The year is 1924; the U.S. Congress has just passed the Johnson-Reed Act (Immigration Act of 1924) and the following quotas have been put into place to determine how many immigrants from each country will be eligible for U.S. citizenship:
Country | Quota | Country | Quota | Country | Quota | ||
Germany | 51,227 | Poland | 5,982 | Africa (non-Egypt) | 1,100 | ||
| Great Britain and Northern Ireland | 34,007 | Italy | 3,845 |
Armenia
| 124 | ||
| Irish Free State (Ireland) | 28,567 | Czechoslovakia | 3,073 |
Australia
| 121 | ||
| Sweden | 9,561 | Russia | 2,248 |
Palestine
| 100 | ||
| Norway | 6,453 | Yugoslavia | 671 |
Syria
| 100 | ||
| France | 3,954 | Romania | 603 |
Turkey
| 100 | ||
| Denmark | 2,789 | Portugal | 503 |
Egypt
| 100 | ||
| Switzerland | 2,081 | Hungary | 473 |
New Zealand & Pacific Islands
| 100 | ||
| Netherlands | 1,648 | Lithuania | 344 |
All others
| 1,900 | ||
| Austria | 785 | Latvia | 142 | ||||
| Belgium | 512 | Spain | 131 | ||||
| Finland | 471 | Estonia | 124 | ||||
| Free City of Danzig | 228 | Albania | 100 | ||||
| Iceland | 100 | Bulgaria | 100 | ||||
| Luxembourg | 100 | Greece | 100 | ||||
| Total (Number) | 142,483 | Total (Number) | 18,439 |
Total (Number)
| 3,745 | ||
| Total (%) | 86.5 | Total (%) | 11.2 |
Total (%)
| 2.3 | ||
| (Total Annual immigrant quota: 164,667) |
Note that the limit for migrants from the "Free City of Danzig" was set at 228 persons; that's from a site with under 370,000 occupants. Compare that to the limit set for Spain, a state with roughly 30 million inhabitants: 131 persons!
Italy's 3,845 is also noteworthy - that's from a population of roughly 37 million.
The limit for Germany was 51,227 persons, from Germany's population of roughly 62 million. Britain, Ireland and Sweden are also noteworthy. It's clear what cultures we believed would produce productive and inventive individuals, and what standards we had set not necessarily due to "blind racism", but because we thought this system would be best for our own country.
