Enacted by U.S. Congress; approved May 26, 1924

Excerpt published in United States Statutes at Large, 68th Cong., Sess. I, Chp. 190

An act to limit the migration of aliens into the United States

"The annual quota of any nationality shall be 2 per centum of the number of foreign-born individuals of such nationality resident in continental United States as determined by the United States census of 1890, but the minimum quota of any nationality shall be 100."

In 1924, the U.S. Congress passed a law to limit immigration into the United States. The law—the Immigration Act of 1924 (also called the National Origins Act) —reflected worries that too many immigrants from southern and eastern Europe were flooding into the country. Many of these immigrants were Roman Catholics. Many Americans worried that the newcomers would change the nature of the population, which had long been made up of...