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This was the first law to define eligibility for citizenship by naturalization and establish standards and procedures by which immigrants became US citizens. In this early version, Congress limited this important right to "free white persons". -
Congress enacted deportation laws targeting persons deemed political threats to the US in response to conflicts in Europe. -
(1803 effective 1808) - The Haitian revolution led Congress to ban immigration by free blacks to contain anti-slavery campaigners. -
During the presidency of Andrew Jackson, this law authorized the confiscation of land from Native Americans and provided resources for their forced removal west of the Mississippi river. -
In the settlement of the Mexican-American war, this treaty formalized the US annexation of a major portion of northern Mexico, El Norte, and conferred citizenship on Mexicans choosing to remain in the territory. -
The Supreme Court designates the authority to legislate and to enforce immigration restrictions a matter of federal authority rather than a state or local power. -
This Supreme Court ruling established that slaves and free African Americans were not citizens of the US and were not entitled to the rights and privileges of citizenship, such as the right to sue in federal courts. -
This law passed during the Civil War, was to encourage the migration of citizens who had never "bore arms" against the government westward. About 160 acres of land were granted to the adult heads of families for the small price of $1.25 an acre. This government move saw many citizens and immigrants move westward in the name of expansion. -
This law legalized labor recruitment practices similar to indentured servitude in an attempt to encourage immigration to the US, but it was quickly repealed. -
Negotiated during construction of the Transcontinental Railroad which relied heavily on Chinese labor, this international agreement secured US access to Chinese workers by guaranteeing rights of free migration to both Chinese and Americans. -
Ratified in 1868 to secure equal treatment for African Americans after the Civil War, the 14th Amendment guaranteed birthright citizenship for all persons born in the US. It also provided for equal protections and due process for all legal residents. -
This Supreme Court decision affirmed that the federal government holds sole authority to regulate immigration. -
This treaty updated the 1868 Burlingame Treaty with China, allowing the US to restrict the migration of certain categories of Chinese workers. It moved US immigration policy closer to outright Chinese exclusion. The Chinese Exclusion Act - This law was a major shift in US immigration policy toward growing restrictiveness. The law targeted Chinese immigrants for restriction the first such group identified by race and class for severely limited legal entry and ineligibility for citizenship. -
The Supreme Court ruled that the 14th Amendment did not apply to Native Americans who did not automatically gain citizenship by birth and could therefore be denied the right to vote. -
Congress extended domestic authority over immigration to improve enforcement of the Chinese exclusion laws. It abolished one of the exempt statuses, returning laborers, stranding about 20,000 Chinese holding Certificates of Return outside the US. -
This marked the opening of Ellis Island, a port of entry for all immigrants coming to the U.S through the New York Harbor. Its purpose was to screen immigrants. It was here that names were recorded, inspections made, and people waited until they were cleared for entry to the country. Anyone fitting the description of an undesirable was held at the island and denied entry. Over 12 million people entered the United States through this port between 1892-1924. -
Rather than enacting racially discriminatory and offensive immigration laws. President Theodore Roosevelt sought to avoid offending the rising world power of Japan through this negotiated agreement by which the Japanese government limited the immigration. -
This act enacted US citizenship for Puerto Ricans after the US acquired the island as an incorporated territory -
After women gained suffrage with the 19th Amendment in 1920, Congress swiftly enacted this law to restore citizenship to US born women who had married non-citizen husbands and thereby lost their citizenship under the Expatriation Act of 1907. -
The law stipulated that all Native Americans born in the US were automatically citizens by birth. Native Americans were the last main group to gain this right set forth in the 14th Amendment. -
Completing the racial exclusion of Asians, Congress imposed immigration restriction on Filipinos by granting the Philippines eventual independence. Previously, Filipinos could immigrate freely as US nationals from a colony of the US. -
In contrast to widespread public and political indifference before World War II, after the war, under pressure from the White House and Department of State, Congress authorized admissions for refugees from Europe and permitted asylum seekers already in the United States to regularize their status. This temporary bill provided for admission of 200,000 displaced persons and attempted to favor Catholic and Protestant refugees over Jewish ones by enacting preferences for agricultural workers. -
The McCarran-Walter Act reformed some of the obvious discriminatory provisions in immigration law. While the law provided quotas for all nations and ended racial restrictions on citizenship, if expanded immigration enforcement and retained offensive national origins. -
This law set the main principles for immigration regulation still enforced today. It applied a system of preferences for family reunification (75%), employment (20%), and refugees (5%), and for the first time capped immigration from within. -
An Act to amend the Immigration and Nationality Act to revise the procedures for the admission of refugees, to amend the Migration and Refugee Assistance Act of 1962 to establish a more uniform basis for the provision of assistance to refugees, and for other purposes. -
This was a case in which the Supreme Court of the US struck down both a state statute denying funding for education of undocumented immigrant children in the US and a municipal school district's attempt to charge an annual $1,000 tuition fee for each student to compensate for lost state funding. -
This act was made in an effort to revise previous immigration laws that prohibited naturalization of citizens as well as influx of immigrants. The significance of this one act is small, but in the grand scheme it signifies that the U.S is on a road for change and better acceptance of those they previously spurned. It also gave those that were in the U.S. illegally the chance to gain citizenship under the new requirements. -
The Immigration Act of 1990 (Pub.L. 101–649, 104 Stat. 4978, enacted November 29, 1990) was signed into law by George H. W. Bush on November 29, 1990. It was first introduced by Senator Ted Kennedy in 1989. It was a national reform of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965. It increased total, overall immigration to allow 700,000 immigrants to come to the U.S. per year for the fiscal years 1992–94, and 675,000 per year after that. -
Under the Haitian Refugee Immigration Fairness Act (HRIFA), enacted by Congress on October 21, 1998, certain Haitian nationals who had been residing in the US could become legal permanent residents. -
Arizona has made waves with the latest in immigration reform. SB1070 bill introduced in 2010 set new requirement for the State of Arizona in regards to illegal aliens. It essentially allowed law enforcement individuals the ability to request proof of citizenship and residency if given probable cause. This caused a large debate on racial profiling, and was even taken to the Supreme Court. -
Trying to cope with the long-term residence of millions of unauthorized immigrants, this executive order provided protection from deportation and work authorization to persons who arrived as minor children and had live in the US since June 15. -
This executive order issued by the Obama White House sought to defer deportation and some other protections for unauthorized immigrants whose children were either American citizens or lawful permanent residents. -
The "Muslim Ban" refers to a series of the Trump administrations executive orders that prohibited travel and refugee resettlement from select predominately Muslim countries. After several legal challenges, the Supreme Court upheld most provisions of a third version of the ban.