{"id":22892,"date":"2020-05-01T09:54:04","date_gmt":"2020-05-01T13:54:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/?p=22892"},"modified":"2020-05-01T09:54:07","modified_gmt":"2020-05-01T13:54:07","slug":"immigration-ellis-island-story-immigrationreform-com","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/2020\/05\/01\/immigration-ellis-island-story-immigrationreform-com\/","title":{"rendered":"The Inconvenient \u2014 But Highly Relevant \u2014 Truth About Ellis Island"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Anyone who has ever tried to discuss the need for immigration control with a friend or colleague has \u2013 at least once \u2013 had all of their fact-based arguments quickly dismissed by someone who spits out the most well known phrases<\/a> from the poem attached to the base of the Statue of Liberty. \u201cGive me your tired, your poor, [Y]our huddled masses\u2026\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Reciting a few lines from a historic poem isn\u2019t a counter argument. It also shows in very clear and unambiguous terms that the person reciting these lines to you has absolutely no idea what actually happened at Ellis Island.\u00a0 As a recent episode of PBS\u2019s American Experience<\/em> reveals<\/a>, Ellis Island was certainly not a welcome center for mass immigration but rather a staging area for vetting who would enter America and who would be turned around and sent back to Europe.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here are a few fast facts to\nkeep in mind about Ellis Island during the alleged \u201cGolden Age\u201d of immigration\nin the early 1900s:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

  1. New\narrivals were quickly processed by a team of doctors who only had a few seconds\nto determine the health status of each individual and whether or not they\nsuffered from one of 60 known illnesses. \nThese included tuberculosis and cholera. \n<\/li>
  2. More\nthan 120,000 immigrants were sent back home for various reasons.<\/li>
  3. More than\n3,500 immigrants died at Ellis Island awaiting approval to enter the U.S.,\nusually because they were already suffering from a chronic medical condition or\ndisease for which they were unable to receive medical attention at home.<\/li>
  4. At least\n20 percent of arrivals at Ellis Island were temporarily detained, often due to\nconcerns that they might become a public charge \u2013 someone who would become\ndependent on government handouts in order to survive.  <\/li><\/ol>\n\n\n\n

    Of course, for those who\nattempt to racialize all discussions of immigration enforcement, what actually\nhappened at Ellis Island is an inconvenient truth. Most of the migrants who\nprocessed through \u201cAmerica\u2019s Golden Doorway,\u201d were Caucasians, of European\nancestry. And European immigrants were screened, and some sent home, for many\nof the same reasons we deport people today. \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Modern immigration has\nchanged in two ways: 1) Most migrants are coming from regions other than\nEurope; and 2) the entire process has become easier on the migrants. But, if\nthere is one lesson that should be drawn from the Ellis Island experience, it\nis that the U.S. must properly screen anyone who is seeking a new life in the\nU.S. \u2013 to ensure that their admission is in the national interest of the people\nof the United States. That is an idea that is as old at the nation itself and\nit ensures that immigration works both for Americans and those who aspire to be\nAmericans. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Those who use Emma Lazarus\u2019s poem thinking that they are justifying the status quo<\/em> of mass immigration, or use the poem as a way to criticize the notion of detaining or properly screening new immigrants, are completely misrepresenting the history of U.S. immigration policy and essentially hijacking the facts. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Anyone who has ever tried to discuss the need for immigration control with a friend or colleague has \u2013 at least once \u2013 had all of their fact-based arguments quickly dismissed by someone who spits out the most well known phrases from the poem attached to the base of the Statue of Liberty. \u201cGive me<\/p>\n

    Read More<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":48,"featured_media":13252,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0},"categories":[548],"tags":[1524,873,545,902],"yst_prominent_words":[8542,8538,8535,3716,2130,3704,8537,8536,2804,1980,1963,8539,2420,2188,6412,8543,3202,8540,2981,1939],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22892"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/48"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22892"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22892\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22893,"href":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22892\/revisions\/22893"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13252"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22892"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22892"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22892"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=22892"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}