The Immigration Act of 1924 sparked conversations surrounding whiteness that complemented nativist practices towards Italian immigrants. During and after WWI, the sweeping immigration of Italians was met with white backlash surrounding their ethnic and national backgrounds, with many whites branding Italians as swarthy, illiterate, and ragpickers.” Furthermore, fiction novels of the early twentieth century portrayed Italians as distinctly non-white. While the Immigration Act was well received by white nativists behind such xenophobic actions, heavily biased mathematical engineering behind the quota system inadvertently spurred the consolidation of an Italian ethnic identity through geo-national pride. While the Immigration Act of 1924, influenced …show more content…
At the beginning of the twentieth century, Italian immigrants were spotlighted for their extreme connections and likeliness to crime, some of which included blackmail and homicide. This fixation on crime by American media sources paved the way for increasing nativist comparisons between Italian immigrants and a spike of crime during and after WWI. Furthermore, the assassination of President McKinley led to increased frustration towards anarchical practices, which connected to Italian immigrant likelihood of crime. The United States was the epitome of such frustrations, especially since Europe had already done so much to combat anarchism and left the rest to the United States. This sweeping mentality of immediate erasure of anarchy from United States soil influenced a large majority of the thoughts and actions behind anti-Italian nativism. However, white nativists were further angered at Italian alliances to non-white ethnic …show more content…
In rural Louisiana, for example, the coming of five Italian immigrant storekeepers disturbed white nativists, as the storekeepers had business relationships with many African Americans. To the white nativists, this procedure violated the white man’s code, eventually ensuing in the lynching of all five storekeepers. The white man’s code, an informal attempt at upkeeping segregation among daily social life, was infringed upon by the Italian immigrants who wanted a solid business foundation in their new home. This episode in Southern history quickened the outcasting of Italian immigrants from society, as shown in the white desire to keep color divisions sharp by banning Italians from white schools. In rural areas, where Italian immigrants were still thought of as white, these episodes of violent nativism changed rural white attitudes towards whiteness as a nationality-based concept, therefore naming all Italian immigrants as non-white and deserving of few societal rights. While at first, these violent nativist actions were sporadic throughout the East Coast and the South, they increasingly consolidated into nationwide