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Asian Immigration World War II and After394256541686Immigration from Asia, 1950-2008 Source:?Department of Homeland Security, Yearbook of Immigration Statistics, 2008. Figures cover all regions of Asia, including the Middle East, and include only immigrants who obtained legal permanent resident status.00Immigration from Asia, 1950-2008 Source:?Department of Homeland Security, Yearbook of Immigration Statistics, 2008. Figures cover all regions of Asia, including the Middle East, and include only immigrants who obtained legal permanent resident status.After Japan attacked Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, the United States reacted harshly against Japanese Americans. Executive Order 9066, signed by U.S. president Franklin D. Roosevelt on February 19, 1942, directed federal authorities to relocate from their homes on the West Coast all persons of Japanese ancestry, both aliens and U.S. citizens alike. Eventually, more than 110,000 ethnic Japanese were sent to relocation camps dispersed in remote regions of the Far West.?The internment order was the infamous high water mark of anti-Asian U.S. sentiment. The Chinese Exclusion Act was repealed in 1943, as the United States and China were wartime allies. Repeal of the discriminatory law carried much symbolic weight. By 1944, internees were starting to be released from the Japanese relocation centers, which were finally closed in 1945. Meanwhile, Japanese American volunteer soldiers fought bravely in World War II.?After World War II ended in 1945, U.S. immigration policy shifted positively toward Asian immigration. In 1946, Filipinos and Asian Indians were given the right to become naturalized citizens. In 1947, Asian American soldiers were allowed to bring home their Asian spouses. After Mao Zedong’s Communist Party created the People’s Republic of China in 1949, the United States granted refugee status to 5,000 Chinese studying in America.?The Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952 gave Asian immigrants the right to become U.S. citizens. The act set national quotas for immigration while establishing non-quota immigration rights for spouses and unmarried children of U.S. citizens. This provision greatly helped male Asian immigrants, particularly Chinese and Filipinos, bring in their wives after they obtained citizenship.?Indicative of the 1952 act’s positive effect on Asian immigration, the number of Asian Americans living in the continental United States, which had risen from 254,918 in 1940 to 321,033 in 1950, climbed to 565,443 in the U.S. Census of 1960. As always, the census did not distinguish between citizens and alien residents. Nevertheless, its data offer a valuable tool to measure success of Asian immigration. When Hawaii became a U.S. state in 1959, it added some 315,000 Asian Americans to the U.S. population, as well more than 100,000 people of either full or partial Hawaiian descent. In Hawaii, Asian Americans immediately won political power, as Daniel Inouye and Hiram Fong became the first two Hawaiian representatives in the U.S. Congress. In 1962, Inouye became the first Asian American senator.?Benefits from Immigration LiberalizationThe Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 finally did away with national quotas and established race-blind immigration. Instead of quotas for individual nations, as before, each nation could send up to 20,000 immigrants per year to the United States, including people with special skills. The Eastern Hemisphere, including Asia, was allotted an annual total of 170,000 immigrants.?The 1970 U.S. Census showed that 1,538,721 Asian Americans, including 100,179 Hawaiians/ Pacific Islanders, lived in the United States. They accounted for 0.8 percent of the population. As only Japanese, Chinese, Filipinos, and Koreans were counted as “Asian Americans,” Asian minorities from countries, such as India, fell into the census’s “Other” category. Consequently, the total Asian American population was undercounted.?left12065Profile of Asian immigrants*Immigrants who obtained legal permanent resident status in the United States.?Source:?Department of Homeland Security, Yearbook of Immigration Statistics, 2008.00Profile of Asian immigrants*Immigrants who obtained legal permanent resident status in the United States.?Source:?Department of Homeland Security, Yearbook of Immigration Statistics, 2008.After communist regimes took power in Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos during the mid-1970’s, the composition of Asian immigration to the United States altered significantly. To welcome new Southeast Asian refugees, Congress passed the Indochina Migration and Refugee Assistance Act on May 23, 1975. The 1980 U.S. Census showed that of the 3,500,439 Asian Americans, including Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders, there were 261,729 Vietnamese living in the United States. Six years earlier, only 260 Vietnamese were known to be in the United States; most of them were students.?The 1980 census also revealed that the number of Asian Indians had risen to 387,223. This made them the fourth-largest Asian American community in the United States, after Chinese, Japanese, and Filipino Americans. Each of the latter groups numbered about 700,000 to 800,000 people. In contrast to other Asian immigrants, most Indians arrived in the United States already speaking English. Many of them were attracted by the booming American computer and electronics industries.?During the 1980’s, Asian immigration to the United States doubled the population of Asian Americans, who numbered 7,273,662, or 2.9 percent of the total U.S. population, in 1990. The Immigration Act of 1990 sought to diversify immigration to America. This worked against Asian countries with many potential immigrants. However, family members were still given preferences.?The 2000 U.S. Census recognized the increasing national diversity of Asian Americans. For the first time, it listed six different ethnic categories, as well as “Other Asian.” Also for the first time, people could be listed as members of more than one racial or ethnic category, reflecting the growing significance of interracial marriages. The census counted 11.9 million Asian Americans, including 1.7 million people with mixed Asian heritage, or 4.2 percent of the U.S. population.?Asian immigration to the United States continued strongly during the early twenty-first century. In 2007, the American Community Survey estimated that almost 13 million Asian Americans and 1 million “Asian/Caucasian” Americans were living in the United States, accounting for 4.7 percent of America’s total population. At the same time, Asian Americans gained much greater visibility in all aspects of U.S. society, including politics, economics, and popular culture. The United States continued to attract Asian immigrants, leading to a strong growth of Asian American communities.?Citation:“Asian Immigrants.”?Immigration to the United States, 359-asian-immigrants.html. ................
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