Here we are, on America’s Semiquincentennial Anniversary, and the immediate thought that comes to mind is that America is what it is today, the greatest experiment in democracy in world history, and so much of it due to IMMIGRATION, from all over the world.
In the past, there was discrimination and prejudice against Irish and German immigrants in the 1840s-1850s; the Jewish and Italian and Polish immigrants in the 1870s-1920s; Asian immigration and Hispanic immigration through most of American history; and Middle Eastern and African immigrants in recent decades.
But through all of the ups and downs of immigration history, it was such immigrants of all stripes and backgrounds who contributed mightily to American progress, and made the nation a better place.
We live in a time of overt racism and nativism, but the nation will, over time, get past this.
When one studies the history of immigration, one finds a primarily “welcoming” attitude overall by Presidents of all political persuasions until the 1880s-1890s; again in the 1920s and early 1930s; and again since the rise of Donald Trump.
The Presidents most negative toward immigration include:
Chester Alan Arthur, Grover Cleveland, Benjamin Harrison, William McKinley, William Howard Taft, Woodrow Wilson, Warren G. Harding, Calvin Coolidge, Herbert Hoover, Dwight D. Eisenhower, and Donald Trump.
Notice with the exception of Grover Cleveland and Woodrow Wilson (who were Democrats), all of the remaining 9 nativist Presidents were Republicans.
At the same time, Republicans, such as Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, Ronald Reagan, George H. W. Bush, and George W. Bush were very open minded and tolerant on immigration.
While immigration is a negative right now under Donald Trump, one can be quite assured that in the long run, the role and contributions of immigrants will, once again, triumph in the post Donald Trump years.