Modern America found its differences through its diversity. Newcomers flooded to America in mass numbers. Roughly a million a year led America to experience their greatest immigration influx in history. However, more people were arriving from Asian and Latin America rather than Europe. Coming from countries that were growing too rapidly and poor agricultural and industrial nations, the new immigrants sought to improve their lives in the new land. They sought the same economic opportunities that the previous immigrants had fought to obtain. The Southwest felt the brunt of the immigration impact, mainly by the Mexican descendants. By the end of the decade, they would make up over a one third of the state’s populations. In response to the continually growing number of immigrants, America enacted the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986. This legislation, which punished those employers, caught employing undocumented individuals, attempted to protect the integrity of the American workforce. American society was transformed on many levels, as the culture would put more stress on the special traditions of their new members. Although they didn’t even make up more than ten percent of the workforce, the immigrants greatly influenced the nation’s culture and way of living.

            Immigration in the past had been based on leaving oppression and seeking a land of opportunity. America, the land of opportunity, found itself as a very inviting home for many of the oppressed seeking to make something out of their lives. The situation was the same during the new immigration, where the newcomers were leaving their homelands in search of hope. Feeling the pressure of the great increase in population and the failure of the economy to accommodate their needs. So they left, and went to America where previous immigrants had found their salvation. The only major difference of note between the two eras of immigration was the area from which they were fleeing. Originally, Europe found itself giving the most immigrants to America. Beginning with Western Europe, and continuing to the South and Central Europe, the European immigrants made up a large number of the newcomers to America. However, the new immigration homelands were in Latin America and Asia. Now these nations were experiencing the problems that Europe had been fighting through in the past. The second and third world countries were growing to large in population and were not sufficiently keeping up with the amount of people living there. The most significant downside to the influx of so many new people was the possibility for cheap labor throughout America’s economy, a situation that could pose to be a problem that was not encountered during the old era of immigration.

            The people who were immigrating to America in 1990’s were different from the earlier immigrants.  Most of the earlier immigrants were coming from countries found in Europe.  However the new immigrants were mainly coming from Asia and Latin America, especially Mexico.  However the motives of the people who were immigrating to the United States were both similar.  “They typically left countries where populations were growing rapidly and where agricultural and industrial revolutions were shaking people loose from old habits of life- conditions almost identical to those in nineteenth-century Europe.  And they came to America, as previous immigrants had done, in search of jobs and economic opportunity.” (1032). 

            Immigrations caused major changes in the populations of southwestern states.  Most of the immigrants coming to the United States during the “new immigration” were coming from Mexico.  People from this country to the south of the United States mainly settled in Texas, Arizona, California, and New Mexico.  They made up one third of the population in all of these four states except New Mexico, where they made up one half of the population.  These immigrants from Mexico were some of the few immigrants that were able to keep their native customs and language due to where they lived; it is much easier to continue to speak a language of a country if that country is just next-door rather than across an ocean. 

            The immigration of Latinos allowed their minority population to grow.  This then led to their participation in government.  Latinos elected mayors in Denver, San Antonio, and Miami.  They created an association that would improve the work conditions of stoop laborers who worked throughout the American West.  This association was called the United Farm workers Organizing Committee, or the UFWOC.  It was led by Cesar Chavez.  “Hispanic influence seemed likely to grow, as suggested by the increasing presence of Spanish-language ballots and television broadcasts.  Hispanic-Americans, newly confident and organized, might well become the nation’s largest ethnic minority, outnumbering even African-Americans, by the turn of the century.” (1036). 

            Asian Americans also grew in population because of immigration.  In the 1980’s they were the fastest growing minority in the United States.  Other Americans looked down upon Asian Americans at one point in history, however now they were among the most prosperous and most successful people living in the United States.  In 1996 Washington elected the first Asian American governor of a state in the United States.

            In 1992 riots broke out in Los Angeles after a jury had exonerated white Los Angeles police officers that were seen beating a black suspect.  The minority neighborhoods of South Central Los Angeles erupted and began to attack and steal from many businesses all over LA.  Many people were killed and many fires were set.  African Americans even attacked the stores of Asian Americans.  People believe that race had a big influence on the case of OJ Simpson.  The cities of the United States also see minority differences.  The richer people of the United States left the cities to move into the safer suburbs.  This left a very poor class of people in cities.  In ghettos the poorest of the poor live.       

The “new immigration” and rise of ethnic minorities completely transformed American society. The affluent population didn’t feel that the cities were safe any more, so they moved into the suburbs or gated communities, leaving the cities “brown, black and broke.” The cities continued to deteriorate through the 90s, but in some places restoration projects are being attempted. This immigration has also created larger sections of cities where certain ethnic groups reside in vast numbers. There is a large part of San Francisco, “Chinatown,” where Chinese culture seems to spill out of every corner.

            This immigration was very different from earlier immigrations because Europeans had been the only people immigrating to America. In the 1990s, people from Central and South America, and many other places came in large numbers (not all legal.)