Immigration in the United States

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Immigration is what has made America what it is today. An immigrant is a person who comes to a country to take up permanent residence. Everyone in the United States of America is an immigrant either moving here themselves or being directly related to someone who did. All of us came from different parts of the world even as far back as the Native Americans when they emigrated from Asia to the United States. Immigration is needed to grow America with new cultures and ideas. Immigration is a necessity, but the way its being controlled now is not functioning well because we are not fair in choosing the citizens we allow in, thus making illegal immigration rise. An important man in history by the name of Christopher Columbus immigrated to America in 1492. “He landed somewhere in the Caribbean, marking the first encounter of Europeans with the New World” (Purcell 139). Almost a hundred years later Sir Walter Raleigh sent ships over to America to explore and eventually established “Virginia”. Since then, more and more explorers came to America and “marked their territory” as their own. Some important immigration stories were of black African slaves and the people on the Mayflower landing in Plymouth and making that their home. In 1921 congress passed the first comprehensive immigration restriction law. “This law set a limit on the total immigration and imposing a quota system based on the nations of origin” (Purcell 140). About nine years later a four-year period of negative immigration begins causing more immigrants to leave America than come to America. Another nine years later and almost all immigration were stopped because of World War II. The Immigration and Naturalization Act of 1965 brought in a new era of the Immigration pol... ... middle of paper ... .... Web. 26 Nov. 2013. "The Benefits of Commonsense Immigration Reform." White House. N.p., n.d. Web. 24 Nov. 2013. . Bass, Frank. "Second-Generation Immigrants Overtaking U.S. Population Success."Bloomberg.com. Bloomberg, 07 Feb. 2013. Web. 28 Nov. 2013. . Simon, Julian L. "Journal of Libertarian Studies." ARE THERE GROUNDS FOR LIMITING IMMIGRATION? (1998): 137-52. Center for Libertarian Studies. Web. 29 Nov. 2013. . Bouvier, Leon F. "Embracing America: A Look at Which Immigrants Become Citizens | Center for Immigration Studies." Center for Immigration Studies. N.p., July 1996. Web. 01 Dec. 2013. .

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