-A politician claims that he can tell immigrants “by their shoes.”
-A candidate for Governor of Alabama proclaims that in his state, “We speak English.”
-Arizona passes an immigration law that one critic calls “appalling.”
These are but a few of the blowups in the firestorm over immigration ignited by Arizona’s recent legislation. That law prompted Linda Greenhouse, the eminent, longtime New York Times Supreme Court correspondent, to call Arizona “a police state.”
All of this reminds me that there is nothing new in this country about anti-immigrant frenzy. It was part of the American scene long before the nation’s birth. That is a historic truth I explored in this 2007 Op-ed for the New York Times
The anti-immigrant fury took off in the 1830s, leading to the creation of a major political party (called the “Know-Nothings”). The fury exploded into violence with anti-Catholic, anti-immigrant riots that swept over Philadelphia in May 1844.
I tell the story of these riots and the country’s anti-immigrant mood in my new book A NATION RISING
