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This PDF is a selection from an out-of-print volume from the National Bureau
of Economic Research
Volume Title: The Regulated Economy: A Historical Approach to Political
Economy
Volume Author/Editor: Claudia Goldin and Gary D. Libecap, editors
Volume Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Volume ISBN: 0-226-30110-
Volume URL: http://www.nber.org/books/gold94-
Conference Date: May 20-21, 1993
Publication Date: January 1994
Chapter Title: The Political Economy of Immigration Restriction in the United
States, 1890 to 1921
Chapter Author: Claudia Goldin
Chapter URL: http://www.nber.org/chapters/c
Chapter pages in book: (p. 223 - 258)
7 The Political Economy of
Immigration Restriction in the
United States, 1890 to 1921
Claudia Goldin
It does not matter in the least what the favored classes of the coun-
try think about immigration; the doors of this land will never be
closed except upon the initiative and the imperative of the laboring
classes, looking to their own interests, and to the heritage of their
children.
Francis A. Walker, Discussions in Economics and Statistics
7.1 Introduction
With the passage of the Emergency Quota Act in May 1921 the era of open
immigration to the United States came to an abrupt end.' The American policy
of virtually unrestricted European immigration was transformed, almost over-
night, to a quota system that would last, virtually unchanged, until 1965. The
ultimate switch in policy is not hard to explain. The perplexing part of the
legislative history of immigration restriction is its timing. More astonishing
than the closing of the door in 1921 is that it remained open despite twenty-
five years of assault during which 17 million immigrants from among the poor-
est nations in Europe found refuge in America. This paper details the remark-
able set of events that propped the door open and the forces that eventually
slammed it shut.
Because the story of immigration restriction is a legislative one, its main
players will be representatives, senators, and presidents. But behind the legisla-
tive tale are the shifting interests of various groups. The first is organized labor,
Claudia Goldin is professor of economics at Harvard University, director of the Development of the American Economy Program of the National Bureau of Economic Research, and a research associate of the National Bureau of Economic Research. The author thanks Lisa Kao, Boris Simkovich, and Marian Valliant for providing superb re- search assistance. Helpful comments were provided by Stanley Engerman, Zadia Feliciano, Law- rence Katz, Robert Margo, Jeffrey Williamson, the members of the Harvard Economic History Workshop, and participants at the NBER-DAE conference on the Political Economy of Regula- tion, particularly the discussant, Joseph Ferrie. Shawn Kantor supplied the wage data by city for the union sample, 1907 to 1923, and Howard Rosenthal provided the congressional districts for the 1915 vote. The author thanks them both. This research has been funded by National Science Foundation grant SES-9122782. I. As 1 will argue later, the abrupt end should more accurately date with the final passage of the literacy test in 1917. since it was a simple step to move from the test to a quota.
225 The Political Economy of Immigration Restriction in the U.S., 1890 to 1921
on the wages of even skilled workers may have eventually clinched the vote
for restriction.
The chronology of immigration restriction will be detailed first. The history
is well known and has been recounted elsewhere (Higham 1955; Hutchinson
1981; Jones 1992; Taylor 1971). I then move to a more in-depth analysis of
city-level wage data by occupation and industry from 1890 to 1923 to ascertain
the possible economic bases of support.
The wage data reveal substantial negative effects of immigration for both
laborers and artisans, although the effects by industry depended on demand-
side considerations. The impact, moreover, appears to have increased from the
1890s to the early 1920s, corresponding to the rise in negative sentiment
toward open immigration in the immediate pre-World War I period. Finally,
voting in the House is linked to the strength of the wage effect and to the
proportion of the population that was foreign born. The greater the increase in
wages in particular cities, the lower was the probability that a representative
would vote for restriction. The greater the percentage foreign born in these
cities, the lower was sentiment for restriction. Once the foreign born had about
a 30 percent share of a city’s population, support overwhelmingly shifted to a
pro-immigrant stance. At lower levels of the foreign born-in the 10 to 30
percent range-the anti-immigrant position was very strong, although at still
lower levels it became weaker. The desire to restrict was, therefore, tempered
by the composition of the electorate. Increased numbers of foreign born may
have threatened the economic position of many native-born workers, as well
as many foreign-born workers. The personal interests of the foreign born in
keeping the door open dominated economic interests once the foreign born
reached some critical level in a district. But the foreign born may ultimately
have been scapegoats for unfavorable economic factors in certain local labor
markets, similar to recent experience in the United States.
7.2 The Literacy Test
7.2. I Chronology of Immigration-Restriction Legislation
The history of European immigration restriction in the United States begins
with the movement to pass the literacy test, succeeding ultimately in 1917.
Quotas and other types of blanket restrictions were not seriously considered in
the House or the Senate prior to 1920.5 Of the multitude of regulations pro-
- Immigration was restricted and regulated in various ways in addition to the literacy test and, eventually, quotas, but none was of great quantitative significance. Of most importance is that the restrictions placed on Asians will not be treated in any detail here. See, for example, Higham [1955] 1981 for a defense of limiting attention to European immigration. It should be noted, as well, that immigration from the Western Hemisphere was not restricted by the 1921, 1924, and 1929 quotas, although the literacy test was unaffected by that legislation. 5. Various influential groups, prior to the passage of the quotas, had petitioned Congress to end immigration for some period of time. The AFL in December 1918 requested that Congress curtail
226 Claudia Goldin
posed, only two could have significantly restricted immigration-the financial
and literacy tests. Only the literacy test received serious deliberation.h By the
time the literacy test finally passed, it was not as restrictive a measure as when
it was first proposed because literacy rose rapidly in Europe. Thus the quotas
of 1921, 1924, and 1929 quickly followed. The forces that prompted these
more restrictive measures were the same as those that led to the passage of the
literacy test. Thus most of this paper is concerned with the passage of the
literacy test, since the quotas were its logical extension.
The literacy test was not merely given careful consideration in Congress
from 1897 to 1917. It passed the House on five separate occasions and passed
the Senate on four. Further, the House overrode presidential vetoes of the bill
twice and on two occasions failed to override by fewer than seven votes. The
Senate overrode a presidential veto once, when the test became law in 1917.
The literacy test was to be administered to physically capable adults to as-
sess their ability to read. The test was well-defined, although it varied some-
what across proposed immigration legislation. It generally consisted of reading
several sentences of the Constitution in any language chosen by the potential
immigrant, including recognized dialects. Some of the proposed legislation
also required that immigrants be capable of writing the sentences they could
read. Close relatives of an adult male immigrant who was literate were often
exempted. Because the shipping companies that brought immigrants across the
ocean were responsible for the return voyage of any who did not meet U.S.
immigration standards, it is likely that these companies would have adminis-
tered a literacy test of their own, in the same way that they screened for health
violations in European p 0 m 7
immigration for at least two years (Higham [ 19551 1981). During the debates over the quota Icgis- lation in the aftermath of World War I, several bills were introduced that would have suspended immigration for periods of from three to five years (Hutchinson 198 I , 17 I ). Of the many possible means of restricting and regulating immigration contained in^ the^ Reports^ of^ the Immigrarion Com- mission of 1910, none was a blanket quota of the type eventually adopted in I92 I, 1924, and 1929. One suggested means would have limited “the number of each race arriving each year to a certain percentage of the average of that race arriving during a given period of years” (Senate 191 Ia, 747).
- Section 39 of the immigration bill introduced in 1906 contained^ a^ financial test that would have required, among other things, that all male immigrants over sixteen years old (or the male head of the household) have $25 or its equivalent (Hutchinson 1981, 139). The final version of the 1907 act did not contain the provision. An amount of $25 was 2.4 weeks of income for lower- skilled manufacturing labor in America in 1906 and about 9 weeks of income for an equivalent worker in southern and eastern Europe at the time (U.S. Bureau of the Census 1975, aeries D 778; Simkovich, Taylor, and Williamson 1992).
- The literacy test was put in place in 1917 and remained after the quotas were passed. The experience with the literacy test immediately following its passage, and prior to the quotas, can be seen in U.S. Department of Labor 1918,23. The 1917 act allowed for a fine of $200 per alien to be assessed against any transportation company bringing an alien excludable by the literacy test. The fine and the passage home may have been sufficiently steep to give shipping companies an incentive to screen aliens prior to passage, although I do not know whether or how they accom- plished that task. In 1917 fines were levied for only 192 excludable illiterate aliens out of a total of almost 300,000 aliens.
228 Claudia Goldin
immigration. The leadership and members of the AFL and the Knights of La-
bor came out strongly in favor of the literacy test in 1897, but had not done so
before. The depression of the 1890s, with its extremely high rates of unem-
ployment, particularly in the manufacturing sector, appears responsible for the
change of heart.* But capital, too, turned against immigration.
Industry had depended on immigrant labor. Thus the restrictionist sentiment
of certain associations of capitalists may seem inexplicable. The labor unrest
of the 1880s and early 1890s, fresh in the minds of many, may have been a
deciding factor. In addition to a rash of strikes there were particularly odious
events, such as the Homestead Strike of 1892 and the Haymarket Riot of 1886.
The business faction that united against immigration in the last two decades of
the nineteenth century is not easily categorized, but it disintegrated rapidly
once economic conditions improved, labor unrest subsided, and wage de-
creases from immigration were more apparent (Heald 1953; Wiebe 1962).
The face of immigration changed rapidly in the 1890s, moving from north-
ern and western Europe to southern, central, and eastern Europe. Whereas the
new immigrants were 35 percent of the total flow in 1890, they were 56 percent
in 1896, although the flow was of comparatively modest size in the mid-1 890s,
a product of economic depression (see figures 7.1 and 7.2).9 Some have
claimed that the new immigrants were too recent and too few to motivate the
wave of anti-immigrant sentiment in the 1890s (Higham 1955). A reading of
the Congressional Record affords ample reason to disagree with this claim,
but not with a related assertion that the new immigrants were too recent and too
few to influence policy.“’ But they would be fortified by numbers and unified by
fear very soon.
President Cleveland vetoed the immigration legislation in 1897 because it
contained the literacy test, and although the House voted to override his veto,
the Senate took no action and the bill died. Just one year later, in 1898, a similar
immigration law was proposed in Congress. In this case the bill cleared the
Senate but failed by three votes to pass the House, which had just a year before
given it overwhelming support.lI The flip-flopping that took place on this im-
- The AFL letter to Congres, in I898 argued that “laborers are imported from other countries to reduce our wagez and thereby our standard of living” (Congressionnl Record 1898, 3 1686). The AFL, like others, was arguing against contract labor and shipping and railroad companies’ enticing people to emigrate to the United States.
- New immigrants are those from southern, central, and eastern Europe. The countries (at various points in time) in the eastern, central. and southern European group include Bulgaria, Croatia, Czechoslovakia. Greece, Hungary, Italy, Montenegro, Poland, Portugal, Rumania, Russia, Serbia, Spain, Turkey (in Europe), Yugoslavia, and the Baltic republics. I have included non- German-speaking emigrants from Austria in eastern Europe.
- According to Higham ( [ 19551 1981) the Immigration Protection League, organized primar- ily by the older immigrant groups in the late 189Os, led the defeat of the I898 literacy requirement in the House. 1 I. Of the 45 yeas in the Senate in 1898, 23 voted altirmatively in 1897, 6 had voted negatively. 9 had been recorded as absent. and 7 were new members of the Senate. Had all those present in both I897 and I898 voted as they did in 1898, the vote would have been 37 for and 22 againht in
Immigrants (Thousands)
Fig. 7.1 Immigration, 1880-
Source: U S. Bureau of the Census 1975, series C89-119. Note: New immigrants are those from southern, central, and eastern Europe. See note 9 for the included countries.
New Immigrants/Total Immigrants
Fig. 7.2 Proportion of new immigrants, 1880-
Source: U.S. Bureau of the Census 1975, series C 89-119. Nore: New immigrants are those from southern, central, and eastern Europe. See note 9 for the included countries.
231 The Political Economy of Immigration Restriction in the U.S., 1890 to 1921
Both the Senate and House passed the literacy test again in 1912, only to
have it vetoed by lame duck President Taft. The House failed by just six votes
to override the veto. Had it been able to override, the test would have become
law, since the Senate vote was 86 percent in favor of the amendment on the
literacy test. The literacy test was reintroduced in 1915, passing the Senate by
a wide majority and the House by enough to override a veto but with a large
segment not voting. President Wilson, an ardent Progressive remembering his
promise to immigrants in the 1912 election, vetoed the legislation, and the
House failed to override it, this time by just five votes.’7In 1916 the House and
Senate once again passed a bill containing the literacy test, and finally, in 1917,
both houses successfully overrode Wilson’s second veto. The literacy test had
become law.
The votes on the literacy test are evidence of the shifting coalitions men-
tioned earlier. The first vote i n the House, in 1897, brought southern and urban-
northeastern interests together in opposition to the test, with virtually the rest
of the country favoring it.’4The overwhelmingly anti-immigrant vote in 1897
may have been a hysterical reaction to the prolonged economic downturn of
the 189Os, although recovery was well under way by the date of the vote. A
more sober view of the immigration issue may have been given to the vote in
1898, a very close one in the House.
7.2.2 Analysis of Votes on the Literacy Test by State
As can be seen in table 7.2, New England, much of the Middle Atlantic, and
about half of the midwestern region were in favor of the test in 1898. The South
was generally against it, as it had been in the previous vote. The Mountain and
Pacific states were not yet numerous enough to categorize. The next roll call
vote on the literacy test was not for another fifteen years, in 1913. By that date
the shifting coalitions mentioned earlier had become apparent. The Northeast
was split, with the larger cities voting pro-immigrant and the rural areas voting
anti. The Midwest was also split. Differences there may have been rooted in
percent and 70 percent were, but that states often had residence requirements that the mobile foreign born often could not meet. The evidence presented here supports, in principle, the asser- tions of the older literature. The foreign born might have been an even more potent force had naturalization been faster and had various states had more lenient residency requirements.
- Wilson’s veto of the 1915 act can be rationalized, after the fact, by his promise to the foreign born during the election, but it is not clear that it could have been predicted prior to the vote in the House. Only after the House passed the act did Wilson warn the Senate that he would veto the bill if the literacy test was not removed (Link 1954. 60-61). But there is no indication that Wilson explicitly stated that he would veto the bill prior to its passage in the House, although Link states that Wilson “intimated that he would.” In fact, the official magazine of the International Brother- hood of Teamsters predicted in August 1913, six months after Taft’s veto of the literacy act, that “any immigration law passed, carrying a literacy test in all probability, will be approved by Presi- dent Wilson” (International Brotherhood of Teamsters, August 191 3, 5).
- Of the thirty-seven negative votes, twenty-five were cast by southerners. Three from New York City joined them together with eight others from urban areas in the Northeast. One additional representative, from Wisconsin, voted against the test (Congressional Record 1897, 29:2947).
232 Claudia Goldin
Table 7.2 Proportion of House Voting for the Literacy Test or to Override a Presidential Veto of the Literacy Test, by State, 1898, 1913, 1915, 1917
Proportion to Override Number Voting For Test
New England CT 1. MA 0.
ME 1 .o
NH 1.
RI 1.
VT 1.
Middle Atlantic NJ I. NY 0. PA 0. East North Central IL 0. IN 0. MI 0. OH 0. WI 0. West North Central IA 0. KS 0. MN 0. MO 0. ND 1. NE 0. SD 0.
DE 0. FL 0. GA 0. MD 1. NC 0.
sc 0.
VA 0.
WV 0.
East South Central AL 0. KY 0. MS 0. TN 0. West South Central AR 0. LA 0. OK - TX 0.
South Atlantic
I.
1 .o
1. I .O I.
I. I .o
1 .o
1 .o
1.
1.
I.
I.
1 .o
0.8 I
I .o
I .o
I .o
I.
I.
I.
I 1
1 1
7 23 27
15 13 10 17 7
9 3 3 15 I 5 2
1 2 10 4 5 7 9 3 7 9 6 9 5 6
I
I I
I
1 1 10 6 10 6 9 2
9 I I 9 10
7 6 4 15
I
1 4 12 6 9 7 10 6
10 I I 8 10
8 7 7 18
1 1 16 3 5 3
I 4 12 6 10 7 10 6
10 I 1 8 9
7 8 6 19
234 Claudia Goldin
not.I6 The reasons seem obvious, but one cannot differentiate between a per-
sonal interest in open immigration and an ideological one. Recent immigrants
may have wanted to send for relatives and friends. But they may also have
clung more fervently to the notion that America was a haven for the world’s
poor and oppressed than did those who emigrated years before.
The proportion of the House vote in favor of the literacy test has been re-
gressed on the percentage foreign born, the level of urbanization, and the im-
migration rate from 1900 to 1910, all at the state level. The regressions (table
7.3) demonstrate the political strength of the foreign born but also reveal the
mounting opposition to immigration from residents of states with expanding
foreign-born populations.
The most obvious result in the regressions is that the constant terms in all
regressions are close to one-states with few foreign born and only sparse
urban areas voted overwhelmingly against open immigration. Percentage for-
eign born and percentage urban reduce support for the literacy test. A one-
point increase in the percentage foreign born decreases support for the test by
one to two percentage points.” The greater importance of the percentage urban
variable in 1915 than in 1913 highlights the importance of the redistricting
that occurred between the 62d and 63d Congresses. Although increasing the
percentage foreign born reduces support for the literacy test, an increase in the
rate of immigration decreases support.IXThe impact of the rate of increase in
immigration helps explain the anti-immigration sentiment of the West.
The support the West gave to the literacy test by the 1913 and 1915 votes
arose, it appears, from the rapid increase in the percentage foreign born in
those states, rather than from any previous biases regarding Asian immigra-
tion. With few exceptions all states in the West had among the highest rates of
immigration but only moderate levels of foreign born. The percentage foreign
born in those states was insufficient to provide enough positive sentiment
against restriction, but the rate of increase was sufficient to fuel a strong nega-
tive reaction. Immigrants who settled in the West during this period, it should
be added, were largely Europeans, not Asians and Mexicans.
The South has been omitted from the state-level regressions. Its lack of for-
eign born and paucity of cities would have lent overwhelming support to the
- A more accurate test of the proposition that the foreign born from the current sending re- gions were more in favor of open immigration than were those from regions that were no longer sending a large fraction of their populations, requires county-level data on nativity reaggregated to congressional districts. I am currently collecting county-level data to investigate the role of ethnicity and ethnic mix in immigration restriction sentiment in rural districts and to explore how statewide voting regulations affected the political strength of the foreign-bom population. A sim- ple scanning of the ethnic origins of populations in the midwestem states that were most antire- strictive (e.g., Minnesota, Michigan, Wisconsin) suggests the proposition stated here.
- Adding a quadratic in the percentage foreign born shows that the peak negative sentiment occurred at about 10 percent.
- The immigration rate between 1910 and 1920 is used to gauge the most recent flows of foreign born. Because immigration was very low from 191 5 to 1920, most of the increase in the decade was between 19 I0 and 19 15.
235 The Political Economy of Immigration Restriction in the U.S., 1890 to 1921
Table 7.3 Explaining the Proportion of the House Vote for the Literacy Test
Vote in 1913 = 0.857 - 2.08 (% FB) - 0.045 (% Urban) + 0.328 (Immigration Rate)
N = 31 (nonsouthern states); adjusted RZ = 0.
Vote in 1915 = 1.02 - 1.19 (% FB) - 0.608 (% Urban) + 0.339 (Immigration Rate)
N = 32 (nonsouthern states); adjusted R2 = 0.
Nores: r-statistics, in absolute value, are in parentheses. Ordinary least squares regressions are weighted by the total number of representativeq voting. Vote in 1913 and in 1915 is the proportion of the states’ votes in the House cast for the literacy test (that is, to override the presidential veto); B FB is the proportion of foreign born in the state i n 1910; Immigration Rate is the rate of increase in the foreign-born population between 1900 and 19 10. The vote in both years includes those who were “paired’; in this case each negative vote was paired with two positive votes.
relationships investigated. But such results would have offered no insight why
the South shifted sides from the 1890s to the early 1900s. The movement of
the South from the pro-immigration camp to the prorestriction side gave the
prorestriction forces a decisive edge in the House. Had the South remained in
the pro-immigration camp, the literacy test would not have cleared a majority
in the House even in 1915.” Several hypotheses for the switch can be offered.
The most apparent hypothesis from a reading of the Congressional Record
is that antiforeign sentiment on the basis of race had emerged. The South was
struggling with its own race problem and viewed the “new” immigrants as a
European mulatto, adding yet another racial group in America.*O Barring immi-
grants from the new sending regions would remove this danger and, moreover,
would not constrain the South. Southern states had tried to attract immigrants,
particularly for agricultural work, but they had not flocked there in any num-
bers for almost a century. The new immigrants had gone north and west,
rarely south.
Because the South had been unable to attract immigrants for some time, its
changed position around 1900 might have been related, as well, to the resolu-
tion of its own race problem. Jim Crow laws may have given southerners the
false sense that closing the door on immigration would not lead blacks to flee
en masse to the North. Although their numbers might have been higher still
- The total vote in 1915 (including the “pairs”) was 269 to override and 140 against. The South accounted for 134 votes, and 118 were for the override, 16 opposing it. Had the South in 1915 voted as it had in 1898 (see table 7.2 for the proportions cast for and against), it would have cast 43 votes for the override in 1915 and 91 against. The net gain for the pro-immigration forces would have been 75 votes, giving the anti-immigration forces only 194 and the pro-immigration forces 215.
- See, for example, the speech of Senator Simmons of North Carolina during the 1906 de- bates: “The broad fact, then, is that about two-thirds of all the immigration to this country to-day
and during recent years has come from southern and eastern Europe.... They belong... to a
different civilization from that represented by the Anglo-Saxon race” (Congressiond Record 1906.40: 7295).
237 The Political Economy of Immigration Restriction in the U.S., 1890 t o 1921
Table 7.4 (^) Votes to Override the Presidential Veto on the Literacy Test in the 62d, 63d, and 64th Congresses, 1913,1915, and 1917
Number For Number Against Number Not Voting % For“
Vote in 62d Congress (1913) Those remaining in office to 63d Those defeated in 19 I Vote in 63d Congress (I9 15) Incumbents only (62d and 63d) Nonincumbents only (63d not 62d) Those defeated in 1916 Vote in 64th Congress (1917) Incumbents only (63d and 64th) Nonincumbents only (64th not 63d)
I
I
I
Sources: Congressional Record, various years; Congressional Directory, various years
dTwo-thirds is necessary to override a presidential veto.
new members hailed primarily from the large and industrial cities of the North-
east and Midwest, whereas those defeated in 1914 came from small to middle-
sized towns across America. Those suffering defeat, therefore, were replaced
by representatives far less in favor of open immigration. But the newly elected
group was able to make up the difference and prop the door open. America
had become more bifurcated along the lines of open immigration, and it was
redistricting in 19 14 that resuscitated the pro-immigration bloc.*’ Without it,
the anti forces would have won. The increased population of the nation’s big
and industrial cities, with its largely immigrant composition, was responsible
for keeping the anti-immigrant forces just below the two-thirds majority
needed to override. All that changed by 1917, however, when there was no
relationship between incumbency and the vote on the literacy test. All in the
House-save those whose districts were in the nation’s largest cities and a
handful of others-voted overwhelmingly for it, regardless of time in office
and party affiliation.
7.2.4 Restrictiveness of the Literacy Test
The literacy test was an overture to the Emergency Quota Act passed in
1921, the Immigration Act of 1924, and, eventually, the National Origins Act
- The possibility that it was redistricting is by inference only. There were forty-five more representative!, seated in the 63d Congress than in the 62d Congress, and there were forty-three more representatives present for the vote in the 63d than in the 62d Congress to override the president’s veto (see table 7.1 ). Much of the redistricting took place within states, it appears. A tabulation of representatives by state does not reveal much difference between the two Congresses. But New York City, for example, gained seven representatives. Among those who were not seated in the 62d Congress hut who voted in the 63d, there were nine from New York City who voted against the test. Two representatives from New York City were not reelected, one of whom was against and one of whom was for the test. Three of the newly elected representatives were from Philadelphia, which lost only one seat from the 62d to the 63d Congresses. Chicago, however, made no net gain.
238 Claudia Goldin
passed in 1929. Although the quotas were plausibly more potent than the liter-
acy test, the test could have imposed considerable constraints, particularly on
the newer immigrant groups. How much of a constraint depended on the type
of test, the sending country flows, and the period considered.
As initially conceived in 1897, the literacy test involved reading and writing
a short passage of the US. Constitution and barred illiterate adult males and
their accompanying family members. At that time it was believed that the test
would have checked the entry of 25 percent of all recent arrivals, although
more than 40 percent of the newer groups would have been barred.24More
precise estimates were compiled for the Reports of the Immigration Commis-
sion. According to the report, data collected by the U S. commissioner general
of immigration from the self-reported statements of immigrants upon arrival
indicated that 33.4 percent of eastern European and 44.9 percent of southern
European immigrants (fourteen years and older) arriving from 1899 to 1910
were illiterate.25Thus the test would have reduced the new immigrants by 37.
percent in 1907 at the height of immigration. The constraint would have been
less in the 1920s due to the rising literacy in eastern and southern Europe,
although the test could have been made more difficukzh
For the entire 1905 to 1914 period, a decade of immigrant flows of more
than one million per year, the literacy test would have restricted immigration
from southern and eastern Europe to about 445,000 annually when the flow
was, in actuality, 7 1 2,000.27But the eventual quotas were far more restrictive.
The 1921 act limited southern and eastern Europeans to 156,000, and the 1924
- During the debate on the immigration act of 1898, Senator Fairbanks of Indiana inserted data in the Congressiunal Record showing that about 25 percent of immigrants (fourteen years old and over) arriving from I895 to I897 were illiterate. Illiteracy was declared by the immigrant, and no official test was given (CungressiorzalRecord 1898, 3 1 :5 15).
- Female immigrants were less literate than male immigrants. Because many versions ofthe literacy test allowed the illiterate family members of a literate adult male immigrant to emigrate, the constraint would have been less than calculated on the basis of the aggregate data. But younger adults were more literate than older adult immigrants, and since the Immigration Commission data group all ages, this factor would tend to bias the calculation in the other direction. The data from the U.S. commissioner general of immigration in the Reports of rhe Immigration Commission ( 1 9 1 I a, I :99) differ, often radically, by country from those reported in the Congressional Record ( 1898, 3 1 :5 16) for a somewhat earlier period of time. But the data in the report are consistent with estimates I have computed using the 1910 Public Use Micro-data Sample (PUMS).
- Primary-school enrollment had been rising secularly in Italy, Spain, Yugoslavia, and Ruma- nia across the latter half of the nineteenth century and exploded in Russia after the revolution. See, for example, the data in Easterlin 198 1.
- Emigration to the United States from Europe could have slowed in the 1920s as conditions improved in certain European countries relative to those in the United States. Wage data collected for a project on international economic convergence (Simkovich, Taylor, and Williamson 1992) indicate that Italy, the only new immigrant country in the data set, improved its real wage position relative to the United States during the 1900s to 1920s period. In 1910, for example, the ratio of Italian to American real wages for unskilled laborers was 0.29, but by 1925 it was 0.48. It should also be noted that even though gross immigration was 6.71 million from 1908 to 19 14, many immigrants returned home. The net immigration figure is 61 percent of the gross, or 4. million (Willcox 1931, 88).
240 Claudia Goldin
enormous importance on an international scale.’x That most relevant to the
political economy of restriction is a somewhat more short-run tale.
The literacy test was introduced and gained momentum because immigra-
tion in the 1890s had shifted to ethnic and national groups whose schooling
levels and living standards were distinctly below those of previous groups.
They were, moreover, disproportionately male and were often “birds of pas-
sage” who spent only brief durations in America. Such individuals were per-
ceived as a threat to the American working man. By toiling long hours and
bringing living standards from low-wage countries, they probably did lower
the wage-hours offer curve by more than an equivalent increase in native-born
workers would have. Moreover, because they often lacked rudimentary skills
in reading and writing, and more often in speaking English, they may have
earned even less than competitive forces would have di~tated.’~These were
certainly the claims of many observers of the day-Progressives, conserva-
tives, and labor movement organizers alike. Although each group had its own
solution, a dominant one was to restrict immigration on the basis of literacy.
7.3.1 Occupations and Destinations of Immigrants, 1890 to 1920
Certain occupations and industries were disproportionately composed of
immigrants. If recently arrived immigrants were more closely substitutable for
other foreign-born workers and lesser-skilled workers than for native-born
higher-skilled workers, then the wage effects should have been more negative
in industries and occupations having a large percentage of foreign-born and
lesser-skilled workers. The percentage of the labor force that was foreign born
by industry and for selected occupations in 1910 is given in table 7.5. The
foreign born are divided into three groups-all foreign born; the “new” immi-
grants, by which is meant those from eastern, central, and southern Europe;
and among the new immigrants those who emigrated within the ten years pre-
ceding the 19 10 census, termed “recent” immigrants.
All manufacturing employments were more heavily populated by immi-
grants than was the male labor force as a whole, although a substantial fraction
of the differential is accounted for by the disproportionate employment of
native-born workers in agriculture. Excluding the agricultural sector, foreign-
born workers were 1.4 times as likely to have been in the goods-producing
sector than were native-born workers, and the new immigrants were almost 1.
times as likely.3”Among the industries most populated by the new and recent
immigrants were clothing, mining, and iron and steel. But there was substantial
variation in the ethnic backgrounds of workers within industries; in foundries,
- See Hatton and Williamson 1992 on the general issue of wage rate changes with large-scale
- See, for example, Hannon 1982 for empirical evidence on the extent of labor market dis-
- The goods-producing sector is mining, manufacturing, and construction.
immigration on an international level.
crimination against immigrants during the late nineteenth century.
241 The Political Economy of Immigration Restriction in the U S. , 1890 to 1921
Table 7.5 Percentage of “New” and Recent Immigrant Males in the Labor Force, by Industry and Selected Occupations in the Goods-ProducingSector, 1910
( 3 ) (5) (1) ( 2 ) “New” (4) Relative %,
Born Immigrant Immigrant4 Foreign Born” and Recent”
Foreign “New” and Recent Relative %, “New”
(%) (%) ([1]/32.9) ([3]/12.2)
All employed males ( 2 14 years) Excluding those in agriculture In goods-producing sector Mining Building trades Laborers Painters Brick and stone masons Manufacturing Chemicals Clay, glass, and stone Clothing Food Bakeries Iron and steel Foundries Foundry laborers Machinists” Leather Liquor and beverages Lumber and furniture Metals (except iron and steel) Paper and pulp Printing and publishing Textiles Tobacco and cigars
33. I
67. I
8. I
1 .OO
I .OO
I.
I.
I.
I.
1 .OO
I.
I.
Source: 1910 PUMS, males fourteen years and older. Note: “New” and recent immigrants are eastern, central, and southern Europeans who emigrated during the ten years preceding the 1910 census. “he relative percentage divided by the percentage of all employed males (fourteen years and older) in the goods-producing sector for each of the two immigrant groups. hNot necessarily working in foundries or in the iron and steel industry.
for example, 32 percent of the laborers were of the new and recent group of
immigrants but only 4 percent of the machinists were.
Immigrants went disproportionately to the nation’s largest cities, but so did
all Americans during the period under study. Despite the notion that immi-
grants, particularly from 1900 to 1914, crowded themselves into a handful of
America’s urban centers, they were in fact extremely dispersed across all cities
