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New publication by SOF Alumni Hidetaka Hirota | Expelling the Poor

Fellows, SOF Fellows

January 17, 2017
Cover of Expelling the Poor by Hidetaka Hirota

Expelling the Poor
Atlantic Seaboard States and the Nineteenth-Century Origins of American Immigration Policy

Hidetaka Hirota

  • First sustained study of immigration control conducted by states prior to the introduction of federal immigration law in the late nineteenth century.
  • Argues that the origins of American immigration control were in cultural prejudice against the Irish and, more essentially, economic concerns about their poverty, rather than anti-Asian racism.
  • Challenges long-standing idea that immigration was unregulated prior to passage of federal immigration legislation.
  • Connects nativist politics to US deportation policy.
  • Includes immigrants' post-deportation experiences in Europe.

Oxford University Press