The Mother of Exiles Trivia Quiz

Answer: The Naturalization Act of 1790

The Naturalization Act of 1790 grants citizenship to any free white person of "good character," who has been residing in the U.S. for two years or longer. However, in practice the law meant any white male property owner, thereby excluding women, non-whites and indentured servants. Without citizenship, residents were denied basic constitutional rights.

Answer: extended the length of residency from 2 to 5 years

In addition to extending the length of residency from 2 to 5 years, the Naturalization Act of 1795 added the word "moral" between "good" and "character" as found in the 1790 Act. The new act also required the applicant to renounce his former sovereign.

Answer: The Alien and Sedition Acts

The Alien and Sedition Acts were 4 acts enacted by Congress mainly out of fear of a war with France. It encroached upon freedom of speech and freedom of the press.
In the 8 years between 1790 and 1798, three laws were enacted by Congress that dealt with immigration. There were also Naturalization Acts in 1802 and 1804.

Answer: The Steerage Act of 1819

In the mid to late 1800s, immigrants overwhelmed port cities like Philadelphia, New York, and Boston. Many of them arrived sick or dying as a result of the conditions aboard their transport ships. In response, Congress passed the Steerage Act of 1819, which required better living conditions and called for ship captains to record demographic information on their passengers.

Answer: The Know Nothing Party

The Know Nothing Party, whose official name was The American Party, ran on a platform of anti-German, anti-Irish and anti-Catholic sentiment. Additionally, it called for granting voting rights and the right to hold public office only to native-born Americans and extending the residency requirement for citizenship to 21 years.

The Constitutional Union Party was formed in 1860 by former Know Nothings and former Whigs.

Know Nothing Party members were required to answer that they "knew nothing" when asked about party specifics, hence the moniker.

Answer: Chy Lung v. Freeman

In Chy Lung v. Freeman, twenty-two women who sailed from China to San Francisco were detained by the California Commissioner of Immigration. Because the women traveled alone it was determined that they were "lewd", or prostitutes. They filed a writ of habeas corpus and were freed by the Supreme Court decision.

Answer: True

True. The Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 specifically excluded Chinese laborers from entering the U.S. for a period of 10 years. The act was in response to railroads hiring cheap Chinese labor, with some arguing that it denied jobs to American citizens.

In 1889, the U.S. Supreme Court in Chae Chan Ping v. U.S. affirmed federal jurisdiction over immigration.

Answer: Annie Moore

Annie Moore went on to live her life in obscurity in lower Manhattan. She married and had 10 children, 5 of whom died before aged 3.

Ellis Island was named for its owner, Samuel Ellis who bought the 3-acre tract around 1790. Ellis Island is today 27 acres in size.

Answer: to restrict immigration from southern and eastern European countries

Members of the Immigration Restriction League were of the belief that people from Slavic countries were racially inferior and were undermining Anglo-Saxon culture and values. They claimed that peoples from southern and eastern Europe did not assimilate, and they wanted a literacy test imposed.

Answer: United States v. Wong Kim Ark

Just two years after the Court's landmark "separate but equal" ruling in Plessy v, Ferguson (1986) the Court ruled in U.S. v. Wong Kim Ark that children born in the U.S. automatically became citizens regardless of race or the national origin of their parents.

Wong Kim Ark was born in the U.S. After a trip to China to visit family, he was denied re-entry to the U.S. under the Chinese Exclusion Act even though he had the necessary documents proving he was a U.S. citizen.