History
Community Bonds is a digital humanities project that features the stories of immigrants incarcerated in Massachusetts’ detention centers. The short films on this site invite you to ponder the reasons why Massachusetts’ welcomes or excludes people perceived to be strangers. While these films portray the lived experiences of recent immigrants, Massachusetts has had a long history with immigration regulation and enforcement. During the state’s early history, legislators designed laws to limit the movement of foreigners and potentially indigent people.
In 1820, for instance, the state required shipmasters to pay a bond for passengers who could potentially become public charges. After the Civil War, the Supreme Court found the federal government to be responsible for immigration regulations and not the states. Yet many of the laws that Massachusetts passed became precursors to federal legislation. As Congress created more layers of restriction and bureaucracy, immigrants, citizens, and advocacy organizations pushed back at the judicial level. These laws have remained powerful regulatory strategies for close to two hundred years and Massachusetts’ current practices and procedures of immigration detention are part of this tumultuous history.
Please engage with our interactive timeline of immigration history. As you read through the past, we ask that you pay close attention to the connections in Massachusetts' early attempts at immigration regulation, federal regulations, and the current struggles of people in immigration detention. We also ask that you think about your own family’s intersection with this history. Are there laws, events, or people you would add to this timeline? If so, please submit an event and we will consider posting it to the timeline.
Community Bonds is a digital humanities project that features the stories of immigrants incarcerated in Massachusetts’ detention centers. The short films on this site invite you to ponder the reasons why Massachusetts’ welcomes or excludes people perceived to be strangers. While these films portray the lived experiences of recent immigrants, Massachusetts has had a long history with immigration regulation and enforcement. During the state’s early history, legislators designed laws to limit the movement of foreigners and potentially indigent people.
In 1820, for instance, the state required shipmasters to pay a bond for passengers who could potentially become public charges. After the Civil War, the Supreme Court found the federal government to be responsible for immigration regulations and not the states. Yet many of the laws that Massachusetts passed became precursors to federal legislation. As Congress created more layers of restriction and bureaucracy, immigrants, citizens, and advocacy organizations pushed back at the judicial level. These laws have remained powerful regulatory strategies for close to two hundred years and Massachusetts’ current practices and procedures of immigration detention are part of this tumultuous history.
Please engage with our interactive timeline of immigration history. As you read through the past, we ask that you pay close attention to the connections in Massachusetts' early attempts at immigration regulation, federal regulations, and the current struggles of people in immigration detention. We also ask that you think about your own family’s intersection with this history. Are there laws, events, or people you would add to this timeline? If so, please submit an event and we will consider posting it to the timeline.
