Results found: 1

Search results

Sort By:

Limit search:

AMERICAN ANTI-IMMIGRATION LEGISLATION OF 1921 AND ITS EFFECT ON THE EUROPEAN JEWRY

100%

Wordliczek R.

Studia Historyczne

2006

vol. 49

issue 1(193)

27-39

The article examines the reasons of the adoption of tough anti-immigration laws by the American Congress in 1921. The new legislation was intended to curb the influx of migrants, which continued at extraordinarily high levels for the first two decades of the 20th century. Contemporary political leaders had been keenly aware of the problem of uncontrolled migration (one of its main streams were Jews from Eastern Europe) and offered various ways of solving it. It seems that fears of competition destabilizing the labour market and of a swelling army of the unemployed made the idea of bringing in some restrictive legislation fairly popular. Most Americans, not just the politicians, believed that poverty and Europe's dramatic economic situation In the aftermath of the war would drive millions of East European Jews to America. Another argument in favour of the restrictions drew on the common association of Jews with communism. Jews, it was pointed out, were at the head of the Bolshevik revolution in Russia. Thus the Jewish factor was an important element in the adoption of the Quota laws of 1921. The article surveys the attitude of the American Jews to the proposed bill and their reaction to it once it became law. On the whole they had pleaded for a more lenient formulation of its clauses, and, notwithstanding the outcome, continued to assist the Jewish new arrivals in America. The article also notes the impact which the radical reduction of the number of immigrants to America had on the European Jews. The Dillingham Act of 1921 practically closed America's door to the great masses of European Jews, who had to fare an increasingly virulent antisemitism without much hope of a safe haven in the new continent.

Refine search results

1 Studia Historyczne

1 Wordliczek R.

1 2006

Search results

AMERICAN ANTI-IMMIGRATION LEGISLATION OF 1921 AND ITS EFFECT ON THE EUROPEAN JEWRY