Essay - Immigration, Citizenship, Voting Question: Discuss the Changes in Immigration and...

Immigration, Citizenship, Voting

*****: Discuss the changes in immigration and citizenship qualifications between the years 1850-1930 The Right to Vote: The Contested History of Democracy ***** the United States by Alex*****er Keyssar

Changes in Immigration and Citizenship Qualifications and Political Agendas ***** 1850-1930

***** the ***** States between 1850 and 1930, issues of citizenship, naturalization, and universal suffrage became more important than ever to traditional political stakeholders, mainly due ***** massive immigration during that period, and the voting eligibility of new immigrants to the United States. After ratification ***** ***** Fifteenth Amendment in 1870, universal ***** (i.e., the right of everyone, not just property owners) continued to have both long-term supporters and long-term critics. Fur*****r, ***** to America, especially to the cities, had increased dramatically especially ***** ***** and 1910 (Keyssar).

***** of immigrants, once they attained ***** (the Act of 1802, which stated that in order ***** become a resident, an immigr*****t must ***** two witnesses to his or her residency ***** the United States, remained the law of the land for over 100 years ("This Month in Immigration His*****ry: March 1790"), became so numerous that their presence, as a group, forever changed the face of the *****n electorate (Keyssar). "The vast majority" of these immigrants, moreover, were "propertyless [sic] workers rather than settlers" (pp. 120-121), which did not sit well with the ***** power elite of the time.

Due to such demographic and political trends, beginning in the latter 1870's, widespread public criticisms of universal suffrage, ***** among ***** ***** elite, began ***** circulate in *****ations like ***** Nation. For example, to an anonymous author writing in that magazine ***** in 1877:

establishment ***** universal suffrage by the abolition of ***** property qualification made no practical change in the seat of the sovereignty. It left ***** just where it had always been. The additions it made ***** constituencies, ***** the shape of ignorant and penniless voters, were so trifling that *****y attracted no attention ***** produced no change in the character either ***** legislation or administration. (Qtd. In Keyssar, p.

***** many ways, the granting of universal ***** within the United *****, based on Fifteenth ***** rights, did ***** at first appear to change much, in terms ***** America's l*****gering power structure. However, in the l*****ter ***** of the *****, entrenched power *****terests in the United States to questi***** the *****itial wisdom ***** universal suffrage.

*****, *****n, ***** suffrage ***** not come without significant changes, for the poor and the rich alike. No longer able to control ***** political agenda as easily as be*****e, for example, politicians and policy-makers now ***** trying ***** shape the ***** itself various ways. Increasingly, according to Keyssar:

politics was a m*****ss activity, shaped by increasingly professional party organizations:

public demonstrations ***** parades were common; electoral turnout was high; urban political machines, both Republican and (more often) Democratic, traded services for the votes and loyalty of hundreds of thousands of city dwellers. (Keyssar, p. 118).

According to the article "This Month in Immigration