Old and New Immigrants, Birds of Passage, and True Immigrants
Historians have divided immigration to the United States into two categories: old
and new immigrants. With population increases in almost every European country due to
advances in medicine and public health standards resulting in reduced infant mortality
rates and increased life expectancies, land and food supplies did not increase to meet the
new population demands. England, Ireland, France, Germany, and Scandinavia, defined
the old immigrants who were mostly white Protestants. The majority of them were
literate and had lived under constitutional forms of government.
Greeks, Poles, Russians, Slavs, and Turks were the next wave of immigrants
referred to as new immigrants. They emigrated from eastern and southern Europe only to
find assimilation more difficult because they differed from earlier immigrants and native-
born Americans politically, religiously, and culturally. Some reasons for the cause of
these new immigrants to come to America was overpopulation in eastern and southern
parts of Europe, and young men faced job, land, and food shortages. Between 1860 and
1890, more than ten million migrants arrived on America's shores; between 1890
and 1920 over fifteen million more arrived. The United States did not only lure
immigrants from Europe, millions emigrated from Australia, New Zealand, South Africa,
Canada, Brazil, and Argentina and other areas of the globe.
There were two types of immigrants living in America for different reasons.
Permanent immigrants also known as "true" immigrants came to America because of
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what it had to offer: political and religious freedom as well as economic opportunity.
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