PLS 392 Lecture Notes - Lecture 4: Immigration Policy, Supremacy Clause, Commerce Clause
Document Summary
Immigration in the early republic: state policy. Open door policy: up until 1882 (chinese exclusion act), there was no national level immigration policy. In terms of a comprehensive policy, it"s not until the 1920s. Some of it was because of national security concerns, also because of a lack of agreement, and the constitution is mute on this topic: the situation is different at the state level. So states weren"t forbidden from implementing immigration legislation. Supremacy clause: article vi, clause 2: since there was no federal immigration law, the legality of state level immigration and immigrant policies was different then. So it"s not until the congress approved the chinese exclusion act that local policies could contradict federal immigration laws. Immigration policy: the ability of the national government to manage the entry and exit of persons. Immigrant policy: rights, privileges, and benefits immigrants have. More indicative of the past: now, these 2 are combined into one.
