Filipino Immigration In The 1920s

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The 1920s ended the greatest wave of immigration in American History because of the immigration restriction acts of 1921 and 1924 (Shmoop Editorial Team). Immigration from the Philippines to the United States was not restricted. The Philippines was considered United States territory during this time, so traveling to and from the United States was easy (Dela Cruz and Agbayani-Siewart). Farmers of California and canning factories in Alaska began enrolling Filipino workers to meet the need of labor. In 1920, around 5,600 Filipinos lived on the West Coast of the United States, and by 1930, around 45,400 Filipinos lived on the West Coast. In California, Oregon, and Washington, Filipino migrant workers contributed much of the seasonal labor for fruit and vegetable farms. The West Coast of the United States was not the only ones who were recruiting Filipinos but Hawaii, too. Many Filipino agricultural workers’ destination was Hawaii. The peoples of the Philippines speak many different languages such as Tagalog, Ilocano, and Visayan. The different languages spoken by the Filipino immigrants helped the Hawaiian planters to avoid the problems they experienced with the Japanese. The Hawaiian planters made sure to recruit workers from different regions of the Philippines and limited communication between the Filipino workers. Between 1909 and 1914, about 4,ooo Filipinos immigrated to Hawaii each year. In 1915, the Philippine legislature passed laws controlling the recruitment of Filipinos. The numbers picked up again in 1920. Half of all the plantation workers in Hawaii were Filipinos in 1925, and by the early 1930s, Filipinos made up …show more content…

Even though Filipino immigration started before the 1920s, the numbers of Filipinos immigrating to the Unites States rose quickly during the ‘20s. None of the immigration restriction acts included the Philippines, so it caused Filipino immigration to

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