Waves of Immigration

• The Statue of Liberty was a beacon of hope for millions of immigrants.Ablestock.com/AbleStock.com/Getty Images
  
  Immigrants to the United States have come from every corner of the globe, but eight countries or regions have supplied the greatest numbers: Great Britain and Ireland, Scandinavia, Germany, Central and Eastern Europe, Southern Europe, Asia, Africa, and Latin America. But not all at once. Rather, emigrants from each of these regions have come in massive waves, driven by historical events and conditions that pushed them to seek a better life across the ocean.
  
  

Ireland and Germany

• The Irish Potato Famine killed hundreds of thousands through starvation and disease.Photos.com/Photos.com/Getty Images
  
  According to the Economic History Association, most immigrants who came to the United States between 1820 and 1893 were from Great Britain, Ireland, Scandinavia, and Germany. Ireland and Germany provided by far the greatest numbers. Irish immigrants began coming in significant numbers around 1820, driven by poverty and oppressive British rule. From 1845 on, the Irish Potato Famine was a major contributor to Irish immigration. Between 1847 and 1854, 45 percent of immigrants to the United States were Irish. German immigrants also came in large numbers during this period, peaking at 34 percent between 1865 and 1873.
  
  

Pogroms and Persecution

• Unlike many immigrant groups, Jewish refugees from Central and Eastern Europe were escaping persecution, not poverty.Jupiterimages/Photos.com/Getty Images
  
  It is possible to trace the history of anti-Semitic persecution in places like Poland and Russia by looking at the swelling numbers of Jewish immigrants beginning at the end of the American Civil War and not even starting to taper off until the beginning of World War I. Between 1865 and 1873, only 1 percent of immigrants to the United States came from Central or Eastern Europe. Between 1874 and 1880, that percentage rose to 5 percent, and then to 16 percent in the period from 1881 to 1893. In the five years from 1894 to 1899, 32 percent of immigrants were Central or Eastern European. These numbers peaked at 45 percent starting at the turn of the last century and ending at the start of World War I.
  
  

Nativism and immigration after World War II

• Immigration patterns shifted in the second half of the last century.Comstock/Comstock/Getty Images
  
  Beginning around the end of World War I and continuing through the 1950s, legislation set limits on immigration and established quotas based on national and ethnic origin. As a result, European immigration was sharply curtailed. These policies eased up beginning in the 1960s, although immigration numbers never again approached the levels seen during the 19th and early 20th centuries. Nevertheless, in recent decades, Asia, Africa, and Latin America have contributed a greater share of immigrants to the U.S. Between 1947 and 1960, the Americas provided 38 percent of immigrants to the United States. By 1998, however, that percentage had dropped to 24 percent.
  
  More recently, illegal immigration has become a significant and highly controversial issue. According to Reuters, in 2010, there were roughly 11 million undocumented immigrants living in the United States, most of them poor Hispanics from Mexico and other locations in Central and South America.