Debating Immigration Restriction: The
Ellis Island Era
In this activity, you will consider arguments for and against unrestricted immigration during the Ellis Island era. Students
analyze political cartoons, letters, newspaper articles, posters, and other sources, noting evidence in the documents to support
the viewpoints of the various figures in the 1903 cartoon "The Immigrant."
Essential Question:

What were the different viewpoints for and against immigration restriction during the early 20th
century?
Instructions
1. Step 1: Please look at the projection of the cartoon "The Immigrant." Focus on the immigrant and his
wife, his luggage, and the ships in the background. Discussion:
 Who is he?
 Where is he coming from?



Where might he be going?
What are his motivations for coming to the U.S.?
For the rest of the slides –
o What do they look like?
o What does their sign read?,
o What perspective does each represents?
2. Step 2: Divide into groups of 6. Each group member should choose one of six characters in the cartoon
to focus on and use that worksheet to analyze the evidence. All students should receive the other
documents. You should read all of the documents and find quotes/evidence supporting that character's
viewpoint and cite it on their worksheets.
3. Step 3: Each student pick a partner with a character who represents the opposite viewpoint. The pair of
students will write a dialogue between their two characters. One character writes a sentence that begins
one of two ways, depending on the point of view:
 I think immigration should be restricted because...
 I do not think immigration should be restricted because...
o You complete the sentences using an argument your characters would make
and evidence from the documents. You should pass the paper back and forth,
writing sentences responding to each other's points, using arguments and
evidence from the document.
"The Immigrant"
This 1903 cartoon presents the different perspectives that Americans had about the large number of immigrants entering the
U.S. at the beginning of the twentieth century. It appeared in Judge magazine, which used humorous illustrations and short
essays to comment on current events.
The Immigrant. Is he an acquisition or a detriment?
SOURCE | F. Victor Gillam, "The Immigrant," chromolithograph, Judge, 19 September 1903; from Library of Congress, Prints and
Photographs division; http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/cph.3g03659.
CREATOR | F. Victor Gillam
ITEM TYPE | Cartoon
"The Inevitable Result to the American
Workingman of Unrestricted Immigration"
This cartoon, published in the weekly humor magazine Judge around 1890, presents a vision of what large numbers of poor
immigrants, willing to work for low wages, might do to American workers and their families.
SOURCE | F. Victor Gillam, "The Inevitable Result to the American Workingman of Unrestricted Immigration," chromolithograph, Judge, c. 1890.
CREATOR | F. Victor Gillam
ITEM TYPE | Cartoon
Graph of Immigration and Business Conditions,
1880-1910
This chart compares the growth of the U.S. industrial economy with the arrival of immigrants. Coal was important to the
growth of the economy because coal-powered factories produced other important industrial goods like steel (and steel output of
grew by 700% in the same period). “Bank clearings” refers to bank transactions, and railway freight refers to how many tons
of goods were transported by train. Economists from that time period viewed high bank clearings and high freight tonnage as
evidence of a healthy economy.
SOURCE | Isaac Aaronovitch Hourwich, Immigration and Labor: The Economic Aspects of European Immigration to the United States (New
York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1912), 87.
CREATOR | Isaac Aaronovitch Hourwich
ITEM TYPE | Quantitative Data
Americans All! Victory Liberty Loan
During World War I, the U.S. government needed to raise money to pay for the soldiers, tanks, airplanes, and other equipment
it needed to fight the war. To do this, it sold war bonds, which citizens could buy and then be paid back after the war. This
poster tried to convince Americans that it was their patriotic duty to buy war bonds by listing names from many different
nationalities on the Honor Roll, reflecting the fact that soldiers from all different immigrant groups had fought and died in the
war.
SOURCE | Howard Chandler Christy, Americans All! Victory Liberty Loan, circa 1919, (Boston: Forbes); Prints and Photographs Division,
Library of Congress, http://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/97520325/.
CREATOR | Howard Chandler Christy
ITEM TYPE | Poster/Print
“The High Tide of Immigration—A National
Menace”
This cartoon appeared in the weekly humor magazine Judge in 1903. It reflects the alarm among some Americans at the
growing number of immigrants from countries in Southern and Eastern Europe (such as Italy, Russia, and Austria-Hungary)
and the declining number of immigrants from countries in Northern and Western Europe (such as Ireland and Germany).
SOURCE | Louis Dalrymple, “The High Tide of Immigration—A National Menace,” Judge Magazine, August 22, 1903, OSUCGA – The Ohio
State University Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum, https://cartoonimages.osu.edu/MbVmUnGXa.
CREATOR | Louis Dalrymple
RIGHTS | Used by permission of The Ohio State University Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum.
ITEM TYPE | Cartoon
A Doctor Decries the Public Health Danger of Immigrants
Starting in the 1890s, many Americans feared that the arrival of large numbers of immigrants from countries in
Eastern and Southern Europe was bad for society. They claimed that immigrants could not easily assimilate, or fit
in, and that they were willing to work for very low wages. Some people also believed that these immigrants brought
diseases with them and were a threat to public health. Doctors inspected immigrants entering the U.S. through
Ellis Island for specific diseases, such as tuberculosis and trachoma (an eye disease). The doctor who wrote this
article, however, believed that this was not enough to protect the public from immigrants.
Thousands of immigrants of poor physique are recorded as such by the
medical inspectors at Ellis Island, and a card to this effect sent to the registry
clerk or immigrant inspector with the immigrant, but this mere note of
physical defect carries little significance under the present law, and the vast
majority of them are admitted by the immigration authorities, because it does
not appear that the physical defect noted will make the immigrant a public
charge. . . .
The real danger to the public health from immigration lies in that class of
immigrants whose physique is much below American standards, whose
employment is in the sweat-shop, and whose residence is the East Side
tenement in New York City. The Mediterranean races, Syrians, Greeks and
southern Italians, who are unused to a cold climate, and who often have
insufficient clothing, also establish in their crowded quarters splendid
[centers] for the dissemination of disease. The Hebrews, Syrians, Greeks, and
southern Italians invariably crowd the most insanitary quarters of the great
centers of population. And the various filthy and infected, though perhaps
picturesque, foreign quarters constitute to-day the greatest existing menace
to the public health.
Vocabulary
Physique : body type
Registry clerk :
government official
Physical defect :
weakness, flaw
P ublic charge : a
person who can’t work
and needs government
aid to survive
Quarters :
neighborhoods
Dissemination :
spread
Insanitary : dirty,
unhealthy
Picturesque : quaint,
old- fashioned
Source: Dr. Allan McLaughlin, “Immigration and the Public Health,” Popular Science (January 1904), 232, 236-237.
The Wall Street Journal Argues for Immigration "Distribution, Not Prevention"
This Wall St. Journal article acknowledges some of the problems that accompanied early-twentieth
century immigration—urban overcrowding, the strain on local resources, threats posed by foreign
anarchists—but argues that immigrants should be encouraged to settle outside of U.S. cities and
provide needed labor for farms, factories, and mines.
…Many of the recent immigrants have come to this country on account of religious
persecution, and a man who will pull up stakes, abandon the place of birth, and seek a new
country, on account of his beliefs, must have within him some of the stuff of which good
American citizens can be made….
It would be far better politically, morally and industrially, if the immigration could be more
widely distributed throughout the country. There is a need of more farm laborers and less
tailors. There is need of more workers in the fields and shops and the mines and fewer street
peddlers.
Source: "Distribution, Not Prevention," Wall Street Journal, 13 April 1904, 1.
Vocabulary
Persecution: discrimination, harassment
Pull up stakes: be willing to leave
Industrially: for the economy
A Congressman Denounces Immigration Quotas as "Un-American"
Restrictions on immigration, largely aimed at would-be migrants from Southern and Eastern Europe, gained
considerable popular support during the 1920s. Anti-immigrant sentiment culminated in the Quota Act of 1921,
which effectively reduced immigration from those areas to a quarter of pre-World War I levels, and in the even
more restrictive Immigration Act of 1924. Although the later bill passed the Senate with only six dissenting votes,
not everyone was persuaded. Congressman Robert H. Clancy defended the Jewish, Italian, and Polish immigrants
that comprised much of his constituency and denounced the quota provisions of the bill as "unAmerican." In a
speech before Congress on April 8, 1924, Clancy traces the history of anti-immigrant sentiment in the U.S. and
reminds his fellow congressmen that all Americans are of foreign origin.
Forty or fifty thousand Italian-Americans live in my district in Detroit.
They are found in all walks and classes of life—common hard labor, the
trades, business, law, medicine, dentistry, art, literature, banking, and so
forth.
They rapidly become Americanized, build homes, and make themselves into
good citizens. They brought hardihood, physique, hope, and good humor
with them from their outdoor life in Sunny Italy, and they bear up under the
terrific strain of life and work in busy Detroit.
One finds them by thousands digging streets, sewers, and building
foundations, and in the automobile and iron and steel fabric factories of
various sorts. They do the hard work that the native-born American dislikes.
Rapidly they rise in life and join the so-called middle and upper classes….
Vocabulary
All walks and classes
of life: all kinds of jobs
and professions
Trades: skilled jobs
such as carpentry or
plumbing
Hardihood: toughness
Physique: body type
Bear up: endure
The Italian-Americans of Detroit played a glorious part in the Great War.
They showed themselves as patriotic as the native born in offering the
supreme sacrifice.
In all, I am informed, over 300,000 Italian-speaking soldiers enlisted in the
American Army, almost 10 percent of our total fighting force. Italians formed
about 4 percent of the population of the United States and they formed 10
percent of the American military force. Their casualties were 12 percent. . .
.
The Polish-Americans are as industrious and as frugal and as loyal to our
institutions as any class of people who have come to the shores of this
country in the past 300 years. They are essentially home builders, and they
have come to this country to stay. They learn the English language as quickly
as possible, and take pride in the rapidity with which they become
assimilated and adopt our institutions.
Source: Speech by Robert H. Clancy, 8 April 1924, Congressional Record, 68th Congress,
1st Session (Washington DC: Government Printing Office, 1924), vol. 65, 59295932.
Great War: World
War
Supreme sacrifice:
willingness to die in war
Casualties: soldiers
wounded in war
Frugal: careful about
spending money
Assimilated: made a
part of society
Our institutions:
American democracy
A Boston Union Urges Immigration Restriction
In 1896 Congress passed a bill which would require all immigrants to be able to read at least 40 words in any language
in order to enter the country. The bill was supported by the Immigration Restriction League. They worried that the
increasing number of immigrants from Italy and Eastern Europe would drive down wages and not be able to become
useful members of American society. As part of its campaign to get the literacy requirement bill passed, the League sent
out the petition below to many unions and civic organizations as a way to pressure Congress to pass the bill. President
Grover Cleveland, however, disagreed with Congress and vetoed the bill.
Source: Immigration Restriction League (U.S.); Records, 1893-1921; Series III, Scrapbook; Immigration Restriction League.
Scrapbook, 1896-1898; MS Am 2245 (1054), v. 1. Houghton Library, Harvard University.
A St. Louis Union Opposes Immigration Restriction
In 1896 Congress passed a bill which would require all immigrants to be able to read at least 40 words in any language
in order to enter the country. The bill was supported by the Immigration Restriction League. They worried that the
increasing number of immigrants from Italy and Eastern Europe would drive down wages and never become useful
members of American society. This statement by the Central Trades and Labor Union of St. Louis took the opposite view.
President Grover Cleveland vetoed the bill.
We declare that the now existing immigration laws, if properly and conscientiously carried out, suffice for
the protection of the interests of American workingmen. . . .
We declare that without the immigration of the last forty years our American Republic could never have
risen to the economic, commercial, and political level which today it occupies among the nations of the
world. . . .
We declare that the workingmen of this country, considered as a class, can not have any interest in
surrounding America with a wall, which undoubtedly would restrain the free development of true civilization
and the realization of those noble principles which have been expressed in the American declaration of
liberty. . . .
We declare that the system of industrial production for profit has brought about the present regrettable
conditions, and that it is our duty as wage workers to ascertain and remove the real causes of this misery.
Source: Immigration Restriction League (U.S.); Records, 1893-1921; Series III, Scrapbook; Immigration Restriction League.
Scrapbook, 1896-1898; MS Am 2245 (1054), v. 1. Houghton Library, Harvard University.
Debating Immigration Restriction: The Ellis Island Era Character Worksheet
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Citizen
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Debating Immigration Restriction: The Ellis Island Era Character Worksheet
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Labor Contractor
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Debating Immigration Restriction: The Ellis Island Era Character Worksheet
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Uncle Sam
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Debating Immigration Restriction: The Ellis Island Era Character Worksheet
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Health Inspector
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Debating Immigration Restriction: The Ellis Island Era Character Worksheet
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Workman
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Debating Immigration Restriction: The Ellis Island Era Character Worksheet
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Immigrant
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