Bona Fide Quotes



At the time immigrants had to live in America 14 years before they were eligible for citizenship. The President urged a reduction in that waiting period which is what was done. This was one of the earliest statements of America as a haven to the oppressed of the world. Note that despite occasional squabbles over land use and theft, the general assessment of the President and the public was that the Indians although not as civilized had welcomed the whites with “hospitality.” The next years would produce the conflict for land and begin the massive usurpation of Indian land that would characterize American policy and practice until the latter half of the 20th century, buy which time there was little Indian land left.


The open borders position may sound new and radical, but it is simply a call for the return of lost liberties. When the Statue of Liberty was erected in 1886, most of the world’s borders could be freely crossed without passports. Passport requirements had sometimes existed before and were still in place in backward Tsarist Russia, but the more liberal governments of advanced European nations regulated migration, as modern democracies regulate speech, only rather lightly and in exceptional cases, if at all. Comprehensive restrictions on international movement, which almost everyone today regards as a normal and necessary government function, are really an innovation of the twentieth century, which emerged as liberalism gave way to nationalism and socialism in the wake of World War I. Although the reasons for border control were The open borders position may sound new and radical, but it is simply a call for the return of lost liberties. When the Statue of Liberty was erected in 1886, most of the world’s borders could be freely crossed without passports. Passport requirements had sometimes existed before and were still in place in backward tsarist Russia, but the more liberal governments of advanced European nations regulated migration, as modern democracies regulate speech, only rather lightly and in exceptional cases, if at all. Comprehensive restrictions on international movement, which almost everyone today regards as a normal and necessary government function, are really an innovation of the twentieth century, which emerged as liberalism gave way to nationalism and socialism in the wake of World War I. Although the reasons for border control were often explicitly racist—such as the national origins quotas of the 1924 U.S. Immigration Act—the restrictions were also motivated by bona fide national security concerns, as well as a desire to protect native wages and welfare states from immigrant competition and foreign dependents.


Most Americans do not realize that for most of Amrcan history there has been open borders with little or no restrcition on immigration. These that there were tend to be rembered becuse of the populism, nativism and unrest taht went with them.


When Kansas was a territory and being considered for statehood, slavery was paramount politically in the nation and in Kansas in particular. There was terrible violence against “immigrants: from the East who would vote to make Kansas a free state and retaliation against the southerners and pro-slavery sympathizers. A constitutional convention was called in the town of Lecompton of the then Kansas Territory. The convention was dominated and controlled by slavery advocates and free soilers boycotted rather than give legitimacy to a constitution where they would lose. The quotation would settle the issue of slavery for Kansas the conferees thought. President Buchanan tried to steer the Lecompton Constitution through Congress, but there was enough opposition to block it. Congress decreed a Kansas referendum. The slavery forces lost and Kansas entered as a free state; there were 3 additional constitutional conventions which passed 3 different constitutions before one was settled upon.