Grauberger 1

Kenzie Grauberger

Colleen Goodrich

3 April 2019

HIS 122

Final Paper

Immigration Difficulties in the Late 1800s and Early 1900s

During the late 1800s and early 1900s, many immigrants found a life in the United States.

Immigrants chose to move to the United States because they found life to be “better” and the

United States brought more opportunities than their home land. As stated in The Library of

Congress “With hope for a brighter future, nearly 12 million immigrants arrived in the United

States between 1870 and 1900. During the 1870s and 1880s, the vast majority of these people

were from Germany, Ireland, and England” (“Rise of Industrial America, 1876-1900:

Immigration to the United States, 1851-1900”). With a high number of immigrants arriving in

the United States in a short period of time, there were many difficulties these immigrants faced.

The difficulties faced by immigrants in the late 1800s and early 1900s include harsh working

conditions, discrimination, and poor living conditions.

Many immigrants moved to America to find a better life. They wanted to flee their home

countries, so they could practice their own religion. They wanted to flee the racial and political

discriminations. They also wanted to flee the lack of economic opportunities and the famine.

Some immigrants were pulled to America because they were promised work. Some were even

promised free land. But it wasn’t that easy. As one Italian immigrant said “I came to America

because I heard the streets were paved with gold. When I got here, found out three things: First,

the streets weren’t paved with gold; second, they weren’t paved at all; and third, I was expected
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to pave them” (“Immigration in the Early 1900s”). Many immigrants, like the Italian man, were

mislead and didn’t experience what they thought they would. When immigrants arrived in

America, they were very disappointed in what they found to be true. They were challenged to

live in the United States with work, living conditions, and the economy.

Harsh working conditions were one of the main difficulties faced by immigrants in the

late 1800s and early 1900s. Many immigrants faced long hours of work, low paying jobs, and

unsafe working conditions. Immigrants would start their day of work early in the morning and

end late in the evening. There was no time to spend time with their families. Rose Cohen was a

child when she came to the United States. She came from Germany with her Aunt and father to

live in Eastern New York. Cohen wrote in her book Out of the Shadow “When he went away in

the morning it was still dark, and when he came home at night the lights in the halls were out. It

was after ten o’clock” (74). Cohen was talking about her father. He was never home to spend

time with his daughter. He worked from dark to dark, to earn money for his family of three at

home. Even though he worked early in the mornings to late in the evenings, he still wasn’t

making as much money as the Americans would had worked from eight in the morning to five in

the evening. The pay immigrants received in their work was very low. They would receive just

enough money to pay for their rent and the necessary items to live. Immigrants had to live with

as little as possible with the money they received from work. At age fourteen, Henry Boucher

began to work in order to bring more money to his family of nine. Boucher informed the

interviewer “the pay was but five dollars a week during the eighteen months that I worked for

this public-spirited grocer.” Five dollars a week would be about one cent an hour if they were to

work ten hours, five days a week. This was barely enough to make a living for many immigrants,

and that is why children began to work at such a young age. The working conditions immigrants
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faced were very dangerous. In some cases, there were many deaths within different types of jobs.

Deaths were caused by machines while others were caused by diseases in the air. Jacob Saranoff,

from Russia, is a great example of death in the workplace. Saranoff worked in a rag-shop located

in an abandoned horse barn. The floors, as described by his wife were “never swept. The dust

was allowed to gather day after day, week after week.” Several years later, Saranoff had coughed

up chunks of blood to then be pronounced dead a week later. The working areas were not kept

clean, causing diseases to easily spread and cause death.

Discrimination was another difficulty faced by immigrants in the late 1800s and early

1900s. During this time period, there were many different races of immigrants. There were

Germans, Italians, Chinese, and many more. One form of discrimination faced by immigrants

was the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882. This act “required the few nonlaborers who sought entry

to obtain certification from the Chinese government that they were qualified to immigrate”

(“Chinese Exclusion Act (1882)”). The act also affected the immigrants who had already

immigrated to the United States. It stated that they cannot leave the country and come back

without the certification from the Chinese government. Even though this act was issued for 10

years, in 1892, another act was passed called the Geary Act. The Geary Act said that any Chinese

living in the United States must have a certificate of citizenship. If they didn’t have one, they

would be deported. Another form of discrimination was certain businesses refusing Irish workers

to apply for a position. A song written by John F. Poole shows how terrible employers were to

different races. In his song, Poole sings:

I'm a dacint boy, just landed from the town of Ballyfad;

I want a situation: yis, I want it mighty bad.

I saw a place advartised. It's the thing for me, says I;

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But the dirty spalpeen ended with: No Irish need apply.

Whoo! says I; but that's an insult -- though to get the place I'll try.

So, I wint to see the blaggar with: No Irish need apply.

Poole couldn’t find a job, only because he was Irish. Later in his song, Poole mentioned that he

wasn’t able to buy a house, only because he was Irish. This made it very difficult for immigrants

to find a happy life in America, just the opposite of what they were promised.

Finally, poor living conditions were one of the difficulties faced by many immigrants in

the late 1800s and early 1900s. Many immigrant families lived in small houses or apartments.

The families included children, parents, grandparents, and sometimes even great grandparents.

Phillippe Lemay, a French Canadian, described his house as followed:

Our kitchen had to serve also as dining-room and living-room. There was no such

thing as a parlor and no place for one, because all the other rooms, including the

front one, were bed-rooms and there weren't too many, you can bet on that.... The

floors, not always of hard wood, were bare and had to be scrubbed on hands and

knees with lye or some other strong stuff, once a week at least, on Saturdays….

There was no hot water in large, convenient tanks, only the one you heated on the

kitchen stove in the washboiler, pans and pots, or if you came to afford it, a tea-

kettle. This hot water served for cooking, washing the dishes, clothes and floors

and to take the weekly bath in the wash tub....

Lemay provides visuals for the way his house was set up. Living conditions weren’t like they are

today. Immigrants didn’t have the money to but what they wanted. They had money to buy what

they needed and that was all, so they had to live off of what they could get.
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Throughout the early 1800s and early 1900s, many different actions were taken to limit

and even stop immigration in the United States. The Immigration Act of 1882 was the first

immigration law enacted by Congress. It stated, “The Treasury Department was mandated to

issue regulations for the orderly admission of immigrants and to collect a ‘head tax’ of fifty cents

for each arriving immigrant to defray administrative expenses” (Bromberg). In 1891, another

Immigration Act was put into place that increased the government regulations. Then, the

Immigration Act of 1907 narrowed Asian immigration, limited Muslim immigration, and

widened the definition of unwanted women immigrants. These are just a few of the many acts

that Congress passed. Immigrants couldn’t enter the land they traveled many days for. They

would dream about the United States every night while on their ship, to then be rejected by the

United States and go back to their home land.

It wasn’t always easy for immigrants to find a happy home in the United States. They

were brought to the United States for jobs, freedom, and homes, but they still struggled to obtain

any of those. With harsh working conditions, discrimination, and poor living conditions,

immigrants couldn’t see the happiness they were promised in America. But, at the end of the

day, immigrants were thankful they got away from their home lands to live a safer and somewhat

better life on the land of the United States.

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Works Cited

An act to execute certain treaty stipulations relating to the Chinese, May 6, 1882; Enrolled Acts

and Resolutions of Congress, 1789-1996; General Records of the United States

Government; Record Group 11; National Archives.

Bromberg, Howard. “Immigration Act of 1882.” Immigration to the United States,

immigrationtounitedstates.org/584-immigration-act-of-1882.html.

Cohen, Rose, excerpt from “Out of the Shadow,” Digital Public Library of America,

http://dp.la/item/b28bc19200b96f4f759c05557967ebb4.

“French Canadian Textile Worker - American Memory Timeline- Classroom Presentation |

Teacher Resources.” Library of Congress, Victor,

www.loc.gov/teachers/classroommaterials/presentationsandactivities/presentations/timeli

ne/riseind/immgnts/textile.html.

“Henry Boucher, French Canadian Textile Worker - American Memory Timeline- Classroom

Presentation | Teacher Resources.” Library of Congress, Victor,

www.loc.gov/teachers/classroommaterials/presentationsandactivities/presentations/timeli

ne/progress/immigrnt/boucher.html.

“Immigration in the early 1900s,” EyeWitness to History, www.eyewitnesstohistory.com (2000).

“Immigrating to America, 1905,” EyeWitness to History, www.eyewitnesstohistory.com (2005).

"Immigration to the United States - American Memory Timeline- Classroom Presentation |

Teacher Resources - Library of Congress."

http://www.loc.gov/teachers/classroommaterials/presentationsandactivities/presentations/

timeline/riseind/immgnts/.
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“The Saranoff Family Embraces America - American Memory Timeline- Classroom

Presentation | Teacher Resources.” Library of Congress, Victor,

www.loc.gov/teachers/classroommaterials/presentationsandactivities/presentations/timeli

ne/progress/immigrnt/saranoff.html.

Turner, Laura Leddy. "Challenges Faced by Immigrants in the 19th Century." Synonym. June

25, 2018. Accessed September 30, 2018. https://classroom.synonym.com/challenges-

faced-immigrants-19th-century-9525.html.