"My Ancestors Came Here Legally"

Oh really?

They say it often. MAGA supporters of Trump’s brutal crackdown on anyone who “looks like an illegal immigrant” will predictably say “but my ancestors came here legally”. Let’s be honest, unless you are a native American or a descendent of native Americans, you are an immigrant or descended from immigrants. What exactly is the history of immigration regulation in the US?

Immigration laws in the 1800s were minimal at the beginning of the century but became increasingly restrictive and formalized as the century progressed. Here's a breakdown by period and key developments:

Early 1800s: Open Immigration

• Few restrictions: The U.S. had virtually no federal immigration laws. Most immigrants—mainly from Northern and Western Europe—entered freely.

• Naturalization Act of 1790: Allowed "free white persons" to become citizens after two years of residence (extended to five years in 1795). It explicitly excluded nonwhites, enslaved people, and Native Americans.

• Immigration was largely managed at the state and local level, with no federal immigration bureaucracy.

• The only immigrants who did not enter freely were the millions of Aftrican slaves who were brought in shackles

Mid-1800s: First Backlash and Beginnings of Regulation

• Large influx: Irish, German, and Chinese immigrants began arriving in large numbers due to famine, political unrest, and economic opportunity.

• Nativist reaction: The rise of anti-immigrant sentiment, especially toward Irish Catholics and the Chinese, fueled early calls for restriction.

• Know-Nothing Party (1850s): A political movement that opposed immigration and sought to extend the naturalization period to 21 years.

Late 1800s: Formal Federal Restrictions Begin

• Page Act of 1875: First federal immigration law. It barred the entry of Chinese women suspected of prostitution and other "undesirable" individuals (including convicts).

• Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882:

  • First major federal restriction on a specific nationality.

  • Barred nearly all immigration from China and prohibited Chinese nationals from becoming U.S. citizens.

• Immigration Act of 1882:

  • Imposed a head tax on each immigrant.

  • Excluded "lunatics," "idiots," and those "likely to become a public charge."

• Ellis Island opens (1892): The federal government centralized immigration processing, inspection, and detention.

Throughout U.S. history, immigration laws have often reflected racial, ethnic, and religious prejudices of the time. Some ethnic groups have been explicitly targeted for exclusion or restriction, while others were favored or largely unaffected. Here's a breakdown:

Ethnic Groups Historically Targeted by U.S. Immigration Regulation

1. Chinese

• Chinese Exclusion Act (1882): First law to explicitly ban immigration based on ethnicity.

• Renewed and expanded repeatedly (e.g., Geary Act of 1892), eventually making it almost impossible for Chinese immigrants to enter or gain citizenship.

2. Other Asian Groups

• Japanese:

  • Gentlemen’s Agreement (1907) limited Japanese laborers.

  • Immigration Act of 1924 banned all immigration from Japan.

• South Asians (Indians):

  • Targeted by Asiatic Barred Zone Act (1917).

• Filipinos:

  • Restricted after U.S. granted Philippine independence (Tydings–McDuffie Act, 1934).

3. Eastern and Southern Europeans

• Viewed as racially and culturally "inferior" compared to Northern/Western Europeans.

• National Origins Act (1924) imposed strict quotas favoring Northern Europeans, heavily limiting Italians, Poles, Russians, Greeks, Jews, and others.

• Motivated by fears of anarchism, Catholicism, and "foreign ideologies."

4. Jews

• Though not always targeted by name, Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe were severely restricted under national origin quotas.

• Turned away during the Holocaust due to strict quotas and antisemitic attitudes in U.S. government.

5. Mexicans and Other Latin Americans

• While large-scale immigration was sometimes tolerated for labor, there were also targeted deportations:

  • Mexican Repatriation (1930s): ~400,000–1,000,000 people deported or pressured to leave, many of them U.S. citizens.

  • Operation Wetback (1954): Mass deportation of Mexican immigrants, including citizens and legal residents.

• Quotas added in 1965 to limit Latin American immigration for the first time.

6. Middle Easterners and Muslims

• Post-9/11 policies led to surveillance, visa restrictions, and detentions.

• Countries like Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen targeted under the Trump-era travel ban (2017).

Ethnic Groups Generally Not Targeted (or Favored)

Northern and Western Europeans

• British, Germans, Scandinavians, Dutch:

  • Considered racially desirable.

  • Quotas in 1924 law heavily favored these groups.

  • Many early settlers came from these regions, forming the ethnic majority.

Canadians

• Historically low scrutiny.

• Shared cultural/language ties with the U.S.

• White Canadians faced few restrictions, although French-Canadians and Indigenous peoples sometimes faced informal bias.

White Australians and New Zealanders

• Also seen as part of the Anglo-American sphere.

• Minimal restriction historically.

If you are a white immigrant of northern European origin or descended from one, congratualtions, you or your ancestors were viewed as desireable and treated differently. The fact is, there was no regulation of immigration until the mid to late 1800s and since then immigration rules have been applied selectively to facilitate immigration of “desireable” white people and and restrict immigration of “undesireable” people. Nothing has changed. Trump is targeting Latinos and rounding them up whether undocumented or not, beating them up in the process, denying their rights, holding them in unfit, cruel and inhumane conditions and shipping them off to prisons in other countries where they have been tortured. Meanwhile, white Afrikaaners are being welcome. Your northern Europen white Protestant ancestors got the welcome mat while generations of others were denied entry. If you can’t see the racism in this, then you are a racist.

The next time someone of white northern European ancestry says “but my ancestors came here legally” you will have an answer for them.