Whom We Shall Welcome: Italian Americans and Immigration Reform, 1945-1965

Whom We Shall Welcome examines World War II immigration of Italians to the United States, an under-studied period in Italian immigration history. Danielle Battisti looks at efforts by Italian American organizations to foster Italian immigration along with the lobbying efforts of Italian Americans to change the quota laws. While Italian Americans (and other white ethnics) had attained virtual political and social equality with many other groups of older-stock Americans by the end of the war, Italians continued to be classified as undesirable immigrants. Her work is an important contribution toward understanding the construction of Italian American racial/ethnic identity in this period, the role of ethnic groups in U.S. foreign policy in the Cold War era, and the history of the liberal immigration reform movement that led to the 1965 Immigration Act.

Whom We Shall Welcome makes significant contributions to histories of migration and ethnicity, post-World War II liberalism, and immigration policy.

Author: Danielle Battisti
Publisher: Fordham University Press
Published: 03/05/2019
Pages: 352
Binding Type: Hardcover
Weight: 1.55lbs
Size: 9.00h x 6.00w x 1.00d
ISBN: 9780823284399

About the Author
Danielle Battisti is Assistant Professor of History at the University of Nebraska-Omaha.