SEPTEMBER 2020 - AudioFile
Robert Fass’s deliberately paced narration is appropriate for this audiobook as the outrageous history it recounts does not need much help to spark a reaction from the listener. This is the story of the United States’ treatment of immigrants over the years, and it’s not a pretty one. There have been expulsions, criminalizations, racism, detentions, brutality, and exploitation done in the name of and with the blessing of the federal government. Goodman traces individual events and policies, emphasizing their impact on real human beings. Fass is sometimes rhythmic in his delivery and can on occasion elongate pauses or consonants. His overall performance is fairly understated; it’s a suitably unobtrusive support for this painful and shameful story. G.S. © AudioFile 2020, Portland, Maine
From the Publisher
"Finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize in History"
Winner of the Henry Adams Book Prize, Society for History in the Federal Government
Winner of the PROSE Award in North American History, Association of American Publishers"
"Honorable Mention for the Theodore Saloutos Book Award, Immigration and Ethnic History Society"
Finalist for the Shapiro Book Prize, The Shapiro Center for American History and Culture at The Huntington
SEPTEMBER 2020 - AudioFile
Robert Fass’s deliberately paced narration is appropriate for this audiobook as the outrageous history it recounts does not need much help to spark a reaction from the listener. This is the story of the United States’ treatment of immigrants over the years, and it’s not a pretty one. There have been expulsions, criminalizations, racism, detentions, brutality, and exploitation done in the name of and with the blessing of the federal government. Goodman traces individual events and policies, emphasizing their impact on real human beings. Fass is sometimes rhythmic in his delivery and can on occasion elongate pauses or consonants. His overall performance is fairly understated; it’s a suitably unobtrusive support for this painful and shameful story. G.S. © AudioFile 2020, Portland, Maine
Kirkus Reviews
2020-03-02
Exacting study of the historical roots of U.S. deportation policies.
As Goodman observes, though “the deportation machine has been running on all cylinders in recent years…it did not just come into being during the presidency of Donald J. Trump,” whose policies are discussed in a chilling epilogue. The author’s lean narrative contains six long chapters, examining the many political events that have caused fluctuating severity and approaches. Goodman illuminates surprising historical aspects—e.g., how enforcement began as racist local efforts aimed at Chinese and Mexican laborers. With increased central bureaucracy in the 1920s, “authorities placed an even greater emphasis on controlling the nation’s borders.” During the Depression, they were “increasingly aware of the power of scare tactics to exert control over noncitizens, and especially Mexicans.” Later, the Bracero agricultural workers who’d been welcomed during the war were scapegoated, culminating in the aggressive “Operation Wetback.” In the mid-20th century, writes the author, “voluntary departure and anti-immigrant fear campaigns became the dominant mechanisms of expulsion.” With so-called voluntary departures, “there were no bureaucratic hoops to jump through.” A lack of transparency about official practices has always been a problem. Goodman notes that “immigration historians know little about how authorities have forcibly removed people, and even less about the US government contracting private companies to effect expulsions.” He explores how return migration provided profitability to steamship companies followed by private aviation and even Greyhound buses; even in the 1950s, conditions aboard ships were so vile that detainees mutinied. The author also argues that manufactured border crises, abetted by sensationalist media, caused expulsion rates to begin climbing during the 1960s, and he notes that “INS also ramped up neighborhood and workplace raids,” a harbinger of today’s militarized borders and mass-incarceration approach. Goodman’s writing can be dry, but he confidently handles arcane historical details and a volatile subject.
A well-researched historical discussion with clear current relevance. (b/w tables, graphs, photos)
