The 1965 reform capped annual immigration at 290,000 (170,000 for the eastern hemisphere and 120,000 for the western). Within these two quotas, visas would be awarded according to one of seven preferences (one refugee, two occupational, and four family preferences). These seemingly simple provisions set up the conditions for endless chain migrations from the Third World. First, professionals (doctors, scientists, and engineers), most of whom were educated in the West, applied for skilled occupational visas granting permanent residency. They could then request visas for their spouses and unmarried children. Refugees could do the same. Once our new residents became American citizens, they could get visas for their brothers and sisters. The brothers and sisters then repeated the process by requesting visas for their spouses and children. By the 1980s, the admissions of brothers and sisters of US citizens accounted for two-thirds of all family visas. This was the main form of chain migration.
It is important to remember that once an immigrant has American citizenship, he is entitled to bring in his wife, minor children, and parents automatically, and they do not count toward filling quotas. The result was that by the 1980s immigration exempt from the quotas was greater than immigration under the quotas themselves. For example, in 1985, the ceiling for immigration was 254,000 but total legal immigration was 570,000.
At the same time, ever-larger numbers of foreigners were entering illegally. Many millions, mostly Mexicans and other Central Americans, simply sneaked across the southern border. Others overstayed various temporary student or tourism visas, and the INS made only perfunctory efforts to find them.
Prof. Graham fails to point out that the refusal of the federal government to enforce immigration laws was, in effect, a policy decision common to every administration since Lyndon Johnsons, to increase immigration beyond the legal limits. He also fails to explain the effect of granting automatic citizenship to children born on US soil even if their parents were here illegally. Since they were now parents of US citizens, they could not be deported. Their children had a legal right to attend school, and the family was eligible for welfare.
If the 1980s were a decade of defeat, the 1990s were a rout. Only four years after Simpson-Mazzoli, Congress raised the legal ceiling from 500,000 to 700,000, created new diversity visas for people from underrepresented countries, and launched a new temporary worker program (H-1B) to issue 65,000 visas a year to high-tech workers. Polls continued to show the public wanted less immigration, but Congress gave it more.In 1998, it raised the annual number of H-1B visas to 115,000, and in 2000 increased the figure to 195,000. In late 2000, Congress passed, and President Clinton signed, a law granting permanent legal residency to 500,000 illegal aliens and refugees from El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Haiti.
