How Lyndon Johnson Moved the Nation Forward on Immigration – Foreign Policy

Sixty years ago, the President of the United States, Lindon Pines Johnson, defended the value of immigration to the United States. When the president signed the 1965 immigration and nationality law in a law on October 3 of that year, he dismantled the national shares system that was placed in the twenties.

Today, President Donald Trump continues to move in the opposite direction. Based on a road map invented by Counselor Stephen Miller, his administration is in the process of imposing one of the most restricted immigration programs that the nation has witnessed since World War II. The law of the beautiful major law, which took place in the law on July 4, authorized about $ 170 billion to enforce borders and immigration over the next five years, including $ 75 billion to enforce American immigration and customs (ICE) – at the top of its current annual budget of $ 10.4 billion. Funding will help convert us to migration and customs into the largest local police force that was in the country ever.

Michael Thomasky also noted in New RepublicThe administration is likely to expand detention camps such as “Alcatraz” in forced work programs. “This is where we are,” Thomasky expressed, “in the United States of America, in 2025: We are looking for a very real possibility for a series of work camps throughout the country.”

For the first time in seven decades, US immigration can be declined without zero in 2025. In New York City, Lady Liberty is alone and afraid.

Trump has gone After migration, both not documented and legal, in a ruthless manner. The administration closed the border and carried out a huge deportation program, as it sent the detainees to prison facilities in other countries. The President canceled the temporary legal status and canceled the programs that allowed some migrant categories to enter the country and work. It has imposed a new travel ban in addition to the limits of refugee programs that have been on books for decades.

In the aftermath of the Supreme Court ruling recently, the minimum court’s ability to temporarily prevent its policies will use the executive orders to end the ongoing citizenship in the largest possible number of countries, although the procedure is clearly unconstitutional. This will strip the citizenship of children born in the United States in some states where the provincial judges do not challenge the law. Given that the president appears to feel the wind on his back, there is no doubt that he will continue to expand his efforts.

Democrats do not do much to respond. In fact, many of the leading figures-who were shocked by the 2024 elections and the first few months of Trump 2.0-focused on the need for their party to become more striking in the immigration campaign. They are still adhering to arguments about the economic and cultural benefits of migration to the nation, they spend more energy to restore themselves towards a new center. While Democrats in the period before the 2004 elections have tried to be their best in the national defense, they are now competing to be a better alternative to mobilizing harsh immigration.

There are many convincing arguments about the reason for the need of Democrats to make these moves, both in terms of politics and politics, but they will achieve this well to remember the legacy of immigration reform of Johnson. Although defending immigration may be difficult to do in our time, the arguments have deep roots and settle in one of the most important forces that formed the greatest elements of the national personality: the continuous flow of new people, societies and culture on the beaches of the United States.

Nativism has a long history as well, of course. When Johnson entered the White House, the general policy gathered around the measures that limited and restricted the ability of individuals to enter the United States. In 1882, congress passed the Chinese exclusion law, and President Chester signed it. Arthur, who created a ban on Chinese workers entering the country. In 1921 and 1924, Congress approved legislation imposing a number of people who could reach southeast and east of Europe, which was the point of asset to entered the massive immigrants at the beginning of the twentieth century. In 1952, during the early Cold War, the Macaran Walter law established most of the restrictions. President Harry Truman tried to veto the law, but Republican -dominated Congress has passed.

After World War II, the opposition was gradually built against the record regime. The massacre of the Jews is genocide – and the management of Franklin de Roosevelt, which respects the famous from reaching a boat full of refugees fleeing the Nazis, as well as the arrest of Japanese Americans – as live lessons regarding the dangers of ideology that were directed by politicians in the twenties.

The pressures of the Cold War against the Soviet Union and China mean that officials elected in the United States were more keen to welcome refugees from Eastern Europe who were trying to escape from communist regimes. In 1953, President Dwight Eisenhower signed the Refugee Relief Act, which authorized visas for more than 200,000 refugees, most of them from Europe.

“This procedure,” Eisenhower declared, “declares America’s traditional interest in the homeless, persecution and less fortunate for other lands. It is a great contradiction with the tragic events that occur in East Germany and in other captive countries.”

However, it carries feelings of anti -immigration. In fact, a year after the signing of the refugee bill, Eisenhower put the “WetBack” into effect, whose insulting name explains what the policy is doing. The Immigration Office conducted a major military deportation program that connects more than a million Mexican immigrants, most of whom were brought to the country through BraceroI recruited them to work.

Finally, the civil rights movement moved in the mid -twentieth century to preserve this infrastructure. As a result of activists and leaders who fought to protect human rights for black Americans within the United States, an increasing number of elected officials began to link these arguments to the migrants’ plight. At Capitol Hill, MP Celler, Chairman of the House of Representatives Judicial Committee, collaborated with Senator in Michigan Philip Hart to enhance legislation that would end the quota system.

They found support from President John F. Kennedy, who – in a booklet was published while he was in Senator – called Congress to end the quota system, then his successor, Johnson, who folded the reform of immigration in the plan of his great society.

However, success was not without peace. There were many divisions about reform. Many conservatives demanded a number of migrants, while the liberals wanted a more flexible system. In June 1965, Gallup reported the general feelings on this issue: Among those surveyed, 39 percent of the audience wanted to maintain immigration levels as it is, while 33 percent wanted to reduce it. Only 7 percent support any type of expansion.

The 1964 elections established the conditions for success. Johnson’s victory for the ground collapse over Senator Barry Goldinter, which encouraged right -wing extremism, and Democrats were left with 295 seats in the House of Representatives and 68 seats in the Senate. The Southern Democrats were in defense, the Republicans were chaos, and the dried liberal north rule. Their agenda included immigration reform.

One of the main supporters of reform – the brother of the deceased President Kennedy, Ted Kennedy, Senator from Massachusetts – announced that “our streets may not be paved with gold, but they are paved with their promise that the men and women who live here – even among the new wings and friendly – do not turn to their skills, do not allow their skills.

The legislation was issued with strong support from the two parties. In the House of Representatives, 320 members voted in favor and 70 against. The Senate agreed to vote. The Hart Siller Law, known as the Immigration and Nationality Law, submitted the stakes of national origins from the twenties of the twentieth century. The congress is placed in the position of a different political structure based on preference. The government will allocate visas to certain groups of people, such as husbands and children of individuals who were in the United States as permanent citizens as well as certain types of workers. The legislation focused on the topics of family unification and skilled work.

“It is really amazing, and I doubt that the bill will have an opportunity. This time it was easy,” said Senator Kennedy after absorbing victory.

When Johnson signed the bill in law on October 3 on Liberty Island, the first president to visit the statue since Franklin Roosevelt celebrated the fiftieth anniversary of his dedication in 1936, called “one of the most important works of this Congress and in this administration.”

Johnson has argued that the legislation “corrects a harsh and permanent mistake in the behavior of the American nation.” As a result of the reform, he said: “Those who can contribute to this country – to grow him, in his strength, in his soul – will be the first to be accepted on this land.” Calling the spirit of civil rights, Johnson reminded the country as “”[o]The beautiful America was built by a nation of strangers. … the earth flourished because it was fed from many sources – because it was feeding on many cultures, traditions and peoples. “He has never hoped that the shares system was” the shadow of the American nation’s gate with the double barriers of bias and privilege. “

Immigration reform supporters acknowledged that the final bill had defects. Columbia University historian May Nagai, in her major book, Impossible topics: illegal foreigners and making modern AmericaHe pointed out that the legislation imposed a quantitative ceiling on immigrants from countries like Mexico – the first time that the act has places restrictions on Latin America.

The legislation will also have many unintended consequences. Although the crucifixion of reform focused on Eastern Europe, the law ended in a tremendous production of immigrants from Asia, Latin America and Africa through the provisions of family unification.

Despite these issues, many immigration supporters saw that the legislation was transformed. There was a significant increase in immigration. According to the American Progress Center, the number of people born in the United States increased from less than 10 million in 1965 (4.8 percent of the population) to 45 million in 2015 (13.9 percent of the population). “The legislation made the continuation of the type of pluralism that defined America from the beginning,” said historian Geraldo Kadava, the most important of the numbers.

In fact, the Johnson Bill represented a high point of the US positive commitment to a country established by immigrants, expanded by immigrants, and permanently enhanced it with the contributions of migrants.

In 2025, and The United States lives under completely different political ethics. The proposed balance between the road has turned into citizenship and monitoring the most striking borders in which presidents, George W. Bush and Barack Obama, fought, in vain, have turned into a national discourse about lack of legitimacy, criminality, deportation, and harsh repression.

Without reviving the ideas that prompted Johnson in 1965, the United States will be poor forever. The nation is now vulnerable to overcoming one of the basic principles of the American dream. Democrats need to avoid the race down, as political necessities lead them to accept Trump’s conditions in the discussion.

Any fans still have the courage to stay independent, he must remember the words of President Ronald Reagan, who said in 1981: “Our nation is a nation of immigrants. More than any other country, our strength comes from our immigrant heritage and our ability to welcome other reasons.”

Without appreciation, Lindon B. Johnson, we risk wiping one of the greatest components of American history: it has become a stronger, freedom and more powerful nation because it opened its arms to the world.