Since the enactment of the Hart-Celler Act of 1965, a growing number of persons have achieved immigrant status because they were “immediate family members” of United States citizens (defined as spouses, unmarried minor children, and parents of adult U.S. citizens). Entering as an immediate family member has a huge advantage: there was no limit in numbers compared to the regular preferences. For some nations, many of the regular categories were backlogged for years, but immediate family members could usually be approved in less than one year.

In 1968, the year the Hart-Celler Act became effective, immediate family members totaled 43,670, which was not too far from the number predicted when the legislators were debating the new immigration law.Footnote ¹ Yet the growing number of immediate family members quickly became a major source for immigration. In 1996, immediate family members of U.S. citizens totaled 300,439, about one-third of the immigration for that year.Footnote ² By the first decade of the twenty-first century, immediate family members had become the major source for immigration. The table below indicates this pattern for the years 2008–10. Immediate family members accounted for over 40 percent of immigrants, and were nearly one-half in 2009.

Of these newcomers in 2010, spouses accounted for 271,909, children 88,297, and parents 116,208. The figures for children also include orphans adopted abroad and their numbers were usually around 20,000 annually in the first decade of the twenty-first century. Many of these new immigrants were already in the United States and had adjusted their status to become Green Card holders, but adjustment of status was also becoming an important part of the new immigration.Footnote ³

Before the restrictions of the 1920s, there was little need for a policy on family members for Europeans because Europe had no quotas. Practically all Asians were barred from immigration. In 1924, Congress established quotas for Europeans but also created the category of nonquota members for the Eastern Hemisphere. Among these nonquota immigrants were minor children and wives of U.S. citizens. In 1928, Congress amended the law to permit female citizens to bring in their husbands and children, provided they married before that year. Congress later changed the date for women citizens, but U.S. citizen women were not on an equal footing with men until the McCarran-Walter Immigration Act was passed in 1952.Footnote ⁴ A Senate Judiciary Committee reported that between 1925 and 1948, 231,299 wives of U.S. citizens had become immigrants, but the figure for husbands of female citizens was only 12,788. When the War Brides laws were enacted after World War II, the figure jumped to 117,999 for wives compared to 327 husbands in 1949. Men, especially those in the military after World War II, were more apt to travel or be stationed abroad and meet and marry foreigners.Footnote ⁵ Supporters of the McCarran-Walter Act did not think the change was controversial, stating that nonquota status should be granted to a person who is “the child or the spouse of an American citizen, without restriction because of sex and race.”Footnote ⁶ The rationale was, “It would seem, however that there should be no distinction in the treatment of husbands and wives of America citizens. The underlying principle should be to maintain the family unit, which could be accomplished by removing the inequality in the treatment of husbands of American citizens.”Footnote ⁷ The law ended this inequity.Footnote ⁸ As historian Robert Divine noted, the change was a “minor recommendation.”Footnote ⁹

The Western Hemisphere was left untouched in the 1920s legislation and all immigrants from there were considered nonquota, a provision kept by the McCarran-Walter Act. The regular restrictions such as a head tax and a literacy test were supposed to keep down the numbers from south of the American border, but railroad and agricultural interests were successful in insisting that the Western Hemisphere should not have a numerical limit because Mexican labor was needed. Besides, many argued, these immigrant workers would return home once their seasonal labor was no longer required.

The National Origin quotas (which numbered about 150,000 for Europeans), replacing the quotas initiated in 1921, were put into place in 1929 just as the United States plunged into the Great Depression. Americans did not want more immigrants, and during the 1930s and World War II only about 700,000 immigrants arrived, including nonquota wives, husbands, and children of U.S. citizens. Moreover, several hundred thousand Mexicans were sent packing because governmental officials did not want them to receive welfare. However, after 1945 a larger flow of immigration began again and eventually Congress repealed the National Origins quotas when passing the Hart-Celler Act of 1965, which gave a ceiling of 170,000 to the Eastern Hemisphere and a limit of 20,000 to each country in that hemisphere. The Hart-Celler Act also added parents of U.S. citizens to the nonquota exemption and called these exemptions “immediate family members” (to replace the old use of nonquota), defined as spouses, minor unmarried children, and parents of adult U.S. citizens.Footnote ¹⁰

By 1965, adding parents was not controversial. During the debates on the Hart-Celler Act, administration and congressional officials spent little time discussing this issue simply because National Origins, refugees, the preference system, and racism were the main areas of contention in the debates about immigration. When the legislators looked at nonquota members of U.S. citizens who had entered, the figures were not alarming, even to those who still favored the National Origins system. In the early 1960s, spouses and children averaged slightly more than 30,000. When President John F. Kennedy first proposed ending National Origins in 1963, immigrant wives of U.S. citizens numbered 17,590, husbands 6,035, and children 6,981. Among the children were 1,312 orphans, who were nonquota immigrants adopted abroad.Footnote ¹¹ As noted, the imbalance between wives and husbands is not surprising because so many of the wives were married to American soldiers stationed overseas.

Abba Schwartz, administrator of the Bureau of Security and Consular Affairs, a key person in writing the bill, used a figure of 7,000 persons who would be added to the overall nonquota numbers from the Eastern Hemisphere if parents of U.S. citizens were added to immediate family category. He did caution, however, that “we have based this upon the best information we could get, and it is possible that after the initial impact of the admission of the parents waiting now, that the figure would be lower, but we are using this highest figure in these estimates.”Footnote ¹² Nor did Nicholas deB Katzenbach, the attorney general, or Secretary of State Dean Rush use different figures.Footnote ¹³ The report prepared by the congressional committees claimed that adding parents would be logical: “Reunification of families is to be the foremost consideration. . . . In order that the family unit may be preserved as much as possible, parents of adult U.S. citizens as well as spouses and children, may enter the United States without numerical limitation.”Footnote ¹⁴

Spokesmen for reform noted that “parents of U.S. citizens are presently eligible for second preference status under the quotas [National Origins currently in effect], but will hereafter [under the Hart-Celler Act] be permitted to enter without numerical limitation.”Footnote ¹⁵ What these administration officials were referring to is the fact that within National Origins quotas preference was given to persons with skills first and, second, to family unification, including parents of U.S. citizens. The catch was that nations with small quotas, such as Russia, Poland, Greece, and Italy, had few slots for parents. In the case of Greece, with a National Origin quota of 308, only 154 places were reserved for family unification, which was virtually a handful for parents of U.S. citizens. As a result, huge backlogs developed in Italy and Greece. Giving all nations a quota of 20,000 would enable many backlogged Greeks and Italians to come to America, and parents of adult U.S. citizens on the waiting list would be exempt from the national quotas of 20,000 and the overall limit of 170,000 for the Eastern Hemisphere.

While the administration of Lyndon Johnson did not want the nonquota status of the Western Hemisphere abolished, proponents of limiting newcomers from that hemisphere forced the administration to accept a ceiling of 120,000 on the Western Hemisphere in exchange for ending the National Origins quotas. Of course such a ceiling would mean that nonquota immediate family members from that hemisphere would grow in numbers if they were unable to enter because of the new limits. When the law went into effect in 1968, the Western Hemisphere had the overall ceiling but no individual country limit.

Congress changed the law several times after 1965 to give the Western Hemisphere a preference system and a nation limit of 20,000 in 1976 and then to fashion a worldwide uniform system, which came into existence in 1979 with each nation having a 20,000 limit. A uniform preference system favoring family unification (74 percent), skills and occupations (20 percent), and refugees (6 percent) was to be used for the admission of immigrants. The numerical limits did not include the immediate family members of U.S. citizens. By combining the two hemispheres, the overall total was 290,000, excluding immediate family members of U.S. citizens. While the Hart-Celler Act aimed to halt the growth of Western Hemisphere migration, the modifications after 1965 were sold as a way to have a uniform world system.

The preference system provided for:

• Preference 1 Unmarried adult children of U.S. citizens (20%)

• Preference 2 Spouses and unmarried children of permanent resident aliens (20%)

• Preference 3 Professionals, especially gifted scientists and artists (10%)

• Preference 4 Married children of U.S. citizens (10%)

• Preference 5 Brothers and sisters of U.S. citizens (24%)

• Preference 6 Skilled and unskilled workers (10%)

• Preference 7 Refugees (6%)

The Johnson administration reformers did not give attention to immediate family members from the Western Hemisphere simply because they did not propose a ceiling from that region. In 1965, Congress established a Select Commission on Western Hemisphere Immigration to examine immigration from that source. The commission recommended that implementation of the ceiling be postponed for a year, but Congress rejected it and the Western Hemisphere ceiling went into effect in 1968. The commission said practically nothing about immediate family members; rather, it concentrated on population pressures and economic and border issues.Footnote ¹⁶ Even so, it was not believed that the exclusion would lead to a large number of new quota-exempt immigrants from the Western Hemisphere. The ending of the Bracero Temporary Workers Program at the same time as the Hart-Celler Act was passed left many Mexicans without a way to come to America; hence they entered illegally in growing numbers after 1965, which attracted increasing attention in the 1970s. Yet, as noted, a way to enter legally above the national limit was as an immediate family member, but the number did not seem high at first. In 1969, it numbered 21,000.Footnote ¹⁷ The 1976 congressional committee urging that the Western Hemisphere be given a preference system and a country limit of 20,000 noted that the limit “will in all probability reduce the number of admissions from Mexico.”Footnote ¹⁸ However, the number of immediate family members from Mexico grew after that and was especially crucial for Mexico. In 2010, 88,572 Mexicans entered as quota-exempt immediate family members.Footnote ¹⁹ Mexico was not alone in the Western Hemisphere in using the immediate-family category. In the same year, 22,218 of the Dominican Republic’s 53,870 immigrants were immediate family members. In the case of Jamaica, 13,781 of its 19,825 immigrants were immediate family members.Footnote ²⁰

Clearly, while the Hart-Celler Act was presented as a measure to end racial and ethnic discrimination but not increase immigration significantly, it did not turn out that way. At the time the bill passed, President Lyndon Johnson caught the mood of the Congress when signing the Hart-Celler Act at the foot of the Statue of Liberty in October 1965. The president said the bill was “not a revolutionary bill. It does not affect the lives of millions. It will not reshape the structure of our daily lives, or really add to either our wealth or our power. Yet it is still one of the most important acts of this Congress and of this administration. . . . This bill says simply that from this day forth those wishing to immigrate to America shall be admitted on the basis of their skills and their close relationship to those already here.”Footnote ²¹

President Johnson was referring to the fact that 170,000 immigrants were to be admitted from the Eastern Hemisphere compared to the current 158,161, hardly a great increase at the time. True, some National Origins quotas were not being utilized, but special legislation and private member bills after the end of World War II had enabled nations such as Italy, Greece, and those of the Baltic region to exceed their small quotas. It was hoped that the changes for Europe would eliminate the need for special legislation as well as private member bills. Moreover, there was now a new limit of 120,000 placed on the Western Hemisphere. Immigration from that hemisphere had averaged only 110,000 from 1945 to 1965, but it had been growing sharply in the early 1960s. The total for the world would be only 290,000, plus the addition of the nonquota immediate family members of adult U.S. citizens. Defenders of the new law could and did say that immigration would be about 340,000, hardly a radical change from current levels.Footnote ²²

How was it possible for legislators and the administration to underestimate the flow of immediate family members? In retrospect, it appears that a variety of factors explain the change. Laws enacted after passage of the Hart-Celler Act increased the total of immigration, and for the most part these laws rarely, if ever, produced discussions about immediate family members. In response to the sometimes-chaotic admission of refugees, especially those from Vietnam beginning in 1975, Congress passed the Refugee Act of 1980, which separated refugee admissions from those of regular immigrants and increased the total slightly. Yet these refugees could become regular immigrants and eventually U.S. citizens, who in turn could sponsor their immediate family members. For example, at first nearly all Vietnamese were admitted as refugees, but by the late 1990s the vast majority of immigrants from that country were arriving under the immigration preference system and not as refugees. In 2010, 30,632 Vietnamese arrived in the United States. Of those 1,091 were recorded as refugees, but nearly one-half were immediate relatives of U.S. citizens.Footnote ²³ In a similar manner, after the Iranian Revolution of 1978–79, many Iranian students and others in the United States were granted asylum or refugee status, but after 2000 most came under the preference system, with 3,913 immediate family members in 2008 and 1,215 refugees.Footnote ²⁴ In 2010, as many immediate family members arrived as did refugees.Footnote ²⁵

In 1986, the legislators enacted the Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA), which gave an amnesty to nearly three million undocumented immigrants. The law did not increase the total permanently, but once those receiving an amnesty became immigrants and then citizens, they too could sponsor their immediate family members. A special committee established by IRCA reported in 1999 that 21 percent of immediate family members admitted between 1995 and 1999 were the result of those obtaining an amnesty and eventual naturalization.Footnote ²⁶ The Immigration Act of 1990 increased immigration 35 percent, but the major issue behind that debate was the movement to increase the number of immigrants with skills needed in the United States. Several smaller amnesties in the 1990s duplicated the role of IRCA. In total, the changes after enactment of the Hart-Celler Act increased legal immigration nearly threefold, but at the same time immediate family members grew from 32,00 in 1965 to more than ten times that amount annually in the 2000s.

Policymakers did not see how chain migration worked, or in the words of historian Mae Ngai, “Congress had not understood that the system of formal equality would have the practical result of continuously producing new chains of migration. . . . They had no understanding that each quota immigrant admitted into the country could open a path for nonquota family migration.”Footnote ²⁷ And one could add that they especially did not pay much attention to the role of immediate family members.

The case of Asians is well known.Footnote ²⁸ First, Asians with skills entered under occupational preferences, followed by those arriving under family unification preferences and immediate family members. Indians were among the most highly educated post-1965 immigrants and were especially apt to arrive as skilled immigrants. But then came their families; of India’s 69,162 immigrants in 2010, 21,831 were immediate family members.Footnote ²⁹ Asians had high naturalization rates, and as they became citizens in growing numbers they sponsored immediate family members. By the 1990s, they constituted one-third of the growing pool of immigrants.Footnote ³⁰ The immigration of Africans came a little later. Congress paid little attention to Africans since Africans made up such small numbers in the 1960s. The administration had told Congress that it estimated only 16,544 would enter during the phaseout of the old system.Footnote ³¹ This figure was not wrong as immigration from Africa was only 22,617 in the 1960s.Footnote ³² However, newly independent African nations increased rapidly after World War II, and African immigration began to grow after 1970 and doubled every decade thereafter. Many entered under a lottery established by the Immigration Act of 1990 or as refugees in addition to using the preference system, which became increasingly important for those with skills. Then came immediate family members. In 2010, Africans accounted for slightly more than one hundred thousand immigrants, 40 percent of whom were immediate family members of U.S. citizens.Footnote ³³

In part, too, anti-immigrant legislation and hostility prompted many immigrants to naturalize and hence become eligible to sponsor their immediate family members. The Clinton administration had begun a program to encourage immigrants to become citizens before Congress and the state of California added to the incentive for naturalization. In 1994, California passed Proposition 187, which barred undocumented aliens from most assistance from the state. While the courts eventually declared the proposition unconstitutional, the tone of the debates prompted many immigrants to apply for citizenship.

Then in the mid-1990s, the Republican Congress passed laws limiting the rights of immigrants to receive welfare. The newcomers were declared ineligible to receive aid for five years.Footnote ³⁴ As a result of these two actions, hundreds of thousands immigrants began to apply for naturalization. Beginning in 1998, Mexico permitted its citizens to hold dual citizenship, which also encouraged many to apply for naturalization in the United States. Petitions filed in 1992 numbered 343,238 but jumped to more than one million in both 1996 and 1997 and remained high thereafter, and a backlog developed as the Immigration and Naturalization Service lacked personnel to process these requests quickly. Congress in 2006 and 2007 again debated undocumented immigration and the tone of debates was hostile to immigrants, especially Hispanics. Those debates focused on the southern border of the United States.Footnote ³⁵ Most of the debates from 1998 to 2007 focused on illegal aliens, building walls to keep out Mexicans, and raids on places suspected of employing undocumented immigrants.

Once again, Hispanic immigrants grew uneasy, and they along with other immigrants applied for naturalization. More than one million immigrants were naturalized in 2008 and another 743,715 in 2009.Footnote ³⁶ The situation was ironic; large numbers of new citizens hailed from Mexico and Central America, and in turn these new citizens voted overwhelmingly Democratic, which was certainly not what the Republican legislators had in mind.Footnote ³⁷

The debates in recent years about undocumented aliens, deportations, building walls, and terrorism have also attracted the attention of states, which have passed a number of bills trying to deal with undocumented immigration. Little attention has been given to legal immigrants and the core of policy: family unification, although some economists and others have argued that American immigration policy needs to be focused more on bringing skilled workers to America. A commission created by Congress in 1990 did recommend some moderate changes in policy, but its proposals got nowhere.Footnote ³⁸ Although other critics have insisted that the lottery system for 50,000 immigrants annually, created by the 1990 act, makes no sense and should be repealed, it nonetheless remained. When the Hart-Celler Act was passed, the largest preference was for brothers and sisters of U.S. citizens and prompted critics to call the law the “brothers and sisters” act. A few have also suggested that the preference for brothers and sisters of U.S. citizens did not represent close family ties, but they too have not been able to eliminate this preference, although the numbers permitted under this preference were reduced in 1990. When President George Bush proposed accepting more immigrants with skills needed in the United States and dropping the exemption for parents of U.S. citizens, the measure was soundly rejected in the Senate and not even considered seriously by the House of Representatives.

It seems as if family unification, including the large exemption from national and total quotas for immediate family members, is too sensitive to touch. Who could oppose family unification as the heart of immigration policy? In hearings held by the House Subcommittee on Immigration, Citizenship, Refugees, Border Security, and Internationality Law, legislators as well as witnesses rose to the defense of the family unification system as the core of American immigration policy. As Zoe Lofgren, a Democratic representative from California, put it, “To help us determine whether family-based immigration has, in fact, served the interest of our nation, today we will examine the role that family-based immigrants played in our economy and society, particularly since the 1965 act. . . . Not only is it an American value and a pro-family value to keep US citizen and legal permanent resident families together, it is in the economic interest of the United States.”Footnote ³⁹ Unless there is change in mood about families in America, the exemption for immediate family members appears to be almost untouchable, and we can expect that this category will continue to be of prime importance in selecting newcomers in the near future.