From Melting Pot To Salad Bowl
The earlier immigrants to American consisted mainly of Northern Europeans. However, during the 1870s, a flood of immigrants, arriving from Southern and Eastern Europe, gushed into the already overcrowded metropolises. Many immigrants faced the dual problems of changing cultures and migrating from a rural life to an urban one. In addition to these difficulties, the new immigrants often faced prejudice from nativist Americans.
"New Immigration": They were a new group of immigrants coming into the United States that consisted of Italians, Slavs, Greeks, Jews, and Armenians. They came from both Southern and Eastern Europe, and also from the Middle East. In the 1890s, their numbers first began to increase, and the numbers continued to increase for the next three decades. Most of the immigrants came from peasant and poor backgrounds and boosted America’s foreign-born population by 18 million. They were often discriminated against.
"Old Immigration": This Term applies to those migrating from Western and Eastern Europe. They were the largest group of immigrants that migrated to the United States. The largest group of approximately three million, came from Germany in the 1840s and 1850s. Next came the British, Scottish, and Welsh immigrants, which totaled 2 million. In addition, one and a half million traveled over from Ireland. All of these immigrants came over in search of jobs and of new economic opportunities.
Literacy tests: Passed by Congress in 1917in order to restrict immigration, the law enlarged the group of immigrants that could be excluded from the United States. Literacy tests were imposed on all immigrants, and any immigrant who could not pass the tests was not allowed entry into the U.S.
Chinese Exclusion Law, 1882: Passed by Congress, it was one of three laws that attempted to solve the increasing immigration problem. There had also been increasing labor violence against the Chinese. By this law, immigrants had to be examined, and all convicts, polygamists, prostitutes, anarchists, persons suffering from loathsome or contagious diseases, and persons liable to become public disturbances and problems were all excluded form the U.S.
American Protective Association: Founded by Henry F. Bowers, this was a secret anti-Catholic society founded in 1887, in Clinton Iowa. The panic of 1893 greatly increased its membership, and it supported the Republican Party until it split over the question of whether or not to support William McKinley. It died in 1911.
