326 to 70 (82.5%) in favor of the act, while the Senate passed the bill by a vote of 76 to 18. In the senate, 52 Democrats voted yes, 14 no, and 1 abstained. Of the Republicans 24 voted yes, 3 voted no, and 1 abstained. Most of the no votes were from the southern belt, then strongly Democratic.[3] On October 3, 1965, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the legislation into law, saying "This [old] system violates the basic principle of American democracy, the principle that values and rewards each man on the basis of his merit as a man. It has been un-American in the highest sense, because it has been untrue to the faith that brought thousands to these shores even before we were a country".[4]
Long-term results
Immigration did change America's demographics, opening the doors to immigrants from Mediterranean Europe, Latin America and Asia. By the 1990s, America's population growth was more than one-third driven by legal immigration, as opposed to one-tenth before the act. Ethnic and racial minorities, as defined by the Census bureau, rose from 25 percent in 1990 to 30% in 2000. Per the 2000 census, roughly 11.1% of Americans were foreign-born, a major increase from the low of 4.7 percent in 1970. A third of the foreign-born were from Latin America and a fourth from Asia. The act increased illegal immigration from Latin America, especially Mexico, since the unlimited legal 'bracero' system previously in-place was cut.
The waves of immigration has raised both possibilities and problems. Many immigrants have taken advantage of the abundance of opportunities in the US, although some immigrant groups continue to face major challenges. For example, Asian Indians in the U.S. have a higher average income and lower poverty rate than the national average while Vietnamese Americans (mostly from refugee backgrounds) have median earnings less than the national average and a higher poverty rate[5]. Asians and Pacific Islanders constituted one-fifth of the students in California's public universities by 2000. Immigration helped stimulate the sunbelt boom. The problems have centered on questions of multicultural identity as opposed to the melting-pot idea, debates on the economic impact of immigration, impact of illegal immigration, and fears of becoming a polyglot nation with English not the primary language.[6]
As a result of these changes in legal immigration among other factors, America is expected to have less than 50 percent non-Hispanic whites in the total population by the year 2042.[7]
See also
- History of laws concerning immigration and naturalization in the United States
- Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952
- Luce–Celler Act of 1946
References
- ^ a b Sarah Starkweather. "US immigration legislation online". University of Washington, Bothell Library. http://library.uwb.edu/guides/usimmigration/1965_immigration_and_nationality_act.html. Retrieved January 1, 2012.
- ^ Jennifer Ludden. "1965 immigration law changed face of America". NPR. http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5391395.
- ^ Keith Poole. "Senate Vote #23 (Sep 22, 1965)". Civic Impulse, LLC. http://www.govtrack.us/congress/vote.xpd?vote=s1965-232.
- ^ "Remarks at the Signing of the Immigration Bill, Liberty Island, New York". October 3, 1965. http://www.lbjlib.utexas.edu/Johnson/archives.hom/speeches.hom/651003.asp. Retrieved January 1, 2012.
- ^ U.S. Census Bureau (December 2004). [http"//www.census.gov/prod/2004pubs/censr-17.pdf "We the People:Asians in the United States"]. http"//www.census.gov/prod/2004pubs/censr-17.pdf. Retrieved September 10, 2012.
- ^ Institute of Portland Metropolitan Studies, Portland State University (August 2011). "Immigration & naturalization act of 1965: Origin of modern American society". http://www.upa.pdx.edu/IMS/currentprojects/TAHv3/Immigration_Act.html. Retrieved January 1, 2012.
- ^ US Will Have Minority Whites Sooner, Says Demographer (June 27, 2011), NPR.
External links
- Immigration Policy in the United States (2006), Congressional Budget office.