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In a book of deep and telling ironies, Peter Schrag provides essential background for understanding the fractious debate over immigration. Covering the earliest days of the Republic to current events, Schrag sets the modern immigration controversy within the context of three centuries of debate over the same questions about who exactly is fit for citizenship. He finds that nativism has long colored our national history, and that the fear—and loathing—of newcomers has provided one of the faultlines of American cultural and political life. Schrag describes the eerie similarities between the race-based arguments for restricting Irish, German, Slav, Italian, Jewish, and Chinese immigrants in the past and the arguments for restricting Latinos and others today. He links the terrible history of eugenic "science" to ideas, individuals, and groups now at the forefront of the fight against rational immigration policies. Not Fit for Our Society makes a powerful case for understanding the complex, often paradoxical history of immigration restriction as we work through the issues that inform, and often distort, the debate over who can become a citizen, who decides, and on what basis.
Contents Sources and Acknowledgments
Introduction
1. A City upon a Hill
2. "This Visible Act of
Ingurgitation"
3. "Science" Makes Its Case
4. Preserving the Race
5. The Great Awhitening
6. "They Keep Coming"
7. A Border without Lines
Epilogue
Notes
Index
mugwump2
Posted May 31, 2010
Peter Schrag's book combines deep reporting and analysis of the current debate over immigration with the historical scholarship on nativism. The result is the best and most engaging overview of the subject since John Higham's "Strangers in the Land." Lucid and rich in irony, this book delivers a strong narrative held together by Schrag's themes and propelled both by the play of ideas and his mini-portraits of the many characters that show up along the way. It deserves to be widely read and discussed by all those involved -- citizens, policy makers, journalists, public officials -- in the debate about immigration reform.
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Posted April 23, 2011
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Overview
In a book of deep and telling ironies, Peter Schrag provides essential background for understanding the fractious debate over immigration. Covering the earliest days of the Republic to current events, Schrag sets the modern immigration controversy within the context of three centuries of debate over the same questions about who exactly is fit for citizenship. He finds that nativism has long colored our national history, and that the fear—and loathing—of newcomers has provided one of the faultlines of American ...