Explain the causes and effects of the new immigration from southern and eastern Europe and Asia, the growth of cities, the rise of nativism, and the reform response, including geographic patterns of settlement (Tennessee Academic Standards for Social Studies, United States History and Geography, US.07).

What this topic is asking

Standard US.07 asks how the new immigration and the explosive growth of cities transformed American society between roughly 1880 and 1920. For the EOC that means understanding who the new immigrants were and why they came (push and pull factors), how they entered through Ellis Island and Angel Island, how industrial cities grew (and their tenements and problems), and how nativism produced restrictions like the Chinese Exclusion Act while reformers responded with settlement houses.

The new immigration

The decades after the Civil War saw a historic surge of immigration that changed in origin:

• The "old immigration" (before about 1880) came mostly from northern and western Europe (Britain, Ireland, Germany, Scandinavia).
• The "new immigration" (about 1880 to 1920) came mostly from southern and eastern Europe (Italy, Poland, Russia, the Austro-Hungarian and Ottoman lands) and from Asia (especially China and later Japan).

Ports of entry: Ellis Island and Angel Island

Most European immigrants arrived at Ellis Island, the immigration station in New York Harbor, where they were inspected and processed beneath the Statue of Liberty. On the West Coast, many Asian immigrants were processed at Angel Island in San Francisco Bay, where conditions were harsher and detentions longer because of discriminatory policies.

The growth of cities

The new immigrants, along with Americans leaving farms, poured into industrial cities, which grew explosively. Cities offered factory jobs but also serious problems:

• Overcrowded tenements (cheap, cramped apartment buildings) with poor light, air, and sanitation.
• Disease, fire hazards, and pollution.
• Strained services and the rise of political machines that traded help for votes.

New technology reshaped the city, too: skyscrapers (made possible by steel and the elevator), streetcars and subways, and bridges expanded where people could live and work.

Nativism and restriction

The scale of immigration, religious and cultural differences, and competition for jobs and housing fueled nativism.

The reform response

Not everyone responded with hostility. Reformers built settlement houses in immigrant neighborhoods to provide education, child care, English classes, and health services. The most famous was Hull House in Chicago, founded by Jane Addams. Settlement houses helped immigrants adjust and became a training ground for the Progressive reformers of the next era.

Why this matters for the EOC

This topic is rich in cause and effect (why people migrated and what cities became), vocabulary (push and pull factors, nativism, tenement, assimilation), and geography (the ports of entry and the urban concentration of immigrants in the Northeast and Midwest). It connects directly to the labor movement (immigrants filled the factories) and the Progressive Era (urban problems drove reform).

Try this

Q1. State where most new immigrants came from and one reason they came. [2]

• Cue. Mostly southern and eastern Europe (and parts of Asia); reasons include jobs, freedom, escape from poverty or persecution.

Q2. Define nativism and give one example of a nativist law. [2]

• Cue. Nativism favors native-born Americans over immigrants and supports restriction; example: the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882.