Inventing the Immigration Problem: The Dillingham Commission and its Legacy

The Dillingham Commission, the largest immigration study ever conducted in the United States, was an investigative commission devoted to assess the growing presence of immigrants in the United States in 1907. In Inventing the Immigration Problem (Harvard University Press), Benton-Cohen ’94 argues that the legacies of the Dillingham Commission continue to impact the way the United States approaches immigration policy today and describes how its recommendations, including a literacy test, a quota system based on national origin, the continuation of Asian exclusion, and greater federal oversight of immigration policy were implemented into law.