The Simple Answer to the Furore over Trump’s Muslim Ban

Just have a 40 year moratorium on *all* Third World mass immigration of people who want to permanently live in the US. It’s that simple.

Of course, you don’t need to ban vetted students or tourists, or people who might be temporarily employed for some job that can’t be done by a US citizen. Nor do you need to ban immigration involving cultural exchanges, scientific research, or limited and reasonable asylum for people who are culturally compatible and genuinely fleeing persecution, especially if the asylum is only temporary.

But a straightforward ban on all Third World mass immigration would end the hysteria about singling out one religion and would, quite probably, turn out to be popular too. America had such a moratorium on mass immigration from 1924 to 1965.

A moratorium means more jobs for American citizens, tight labour markets, and rising real wages. Working and middle class people will love that.

The absurd Liberal and cultural leftist cry that such a policy would be contrary to the spirit or history of American immigration policy only shows how ignorant, stupid or just completely dishonest these people are, as I demonstrated here.

Severe restriction of Third World mass immigration is as American as apple pie.

Here is just a sample of some of the legislation from US history restricting immigration up until the 1920s:

(1) Page Act of 1875
This act excluded Asian and Chinese forced labourers, Asian woman engaging in prostitution, and all people who were convicted criminals in their own country. It was driven by working class hostility to Chinese coolie labour.

(2) the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882
This immigration act prohibited all immigration of Chinese labourers, and like the act of 1875 was driven by socialist, trade unions and working class opposition to Asian immigration. This was extended and even made more onerous by the Geary Act of 5 May, 1892.

(3) the 1885 Alien Contract Labor Law
This law was a pro-working class measure designed “to prohibit the importation and migration of foreigners and aliens under contract or agreement to perform labor in the United States.”

(4) Immigration Act of 1903 (the Anarchist Exclusion Act)
This immigration act law excluded anarchists, people with epilepsy, beggars, and importers of prostitutes.

(5) Naturalization Act of 1906
This immigration law made the US federal government the policy maker of national immigration and naturalization policy, and stated “That no alien shall hereafter be naturalized or admitted as a citizen of the United States who can not speak the English language.”

(6) Immigration Act of 1907
This immigration act excluded a vast swathe of people:

“All idiots, imbeciles, feebleminded persons, epileptics, insane persons, and persons who have been insane within five years previous; persons who have had two or more attacks of insanity at any time previously; paupers; persons likely to become a public charge; professional beggars; persons afflicted with tuberculosis or with a loathsome or dangerous contagious disease; persons not comprehended within any of the foregoing excluded classes who are found to be and are certified by the examining surgeon as being mentally or physically defective, such mental or physical defect being of a nature which may affect the ability of such alien to earn a living.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immigration_Act_of_1907

(7) Immigration Act of 1917
This immigration act excluded a vast group of people from an “Asiatic Barred Zone” including much of Asia and the Pacific Islands.

(8) (a) Immigration Act of 1924 and (b) National Origins Formula
These set strict limits on immigration and essentially limited immigration to southern Europeans and Eastern Europeans; it excluded Africans, Arabs and Asians. At the same time, from the date of June 30, 1927 it made “total immigration from all countries … limited to 150,000, with allocations by country based upon national origins of inhabitants according to the census of 1920.” This was designed to preserve the “ethnic distribution of the population” of the US. This was the foundation of the American system of immigration from 1924 to 1965.

The driving force for much of this restriction came from the working class, trade unions and socialist movements.

And why is that?

Because working class people have *nearly always* loved mass immigration restriction, and you can see this in nation after nation.

At the famous Socialist Congress that occurred in Chicago in 1910, American socialists, trade unions, Marxists and Labour activists adopted the following resolution:

“The Socialist party of the United States favors all legislative measures tending to prevent the immigration of strike breakers and contract laborers, and the mass importation of workers from foreign countries, brought about by the employing classes for the purpose of weakening the organization of American labor and of lowering the standard of life of the American workers.” (Carlton 1911: 352).

Yep, that was “socialism” in America in 1910.

As I said, severe restriction of Third World mass immigration is not only as American as apple pie, but also a long-standing and venerable socialist tradition too.

BIBLIOGRAPHY
Carlton, Frank Tracy. 1911. The History and Problems of Organized Labor. D.C. Heath, Boston.