Since when di done need paper work to settle in USA and then become US citizen?

A

AmericanWannabe

Registered Users (C)
Was there a time when people did not need any government permit
to come to USA and become its citizen by default? i.e. they
just went aboard a a ship that was bound for USA?

Before USA was founded, did the people from other continent
need any such permit to come? and if they came, were they
British citizens?
 
AmericanWannabe said:
Before USA was founded, did the people from other continent
need any such permit to come?
Click to expand...
Before USA was founded who was there to adminster permits?
So it doesn't require to get permits.'Might' is the permit.
Just many people from many nations had landed and these people are who survived the vagaries of Atlantic /pacific oceans in thier primitive ships.
Some migrated thro' land route from S.America and some from north east europe(though these proportion is miniscule)
Later on As far as immigration controls history goes:see:
http://uscis.gov/graphics/aboutus/history/articles/OVIEW.htm
 
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AmericanWannabe said:
America was part of British empire so the British must be in charge then
Click to expand...
To your original question 'Before USA was founded who was there to adminster permits?'--it's not the british only in --which is 'NOW USA'.There were many other nationalities.So on a whole, USA was only solely once of British empire is not true.
Read history.also see the following links.
http://www.lonelyplanet.com/destinations/north_america/usa/history.htm.
http://www.rapidimmigration.com/usa/1_eng_civics_less7.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_United_States#Pre-Colonial_America
http://www2.tntech.edu/history/usa.html.
Adminstering the rules and history --see the INS link in my first post.
 
Participant said:
To your original question 'Before USA was founded who was there to adminster permits?'--it's not the british only in --which is 'NOW USA'.There were many other nationalities.So on a whole, USA was only solely once of British empire is not true.
Click to expand...

But the original 13 states that declare independence were under British administration. Otherwise why were independence war only fought between
Americans and British instead of American vs a multi-national forces?
 
AmericanWannabe said:
But the original 13 states that declare independence were under British administration. Otherwise why were independence war only fought between
Americans and British instead of American vs a multi-national forces?
Click to expand...

The name "United States of America" came after the war with British. Before that there was no concept of "USA". The whole land and was devided and colonialized by British, French, Spanish and some independent forces with alignments of various degrees. Before war, British part was just British colony. I guess British practiced the permit issue probably the very same way it did for rest of the world - like Asian/Indian/Australia colonies etc. British nationals were allowed to go to those colonies and do business, own properties. But the local or native people never got that kind of privileges - they were not allowed to go to Great Britain freely and start doing business.

Initially after US contitution was formed, people could come to USA and settle - with no requirement of permit. But as per 1790 law, immigrants were not given US citizenship immediately after landing from ship. It was required to be US for atleast two years to be eligible for US citizenship. In 1795, the residency requirement was changed - from two years to five years. Before getting US citizenship immigrants were simply considered "alien".

You will get some idea about immigration history from following pages:
http://uscis.gov/graphics/aboutus/history/mar1790.htm
http://www.aca.ch/hisuscit.htm
 
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