Irish Immigration 19th Century

Immigration in the U.S was a very prominent occurrence in the 19th century. However, this great wave started coming to an end by the beginning of the 1920s. Between the late 19th century and the beginning of the 20th approximately 25 million people on American land were foreigners. Of that 25 million about 9 percent of them were Irish Immigrants (Over 7 million). Most of the foreign people from this time period, categorized as the New Immigrants, were young men looking for jobs to accrue enough money to go back to their homelands with some kind of wealth. The Irish, however, generally tended to stay in America permanently because they faced religious persecution, political oppression, and economic privation back home.
The presence of immigrants was sought as detrimental to the Americans; who’s strong sense of Nativism was on the rise. Because of the nativism, enforced primarily by Theodore Roosevelt, many stereotypes arose about the Irish. People viewed the Irish as ignorant, uneducated and volatile people who had to be kept under control. The belief in Nativism fueled prejudice and discrimination against immigrants from Ireland and led to xenophobia, the irrational fear of foreigners leading to racism and ethnic conflict.
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Most of the Irish who came over were unskilled workers and some businesses took advantage of their willingness to work for low wages. Irish women were known to work as servants or domestic workers, while Irish men worked in coal mines and built railroads and canals. The Americans grew to resent the newcomers because they were competition for low-wage jobs and often were replacing them when demands for higher wages occurred. The Irish Americans were often antagonized by organizations such as the American Protective Association (APA) and the Ku Klux Klan because of the rising tensions between them and the