The ideology of nativism—favoring native inhabitants, as opposed to immigrants—has been very common and contentious within American politics for centuries. In this context "native" does not mean Indigenous Americans or American Indians, but refers to early European settlers and their descendants. Nativist movements have existed since before American independence, and have targeted a wide variety of nationalities. Historically, nativism was present even in colonial America. During that era, anti-German feelings, particularly towards the Pennsylvania Dutch, ran deep. Later on, when the U.S. became its own nation, the Federalist Party expressed opposition to the French Revolution, and also passed the 1798 anti-immigrant Alien and Sedition Acts. When immigration rates to the nation exploded in the 1840s and 1850s, nativism returned with a renewed fervor, with the word nativism itself coined by 1844, and the formation of the Know Nothing Party.
In the late 19th century, going into the early 20th, nativism began to reappear. Contemporary laws and treaties included the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act, the 1907 Gentlemen's Agreement (preventing Japanese immigration), the 1921 Emergency Quota Act, and the 1924 Immigration Act. Nativists and labor unions also argued for literacy tests, arguing that it would stop illiterate immigrants from Southern or Eastern Europe. In the 1970s, the immigration reductionism movement, which exists to this day, was formed. In the 2010s, the Tea Party Movement, which split off from the Republican Party, brought a new form of nativism. Donald Trump introduced several nativist policies, such as the 2017 Trump travel ban.
Background
Nativism According to Merriam-Webster, nativism is defined as:
a policy of favoring native inhabitants as opposed to immigrants the revival or perpetuation of an indigenous culture especially in opposition to acculturation
Nativism in United States politics
Is opposition to an internal minority on the basis of its supposed “un-American” foundation. Historian Tyler Anbinder defines a nativist as:Tyler Anbinder, Nativism and prejudice against immigrants in Reed Ueda, ed., A Companion to American Immigration (2011) pp. 177–201, at 177. someone who fears and resents immigrants and their impact on the United States, and wants to take some action against them, be it through violence, immigration restriction, or placing limits on the rights of newcomers already in the United States. “Nativism” describes the movement to bring the goals of nativists to fruition.
According to the historian John Higham, nativism is:an intense opposition to an internal minority on the grounds of its foreign (i.e., “un-American”) connections. Specific nativist antagonisms may and do, vary widely in response to the changing character of minority irritants and the shifting conditions of the day; but through each separate hostility runs the connecting, energizing force of modern nationalism. While drawing on much broader cultural antipathies and ethnocentric judgments, nativism translates them into zeal to destroy the enemies of a distinctively American way of life.John Higham, Strangers in the Land: Patterns of American Nativism, 1860–1925 (1955), p. 2.
History
Colonial America In the Pennsylvania Colony of British America, there existed widespread anti-German sentiment among Anglo-Americans (English settlers who were established in the colonies throughout the 17th century).https://www.emmigration.info/english-immigration-to-america.htm?utmhttps://www.britannica.com/topic/American-colonies This sentiment was particularly directed towards the Pennsylvania Dutch or Pennsylvania Germans, who originated from the Palatinate region of Europe. Rooted deeply in cultural biases and economic rivalry, Anglo-Americans harbored suspicions and often scorned the language, traditions, and religious practices of the Palatines.
Benjamin Franklin articulated his grievances regarding the arrival of Palatine Germans in his work "Observations Concerning the Increase of Mankind" (1751), expressing concern over the influx of "Palatine boors" into their settlements. Franklin questioned the wisdom of allowing Pennsylvania, originally founded by the English, to become dominated by "aliens" who would eventually outnumber the English settlers, leading to a Germanization of the colony rather than the Anglicization of the newcomers. Franklin argued that these newcomers would resist adopting English language and customs, just as they could not change their "complexion".John B. Frantz, "Franklin and the Pennsylvania Germans," Pennsylvania History, 65#1 (1998), 21–34 online
Early Republic Nativism became a major issue in the late 1790s, when the Federalist Party expressed its strong opposition to the French Revolution. Federalists were especially troubled by Republican leader Albert Gallatin, an immigrant from Geneva, Switzerland. Fearing that he represented foreign interests, the Federalists had him expelled from the Senate on a technicality in 1794. They then began to build their nativist appeals.Sean P. Harvey, "Tools of Foreign Influence: Albert Gallatin, Geneva, and Federalist Nativism before the Alien and Sedition Acts." Journal of the Early Republic 41.4 (2021): 523–551. They sought to strictly limit immigration, and to stretch the time to 14 years for citizenship. During the 1798 Quasi-War with France, the Federalists passed the Alien and Sedition Acts. They included the Alien Act, the Naturalization Act and the Sedition Act. The movement was led by Alexander Hamilton, despite his own status as an immigrant. Phillip Magness argues that "Hamilton's political career might legitimately be characterized as a sustained drift into nationalistic xenophobia."Phillip Magness, "Alexander Hamilton as Immigrant: Musical Mythology Meets Federalist Reality", The Independent Review 21#4 (2017) pp 497–508, quote on p 500. Thomas Jefferson and James Madison led the opposition by drafting the Virginia and Kentucky Resolutions. The two laws against aliens were motivated by fears of a growing Irish radical presence in Philadelphia, where they supported Jefferson.Douglas M. Bradburn, "'True Americans' and 'Hordes of Foreigners': Nationalism, Ethnicity and the Problem of Citizenship in the United States, 1789–1800." Historical Reflections/Réflexions Historiques (2003): 19–41. online However, they were not actually enforced.James Morton Smith,"The Enforcement of the Alien Friends Act of 1798." Mississippi Valley Historical Review 41.1 (1954): 85–104. online President John Adams annoyed his fellow Federalists by making peace with the Republic of France, and he also annoyed them by splitting his party in 1800. Jefferson was elected president, and was able to reverse most of the hostile legislation.Douglas Bradburn, "A clamor in the public mind: Opposition to the Alien and Sedition Acts." William and Mary Quarterly 65.3 (2008): 565–600. online
1830–1860 The rate of immigration into the new nation was slow until 1840, when it suddenly expanded, with the arrival of a total of over 4 million Irish and German (and other) immigrants, men, women and children, from 1840–1860. Nativist movements immediately emerged.Luke Ritter, Inventing America’s First Immigration Crisis: Political Nativism in the Antebellum West. Fordham University Press, 2021. P. 2 online The term "nativism" appeared by 1844: "Thousands were Naturalized expressly to oppose Nativism, and voted the Polk ticket mainly to that end."Whig Almanac 1845 quoted in Oxford English Dictionary (under "Nativism"). Nativism gained its name from the "Native American" parties of the 1840s and 1850s. In this context "Native" does not mean Indigenous Americans or American Indians but rather those European descendants of the settlers of the original Thirteen Colonies. Nativists objected primarily to Irish Roman Catholics because of their loyalty to the Pope and also because of their supposed rejection of republicanism as an American ideal.Ray A. Billington, The Protestant Crusade, 1800–1860: A Study of the Origins of American Nativism (1938) p. 1 online.
Nativist movements included the Know Nothing or "American Party" of the 1850s, the Immigration Restriction League of the 1890s, and the anti-Asian movements in the Western states, resulting in the passage of the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 and the signing of the "Gentlemen's Agreement of 1907", by which the government of Imperial Japan prevented Japanese nationals from emigrating to the United States. Labor unions were strong supporters of Chinese exclusion and limits on immigration, because they feared that immigrants would lower wages and make it harder for workers to organize themselves into unions.Tyler Anbinder, Nativism and Slavery: The Northern Know Nothings and the politics of the 1850s (1992).
Know Nothing Party mid-1850s
The Know Nothing party had a marching song they chanted in 1855:Luke Ritter, Inventing America's First Immigration Crisis: Political Nativism in the Antebellum West (Fordham UP, (2021) p 60.
Nativist outbursts occurred in the Northeast from the 1830s to the 1850s, primarily in response to a surge of Irish Catholic immigration. The leadership was mostly obscure local men, although 1836 the famous painter and telegraph inventor Samuel Morse was a leader. In 1844 the Order of United Americans was founded as a nativist fraternity, following the Philadelphia Nativist Riots.Billington, The Protestant Crusade, 1800–1860 p 336.
The nativists went public in 1854 when they formed the "American Party", which was especially hostile to the immigration of Irish Catholics, and campaigned for laws to require longer wait time between immigration and naturalization; these laws never passed. Henry Winter Davis, the Know-Nothing Congressman from Maryland, blamed the un-American Catholic immigrants for the election of James Buchanan in 1856, stating:Quoted in James Fairfax McLaughlin, The life and times of John Kelly, tribune of the people (1885) pp 72–73 online The recent election has developed in an aggravated form every evil against which the American party protested. Foreign allies have decided the government of the country – men naturalized in thousands on the eve of the election. Again in the fierce struggle for supremacy, men have forgotten the ban which the Republic puts on the intrusion of religious influence on the political arena. These influences have brought vast multitudes of foreign-born citizens to the polls, ignorant of American interests, without American feelings, influenced by foreign sympathies, to vote on American affairs; and those votes have, in point of fact, accomplished the present result.
It was at this time that the term "nativist" first appeared, as their opponents denounced them as "bigoted nativists". Former President Millard Fillmore ran on the American Party ticket for the Presidency in 1856, although he gave only weak support to nativism. The American Party also included many former Whigs who ignored nativism, and included (in the South) a few Roman Catholics whose families had long lived in America. Conversely, much of the opposition to Roman Catholics came from Protestant Irish immigrants and German Lutheran immigrants, who were not native at all and can hardly be called "nativists."Anbinder, Nativism and Slavery: The Northern Know Nothings and the politics of the 1850s