WW I Effect on Migration (ELD)

The Alien and Sedition Acts were passed by a Federalist Congress and signed into law by President John Adams in 1798 at a time when Adams feared the possibility of war with France.

In this excerpt from his memoir, Rodriguez provides a stirring recollection from his adolescence: the first time he experienced racism as a result of being an immigrant in America. As he says, the experience "stays with [him] like a foul odor."

In this excerpt, the narrator, a young Chinese girl, poses as a boy with forged papers, trying to gain entry into the United States. When she realizes the American immigration agents are checking identity papers at the dock, she fights past them and runs for her life.