Table Of ContentBootlegged Aliens
POLITICSANDCULTUREINMODERNAMERICA
SeriesEditors:
KeishaN.Blain,MargotCanaday,MatthewLassiter,
StephenPitti,ThomasJ.Sugrue
Volumesintheseriesnarrateandanalyzepoliticalandsocialchangeinthe
broadestdimensionsfrom1865tothepresent,includingideasabouttheways
peoplehavesoughtandwieldedpowerinthepublicsphereandthelanguageand
institutionsofpoliticsatalllevels—local,national,andtransnational.Theseries
ismotivatedbyadesiretoreversethefragmentationofmodernU.S.history
andtoencouragesyntheticperspectivesonsocialmovementsandthestate,on
gender,race,andlabor,andonintellectualhistoryandpopularculture.
Bootlegged Aliens
Immigration Politics on America’s Northern Border
Ashley Johnson Bavery
UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA PRESS
PHILADELPHIA
Copyright(cid:2)2020UniversityofPennsylvaniaPress
Allrightsreserved.Exceptforbriefquotationsusedforpurposesofreviewor
scholarlycitation,noneofthisbookmaybereproducedinanyformbyanymeans
withoutwrittenpermissionfromthepublisher.
Publishedby
UniversityofPennsylvaniaPress
Philadelphia,Pennsylvania19104-4112
www.upenn.edu/pennpress
PrintedintheUnitedStatesofAmerica
onacid-freepaper
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
LibraryofCongressCataloging-in-PublicationData
Names:Bavery,AshleyJohnson,author.
Title:Bootleggedaliens:immigrationpoliticsonAmerica’snorthernborder/Ashley
JohnsonBavery.
Othertitles:PoliticsandcultureinmodernAmerica.
Description:1stedition.(cid:2)Philadelphia:UniversityofPennsylvaniaPress,[2020](cid:2)
Series:PoliticsandcultureinmodernAmerica(cid:2)Includesbibliographical
referencesandindex.
Identifiers:LCCN2019054907(cid:2)ISBN9780812252439(hardcover)
Subjects:LCSH:Immigrants—Governmentpolicy—UnitedStates—History—20th
century.(cid:2)Immigrants—Michigan—Detroit—History—20thcentury.(cid:2)
Illegalaliens—Michigan—Detroit—History—20thcentury.(cid:2)Automobile
industryworkers—Legalstatus,laws,etc.—Michigan—Detroit—History—20th
century.(cid:2)UnitedStates—Emigrationandimmigration—Government
policy—History—20thcentury.(cid:2)Detroit(Mich.)—Emigrationand
immigration—Governmentpolicy—History—20thcentury.(cid:2)United
States—Ethnicrelations—History—20thcentury.(cid:2)Canada—Emigrationand
immigration—Governmentpolicy—History—20thcentury.
Classification:LCCJV6483.B392020(cid:2)DDC325.7309/042—dc23
LCrecordavailableathttps://lccn.loc.gov/2019054907
Contents
ListofAbbreviations vii
Introduction 1
Chapter1.“IllegalImmigrants”inanIndustrialBorderland 12
Chapter2.DefiningUndesirablesandProtestingQuotas 55
Chapter3.TheProblemofCanadianDayLaborers 82
Chapter4.Reform,Repatriation,
andDeportationDuringtheDepression 103
Chapter5.RegisteringImmigrantsintheDepressionEra 124
Chapter6.TheImmigrantPoliticsofAnticommunism 150
Chapter7.AliensandWelfareinNorthAmerica 179
Conclusion.TheLegacyofRestrictiveImmigration 213
Notes 221
Index 269
Acknowledgments 275
Abbreviations
Archival Collections
ACHR AmericanCatholicHistoryResearchCenterandUniversity
Archives,Washington,D.C.
ADA ArchdioceseofDetroitArchives,Detroit,Michigan
BDPL BurtonHistoricalLibrary,DetroitPublicLibrary,Detroit,
Michigan
BFRC BensonFordResearchCenter,TheHenryFordMuseum,
Dearborn,Michigan
BHL BentleyHistoricalLibrary,UniversityofMichigan,AnnArbor,
Michigan
DLA DioceseofLondonArchives,London,Ontario
LAC LibraryandArchivesofCanada,Ottawa,Ontario
NARAI UnitedStatesNationalArchivesI,Washington,D.C.,Subject
Correspondence,RecordsoftheImmigrationand
NaturalizationService,RecordGroup85,Recordsofthe
ImmigrationandNaturalizationService(INS)
NARAII UnitedStatesNationalArchivesII,CollegePark,Maryland,U.S.
StateDepartmentRecords
NAUK NationalArchivesoftheUnitedKingdom,Kew,London
RL WalterP.ReutherLibrary,ArchivesofLaborandUrbanAffairs,
WayneStateUniversity,Detroit,Michigan
UMSC LabadieCollection,UniversityofMichiganSpecialCollections,
AnnArbor,Michigan
WPLA WindsorPublicLibraryandArchives,Windsor,Ontario
Organizations
AFL AmericanFederationofLabor
ANOCL Anti-NationalOriginsClauseLeague
viii Abbreviations
AWU AutomobileWorkersUnion
CIO CongressofIndustrialOrganizations
CP CommunistParty
DAR DaughtersoftheAmericanRevolution
DFL DetroitFederationofLabor
DOJ DepartmentofJustice
DOL DepartmentofLabor
INS ImmigrationandNaturalizationService(1933–present)
IS ImmigrationService(1891–1933)
RCMP RoyalCanadianMountedPolice
SAR SonsoftheAmericanRevolution
UAW UnitedAutomobileWorkers
Introduction
In May 2018, Attorney General Jeff Sessions told hundreds of Hondurans,
Guatemalans, and Salvadorans seeking asylum in the United States to
“enterAmericainthelawfulwayandwaityourturn.”1Sessions’sassertion
thatmigrantsshould applyforlegalimmigrationstatus,acommonrefrain
amongnativistpolicymakersofthe2000s, reliesontheideathattheirown
ancestorspassedthroughinspectionlinesatEllisIslandbeforeassimilating
intothefactoriesandfarmsofearlytwentieth-centuryAmerica.Bootlegged
Aliens challenges this narrative by demonstrating that instead of “waiting
their turn,” thousands ofEuropeans once crossedthe borderwithout legal
papers,seekingrefugefromanti-Semitism,violence,andpoverty.
Bootlegged Aliens explores how immigration quotas of the 1920s
launched an era of policing and profiling that categorized certain Europe-
ans as “foreigners” and excluded them from the benefits of citizenship in
the decade that followed. On the borderland between Detroit, Michigan,
andWindsor,Canada,defining,policing,andmarginalizingthese“foreign-
ers”becameaprofoundlylocalaffairthatdeniedthosewithoutcitizenship
accesstojobs,laborunions,and,ultimately,thefederalwelfarestate.Before
World War II, grassroots nativist groups, unions, and politicians created
policies that curtailed the rights of aliens, a process that occurred both
locallyand,becauseofDetroit’slocationontheinternationalborder,trans-
nationally. The employment practices and precedents established in this
northern industrial borderland shaped national immigration policies that
cast suspicion on European foreigners across America’s industrial core. By
theoutbreakofWorldWarII,concernsaboutillegalEuropeanshadwaned,
but the policing and employment tactics that developed on America’s
northern border would influence wider policy toward immigrant employ-
ment and welfare for decades.2 Bootlegged Aliens disrupts the narrative set
forth by President Donald Trump and his contemporaries that positions
