United+States+Immigration+Policy+Time+Line

A Brief Timeline of U.S. Policy on Immigration and Naturalization
Adapted from the website www.flowofhistory.org
 * 1790 || Congress adopts uniform rules so that any free white person could apply for citizenship after two years of residency. ||
 * 1798 || Alien and Sedition Acts required 14 years of residency before citizenship and provided for the deportation of "dangerous" aliens. Changed to five-year residency in 1800. ||
 * 1882 || Chinese Exclusion Act. First federal immigration law suspended Chinese immigration for 10 years and barred Chinese in U.S. from citizenship. Also barred convicts, lunatics, and others unable to care for themselves from entering. Head tax placed on immigrants. ||
 * 1885 || Contract Labor Law. Unlawful to import unskilled aliens from overseas as laborers. Regulations did not pertain to those crossing land borders. ||
 * 1888 || For the first time since 1798, provisions are adopted for expulsion of aliens. ||
 * 1892 || Ellis Island opened to screen immigrants entering on east coast. (Angel Island screened those on west coast.) Ellis Island officials reported that women traveling alone must be met by a man, or they were immediately deported. ||
 * 1903 || Anarchists, epileptics, polygamists, and beggars ruled inadmissible. ||
 * 1905 || Construction of Angel Island Immigration Station began in the area known as China Cove. Surrounded by public controversy from its inception, the station was finally put into operation in 1910. It was designed to control the flow of Chinese into the country, who were officially not welcome due to the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882. ||
 * 1906 || Procedural safeguards enacted for naturalization. Knowledge of English becomes a basic requirement. ||
 * 1917 || Immigration Act provided for literacy tests for those over 16 and established an "Asiatic Barred Zone," which barred all immigrants from Asia. ||
 * 1921 || Quota Act of 1921 limited immigrants to 3% of each nationality present in the US in 1910. This cut southern and eastern European immigrants to less than 1/4 of those in US before WW I. Asians still barred; no limits on western hemisphere. Non-quota category established: wives, children of citizens, learned professionals, and domestic servants not counted in quotas. ||
 * 1924 || Immigration Act of 1924 Quotas changed to 2% of each nationality based on numbers in US in 1890. Based on surnames and not the census figures, 82% of all immigrants allowed in the country came from western and northern Europe, 16% from southern and eastern Europe, 2% from the rest of the world. As no distinctions were made between refugees and immigrants, this limited Jewish emigres during 1930s and 40s.

Despite protests from many native people, Native Americans made citizens of the United States. Border Patrol established. ||
 * 1929 || The annual quotas of the Immigration Act of 1924 are made permanent. ||
 * 1948 || Displaced Persons Act allowed 205,000 refugees over two years; gave priority to Baltic States refugees; admitted as quota immigrants. Technical provisions discriminated against Catholics and Jews; those were dropped in 1953, and 205,000 refugees were accepted as non-quota immigrants. ||
 * 1952 || Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952 eliminated race as a bar to immigration or citizenship. Japan's quota was set at 185 annually. China's stayed at 105; other Asian countries were given 100 a piece. Northern and western Europe's quota was placed at 85% of all immigrants. Tighter restrictions were placed on immigrants coming from British colonies in order to stem the tide of black West Indians entering under Britain's generous quota. Non-quota class enlarged to include husbands of American women. ||
 * 1953 || The 1948 refugee law expanded to admit 200,000 above the existing limit ||
 * 1965 || The Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965, also known as the Hart-Celler Act, abolished national origins quotas, establishing separate ceilings for the eastern (170,000) and western (120,000) hemispheres (combined in 1978). Categories of preference based on family ties, critical skills, artistic excellence, and refugee status. ||
 * 1980 || The Refugee Act removes refugees as a preference category; reduces worldwide ceiling for immigration to 270,000. ||
 * 1986 || Immigration Reform and Control Act provided for amnesty for many illegal aliens and sanctions for employers hiring illegals. ||
 * 1990 || Immigration Act of 1990 limited unskilled workers to 10,000/year; skilled labor requirements and immediate family reunification major goals. Continued to promote nuclear family model. Foreign-born in US was 7%. ||
 * 2001 || USA Patriot Act amended the Immigration and Nationality Act to broaden the scope of aliens ineligible for admission or deportable due to terrorist activities to include an alien who: (1) is a representative of a political, social, or similar group whose political endorsement of terrorist acts undermines U.S. antiterrorist efforts; (2) has used a position of prominence to endorse terrorist activity, or to persuade others to support such activity in a way that undermines U.S. antiterrorist efforts (or the child or spouse of such an alien under specified circumstances); or (3) has been associated with a terrorist organization and intends to engage in threatening activities while in the United States. ||

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