Immigration in America Before 1900

Written by: Roberto Santiago-Garcia, Immigration Help USA (A Division of Lex Tecnica) Law Clerk

“America has always been a refuge from tyranny. As a nation conceived in liberty, it has held out to the world the promise of respect for the rights of man. Every time a revolution has failed … every time a nation has succumbed to tyranny, men and women who love freedom have assembled their families and their belongings and set sail across the seas.”¹ — President John F. Kennedy

Leaving your home country is never an easy decision. Everything that makes life worth living — family, work, and education — is forever impacted. Still, the desire to improve one’s condition has driven human migration for centuries. Immigrants to America, whether historic or recent, are no different, immigrating to seek a better life for themselves and their posterity.

It is a gamble. There is no guarantee. Immigrants often face discrimination, work barriers, and travel restrictions in their home country. Still, the desire to improve one’s condition has compelled generations of immigrants to take that gamble. In doing so, each generation of immigrants has contributed to the nation’s progress.

America’s early demographics were shaped by waves of voluntary European immigration and the transatlantic slave trade. Columbus’s 1492 “discovery” of the “New World” sparked a scramble for its resources among European powers.² St. Augustine, the first permanent settlement in America, was established by the Spanish in 1565 as a military post.³ Spain founded the settlement partly in response to Fort Caroline, a French colony built on land Spain claimed near present-day Jacksonville, Florida. Spanish forces later attacked and wiped out the French colony.⁴

Jamestown, America’s first permanent English settlement, was founded in 1607.⁵ Sponsored by the Virginia Company of London as a profit-seeking venture, the colony expanded English influence in the region while counterbalancing the territorial expansion of rival European nations.⁶ Other European powers quickly followed, with the French establishing Quebec in 1608,⁷ and the Dutch establishing New Amsterdam, later renamed New York, by 1624.⁸

Many early English immigrants to New England came fleeing religious persecution. Between 1630 and 1640, over 200 ships carrying approximately 20,000 mostly Puritan immigrants arrived in Massachusetts.⁹

Approximately 450,000 enslaved Africans arrived in the United States between 1525 and 1866.¹⁰ In particular, the tobacco and rice industries in the Southern United States oversaw the importation of approximately 278,000 enslaved Africans between 1700 and 1775.¹¹ Between 1619 and 1699, the pounds of tobacco per farm worker increased from 712 pounds per worker to 1,710 pounds per worker.¹² Simultaneously, the importation of enslaved Africans also increased, reaching 7,000 per decade in 1670 and then doubling to 13,500 per decade by 1750.¹³

South Carolina’s rice industry oversaw a similar increase in the importation of enslaved Africans, increasing to more than 20,000 per decade during the 1720s, and continuing at about 17,000 per decade from the 1750s to the 1790s.¹⁴ By the time of the first U.S. Census in 1790, there were approximately 697,897 enslaved Africans and 59,466 “Free Colored” people present in America. By 1860, more than four million “colored people” resided in the Southern United States, including approximately 3,953,760 enslaved people and 487,970 Free Colored people, accounting for roughly one-third of the total population.¹⁵

Between 1815 and 1860, more than 5 million immigrants arrived in America, mostly from European countries, mainly Great Britain, Ireland, and the German states.¹⁶ Ireland’s 1845 Potato Blight launched a wave of Irish immigration to America, comprising nearly half of all immigrants to the United States during the 1840s.¹⁷ Between 1845 and 1855, approximately 1.8 million people left Ireland for Canada and the United States.¹⁸

During the 1850s, the California Gold Rush attracted immigrants from all over the world. At the start of the Gold Rush, the 1850 Census estimated a population of 1,000 Asian Americans on the U.S. mainland. By 1860, that number had grown to 37,000. A majority of the immigrants came from Kuangtung Province in southern China.¹⁹ In 1886, the Japanese government and Hawaiian sugar plantations reached an agreement to import 180,000 Japanese plantation workers to the islands by 1908.²⁰ During that time, approximately 175,000 Chinese immigrants and 150,000 Japanese immigrants arrived in America.²¹

Approximately 200,000 German immigrants, with many fleeing the failed German Revolution of 1848 and the ensuing economic hardships, had arrived in the United States by 1854.²² The 1880s marked a shift in immigration demographics as immigration from Eastern Europe surged, bringing in a large influx of Polish, Russian, Ukrainian, Lithuanian, and Jewish immigrants.²³

Immigrants played a foundational role in building the American economy during the nineteenth century. Over 3,000 Irish helped to build New York’s Erie Canal, creating an efficient, low-cost transportation route for agricultural and industrial goods between the East Coast and the Midwest.²⁴ German Americans made many important contributions to American culture, introducing foods like hot dogs and hamburgers and popularizing beer brewing.²⁵ Chinese laborers built a majority of the western part of the transcontinental railroad, performing some of the most dangerous work, including blasting tunnels through the Sierra Nevada Mountains.²⁶

Immigration fundamentally transformed the United States into one of the most economically dynamic and culturally diverse nations in the world by the turn of the 20th century. Immigrants and their descendants built the railroads, canals, and factories that powered the growth of American cities. These immigration waves contributed to an enduring cultural legacy inseparable from the American identity.

References

1. John F. Kennedy, A Nation of Immigrants 7, revised and enlarged edition, 1964.

2. Europeans Discover the Americas, U.S. History I: Precolonial to Gilded Age, https://mlpp.pressbooks.pub/ushistory1/chapter/europeans-discover-the-americas/

3. Overview, Colonial Settlement, 1600s–1763, Library of Congress, https://www.loc.gov/classroom-materials/united-states-history-primary-source-timeline/colonial-settlement-1600-1763/overview/

4. Fort Caroline National Memorial, National Parks Conservation Association, https://www.npca.org/parks/fort-caroline-national-memorial

5. History of Jamestown, Jamestown-Yorktown Foundation, https://www.jyfmuseums.org/visit/jamestown-settlement/history-of-jamestown

6. Id.

7. Id.

8. New Amsterdam Becomes New York, History, https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/september-8/new-amsterdam-becomes-new-york

9. History of Immigration from 1620 to 1783, EBSCO, 2018, https://www.ebsco.com/research-starters/history/history-immigration-1620-1783

10. How Many Africans Were Really Taken to the U.S. During the Slave Trade?, African American History Museum, https://www.abhmuseum.org/how-many-africans-were-really-taken-to-the-u-s-during-the-slave-trade/

11. EBSCO, supra note 9.

12. Gary M. Pecquet, British Mercantilism and Crop Controls in the Tobacco Colonies: A Study of Rent-Seeking Costs, 22 Cato Journal 467, 2003, https://www.cato.org/sites/cato.org/files/serials/files/cato-journal/2003/1/cj22n3-5.pdf

13. EBSCO, supra note 11.

14. Id.

15. U.S. Census Office, Population of the United States in 1860; Compiled from the Original Returns of the Eighth Census, ix, https://www2.census.gov/library/publications/decennial/1860/population/1860a-02.pdf

16. 1800s U.S. Immigration, Ancestry, https://www.ancestry.com/c/family-history-learning-hub/1800-us-immigration

17. Irish-Catholic Immigration to America, Library of Congress, https://www.loc.gov/classroom-materials/immigration/irish/irish-catholic-immigration-to-america/

18. Kara Rota, The Hands that Built America, Irish America, May 1, 2024, https://www.irishamerica.com/2024/05/the-hands-that-built-america/

19. Alicia J. Campi, “Eating Bitterness”: The Impact of Asian-Pacific Migration on U.S. Immigration Policy, American Immigration Law Foundation, 2, May 2004, https://www.americanimmigrationcouncil.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/Brief19%20-%20Eating%20Bitterness.pdf

20. Id.

21. Ancestry, supra note 16.

22. New Surge of Growth, Library of Congress, https://www.loc.gov/classroom-materials/immigration/german/new-surge-of-growth/

23. A People at Risk, Library of Congress, https://www.loc.gov/classroom-materials/immigration/polish-russian/a-people-at-risk/

24. Kara Rota, supra note 18.

25. Anna Fiorentino, Your Favorite Fourth of July Foods Were Invented by Immigrants, National Geographic, July 2, 2025, https://www.nationalgeographic.com/history/article/july-fourth-independence-day-food-history

26. The Transcontinental Railroad and the Asian American Story, Smithsonian National Postal Museum, https://postalmuseum.si.edu/the-transcontinental-railroad-and-the-asian-american-story

This article has been reviewed and approved for legal accuracy by Tamaryn Da Ponte, Esq. It is intended for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice.