New York City is one of the most diverse places in the world with a rich cultural and immigrant heritage. For those looking to learn more about the city’s (and nation’s) immigration and migration history—including both voluntary and forced migration—we recommend ten locations to visit. We have included both well-known and off-the-radar spots.
Read moreNew York Times: “Diversity Visa Lottery: Inside the Program That Admitted a Terror Suspect”
Following the terror attack in New York City last week when a man drove a rented truck down a bike path killing eight, President Trump is calling for the elimination of the Diversity Visa (DV) Program, which allowed the suspected terrorist, Sayfullo Saipov, to gain legal permanent resident status. Claiming he wants “merit based” immigration, President Trump says he is asking Congress to “immediately initiate work to get rid of this program.” Throughout the years, lawmakers have made multiple attempts to end the diversity visa program, citing reasons of fraud, increased numbers of low-skilled (and thus supposedly less desirable) immigrant workers, and claims that diversity recipients are not properly vetted and threats to national security.
Read moreHappy Birthday, Emma!
“'Give me your tired, your poor, / Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, / The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. / Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, / I lift my lamp beside the golden door!'” —Emma Lazarus
On this day in 1849 Emma Lazarus was born into a wealthy New York family descended from Sephardic Jewish Americans. With a clear talent for poetry, she attracted the notice of Ralph Waldo Emerson. Emma Lazarus’s famous poem was originally commissioned for a fund-raising campaign by artists and writers to pay for the statue’s pedestal. Only after her death did it become synonymous with the Statute of Liberty and transformed the statue into the “Mother of Exiles," welcoming new generations of immigrants from all over the world. In 1903, after determined lobbying by a friend of Lazarus who was descended from Alexander Hamilton, himself a famous immigrant, the poem was affixed to the pedestal.
Welcome to the New Ellis Island
“Through the blue door, please.”
This line from the movie Brooklyn, which incidentally we highly recommend, is said by an American immigration official at Ellis Island to Eilis Lacey (played wonderfully by Saoirse Ronan) after her long and uncomfortable boat trip to America. After Eilis is processed at immigration, and as she makes her way to the blue doors, we see behind those doors a bright and heavenly light shining down, signifying hope and new opportunities in America.
Ellis Island, where those blue doors welcomed immigrants for many years, is one of the most famous American immigration landmarks. This tiny island off the southeast tip of Manhattan served as the nation’s first federal immigration processing center from 1892 to 1954, and millions of Americans (including me) can trace their heritage to ancestors who first arrived here. The National Park Service recently opened the newly-renovated and expanded Ellis Island Museum after extensive damage by Hurricane Sandy, and I decided to check it out.
Read moreEnormous Power
Castle Garden
America’s first immigration processing center—which saw approximately eight million immigrants pass through—has a varied history. It was originally built as a fort in 1811 to protect Manhattan against a possible British attack in the war of 1812, and in 1824 it was renamed Castle Garden and turned into an entertainment complex that hosted such performers as the famed Swedish singer Jenny Lind (the Swedish Nightingale), General Lafayette on his American tour, and the 19th century celebrity, courtesan, and “Spanish Dancer,” Lola Montez, who inspired the songs,“Whatever Lola Wants, Lola Gets, ” and Barry Manilow’s “Copacabana.”
Following the end of the Napoleonic wars in 1815, Castle Garden was converted into an immigration center where the large numbers of European immigrants who were arriving in America could receive lodging and travel information, medical attention, and honest currency exchange. Castle Garden closed as an immigration center in 1892 when the federal government transferred immigration processing to Ellis Island. Reopening as an aquarium, the repurposed Castle Garden drew 30,000 people to look at creatures from nearby waters, and soon the aquarium had species from around the globe. In 1941, the aquarium closed, and the structure was saved from destruction only by the work of concerned citizens who were able to classify the building as a national monument in 1946.
Now these many years later, true to its varied past, Castle Garden has a new use: a ticket booth for Ellis and Liberty Island tickets. God bless America!
OPINION: Nothing to Fear But Fear of Immigrants: America’s Worst Immigration Laws and What Current Politicians Can Learn from Them
Some of the unpleasant rhetoric surrounding the presidential campaign involves suggestions that the immigration laws should be changed seemingly based on fears and prejudices. While these debates bring me uneasiness, it certainly isn’t a unique occurrence in our country’s history that fear-based immigration laws are passed reflecting our country’s mores at the time.
Read moreNew York Times Op-Ed: "Tomorrow’s America, in Queens"
When fifty years ago the 1964-65 World's Fair opened in Flushing Meadow Park, critics did not love it, says Joseph Tirella, author of Tomorrow-Land: The 1964-65 World’s Fair and the Transformation of America. These critics, who called it backward and middlebrow, missed the point:
It wasn’t about fancy pavilions or gee-whiz technology. By introducing the country to cultures beyond Western Europe, the World’s Fair laid the groundwork for the demographic revolution that would transform America in subsequent decades.
Although the fair exhibited Michelangelo’s “La Pietà" on loan from the Vatican (thanks, guys) as well as many American exhibits (such as Disney's “It’s a Small World” ride), due to a boycott by most Western European countries, Mr. Tirella writes that "Flushing Meadow was populated by the rest: Africa and Asia, the Middle East and the Caribbean, and Central and South America all came to Queens, bringing with them their peoples, their languages and their cultures." In 1965, the same month the fair closed, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed into law the 1965 Immigration Act, which opened up the US to millions and helped create the diverse ethnic groups seen today in Queens and the US.
The NY Times has published recollections by some of the fifty-one million fairgoers, and also detailed some the activism and protests that occurred at the fair. The Brian Lehrer Show discussed the fair's significance (Belgian waffles and color TV!). And in case you're curious, here according to General Motors Futurama 2 ride, is what the future--"a world of awesome beauty"--was supposed to look like (perhaps still will):
An Irishman in New York (sort of)
St. Patrick’s Day. The feast day of the patron saint of Ireland. A day to honor Irish culture and heritage. As an Irishman (sort of, well, Irish last name), this year I decided to check out a few ways that New York City celebrates.
The big one, of course, is the parade. The first march was on March 17, 1762, fourteen years before the Declaration of Independence, and is what organizers claim the “country’s oldest and proudest Irish tradition.” I arrive on Fifth Avenue across from the Metropolitan Museum a little after 11am last Monday. It’s mostly deserted, except for a few police officers on the corners, a young couple with dyed green hair holding each other, and a few other bystanders trying to keep warm. The parade is coming north from downtown, but I have time. I should have stopped for a Guinness (not a sponsor).
Read moreHard Times on the Lower East Side
When people ask what made me become an immigration attorney, it’s difficult to give one reason since I can usually think up a number of influences. But one of these influences was a trip I took as a teenager to The Tenement Museum in New York’s Lower East Side. It was an exceptionally hot August weekend when my mom, aunt, and I took the train to the City for the day. It wasn’t a day that I particularly wanted to be traipsing around tiny tenement apartments—but that’s just what made it so meaningful. We felt in some way how it really would have been one hundred years ago to live in such conditions. As my own ancestors came to the US during the end of the 19th century during the pogroms in Eastern Europe, I could better appreciate what their life may have been like upon arriving in America. I recently had the pleasure to re-visit the museum (on a much cooler day, I’m happy to say), and I can report that the experience is still very worthwhile.
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