Immigrate To America

Superior Essays
Immigration is a part of our American history, so is illegal immigration. It’s an important chapter that is written anew every day of our lives. Everyone who lives here is an immigrant. Even Native Americans, who lived here before the first Europeans arrived (Morrow 5). Americans don’t realize the struggle immigrants go through to have a better life and to give their kids and family everything they couldn’t on the other side. They have to leave their families, homes, friends, and everything they are used to just to give their family a better life. Why do people immigrate to the United States? The United States offers a chance to better your life, for personal improvement, or economic gain (Morrow 3). Immigration has a history on how it came …show more content…
Many coyotes led them by foot at night, while others hid them in the back of vans and drove across (Hauser 83-89-91).
The Immigration Act of 1965 changed the face of America, the law changed the focus of immigration to the United States drastically. It increased the share going to Asia and to the Western Hemisphere, and emphasis on family migration led to a great increase in the amount of immigration (Daniels). In an address in 1985, Pope John II declared, “Every human being has the right to freedom of movement and of residence within the confines of his own country. When there are just reasons in favor of it, he must be permitted to migrate to other countries and to take up residence
…show more content…
“And there (Ellis Island) you were just like a number. People were arriving every day from all over Russia, Romania, Poland, Germany, and France. And naturally I couldn’t speak one word of English.” said Jennie Bohsung, young 22 year old woman, from Germany. “For some people it was joy.” said Frieda Jenofsy, who arrived from Europe in 1920. If the Statue of Liberty inspired hope, in arriving immigrants, Ellis Island instilled fear. The joy of arrival quickly passed as the immigrants were ferried to Ellis Island, America’s main immigration station from 1891 to early 1920’s. The concept of the statue as “Mother of Exiles”, a warming figure holding out the beacon of freedom to millions of immigrants, was slowly evolving (Nash 31-36-38). A bronze plaque inside the pedestal of the Statue shows the New Colossus, a sonnet by Emma Lazarus. It says, in part: “Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand a mighty woman with a torch, whose flame is imprisoned lightning and her name Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand glows world-wide welcome, her mild eyes command the air-bridged harbor that twin-cities frame.” Cries she with silent lips. “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore; send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, I lift

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