America has, is, and will always be a nation of immigrants

Essay by sosomiaw28College, UndergraduateB+, May 2005

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In the years that have passed since Emma Lazarus' poem was inscribed on the Statue of

Liberty "the golden door" Americans have seen times when the door was Open wide and times when

It was close shut to most immigrants. Many people look at the present immigration problems as a

Purely modern dilemma. The truth is America has always struggled with the issue of immigration,

Both legal and illegal. Changing times, however, makes it very important that our government

Reexamines and adjusts today's immigration laws to today's standards. Those standards,

However, are not easily defined. Too often the issue of immigration is used as a Political tool or is lost

In heated moral debates. In any discussion about immigration there will be those who claim it is

Good for our nation and those who claim it is ruining the nation. Americans to this day are still

Facing this dilemma; the nation must decide whether it is willing to accept more new

Immigrants and whether immigration laws should be reformed?

The concern about the impact that immigration impose on American society is not a new one.

Since the discovery of the New World immigrants from all over the World moved to American

Continent in search of a better life, that this huge and rich in sources, yet rare in population land had

Promised them. Soon the immigrants outnumbered the native population. They came from England,

Europe and Asia. In Addition, millions of Africans were imported as slaves. By 1700 the United

States became a country of immigrants and more were still to come. At that time America Welcomed

Everybody who ventured to settle in the new country. (Barbour, p.11)

In the 1780s after the revolutionary war ended, the concerns and worries about the impact of

Immigration launched with the worries of...