Unintended Consequences: The Story of Irish Immigration to the U.S. and How America’s Door was Closed to the Irish

Description

Unintended Consequences reveals how America’s door closed on legal Irish immigration in the 1960s, and how America’s Irish mounted a counterattack when nation-changing political forces were sweeping the country during the era of civil rights, political assassinations, and the Vietnam War.

This book looks at the full historical background to Irish migration across the Atlantic, how it helped shape the young republic, and how the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 brought a near total halt to this westward flow. Nevertheless, the Irish would not be denied and continued to make the journey, no longer into the light of a full and legal American life, but rather into the shadows of an undocumented existence. Successive organisations championed the undocumented Irish, and the fight continues to this day, but this is a new America, where, in recent years, there has been growing hostility to immigrants of every nationality. Ray O’Hanlon has spent over three decades reporting on battles over comprehensive U.S. immigration reform, and Unintended Consequences is the story of the Irish past, its present, and most uncertain future in the ‘land of the free,’ now in the presidency of Joe Biden, a man who fully embraces his Irish immigrant family story. Through Biden, the great Irish of America story continues, and with renewed hope.

CONTENTS

 Preface

1. Searching for a Savior
2. Mustering for Battle
3. 1965: The Year of the New Divide
4. The Fading Drumbeat
5. Teddy
6. The Fighting Irish in Retreat
7. The Irish Fight Back
8. Revulsion, Rejection, Retreat
9. Restless, Ever Restless
10. Annie Moore and the Power of Sentiment
11. Cold Prose Loudly Proclaimed
12. A New Divide
13. Read All About It!
14. Saved Amid Depression
15. Cometh the Hour
16. The Hour Cometh
17. Back to Boston
18. On Wings and Prayers
19. A Favorite Son Rises
20. A Favorite Son Falls
21. The Torch is Passed
22. Paddy Goes Marching Away
23. Aliens Ahoy!
24. All Aboard!
25. Finally!
26. An Explanation of the Problem
27. Attention Ladies and Gentlemen
28. The Road to Washington
29. To the Hill
30. The Swinging Door
31. A Stunned Loudness
32. Peaks and Fallows
33. A Measure of Success
34. Troubles Behind, Troubles Ahead
35. The Boys from Massachusetts
36. To the Banner Born
37. Numbers Up, Numbers Down
38. Like Summer Leaves
39. Christmas Postponed
40. One Big Bust
41. The Morrison Express
42. The Train Arrives
43. McCain on McLean
44. No Going Back
45. Legalize the Irish!
46. McCain’s Embrace
47. Yes We Can, Well Maybe
48. A Last Full Measure
49. An Anniversary Falls
50. A State O’ Chassis
51. ‘Afterwords

ISBN
9781785373787

Praise for Unintended Consequences

‘I was proud to hand deliver to the President of the United States, Joe Biden, a copy of my friend Ray O’Hanlon’s wonderful and insightful new book, Unintended Consequences just before the meeting in the White House with the four legislative leaders and the Vice President. President Biden was clearly very pleased to receive the book. As a proud son of Ireland, and a fellow ardent backer of immigration reform, President Biden is keenly aware of both the massive contributions of the Irish to America and the need to improve our current policies to address the undocumented and to rectify certain unintended consequences of past reforms, so that – amongst other things – more people from Ireland can once again help build a better United States of America.’
Senator Charles Schumer

‘As Ray O’Hanlon’s impressively thorough history of Irish immigration to the United States shows, people here have been looking across the Atlantic Ocean with longing and fascination for centuries. In recent decades, however, this story has been dominated by political rows, legal logjams and emotional insecurity. Despite the dewy-eyed rhetoric of presidents from John F Kennedy to Joe Biden, roughly 15,000 Irish citizens across the 50 states still live in constant fear of a knock at the door and a one-way ticket home … Unintended Consequences feels like the definitive version of a story that should be much better known.’
Sunday Business Post

“O’Hanlon provides an important angle on Irish-American relations over the last two hundred years and also demonstrates the complex nature and political consequences of immigration”
Matthew Geden, Irish Examiner

‘Ray O’Hanlon takes an unflinching look at more than 100 years of American immigration policy broadly and how it affects the Irish specifically, particularly since the passage of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965. With clarity and context, he provides an essential chronology of the many battles waged to correct the ‘consequences’ of that legislation and its impact on Irish America. His assessment is as eye-opening as it is sobering, squarely assigning credit and blame for the results where they belong.’
Linda Dowling Almeida, author of Irish Immigrants in New York City: 1945–1995, Glucksman Ireland House, New York University

‘Ray O’Hanlon remains the pre-eminent chronicler of the Irish American experience, in large part because for him it has never been purely an academic exercise, but a lived one, experienced first-hand as an Irish person who made his home and his life in America. His grasp of history informs a nuanced understanding of the modern, real-time Irish America.’
Kevin Cullen, Boston Globe 

‘Ray O’Hanlon plays the role of historian and fly-on-the-wall journalist in this well-researched narrative about immigration, politics and culture. It is an Irish story and an American story, told by one of Irish America’s foremost observers.’
Dr Terry Golway, journalist, author, historian, and editor of Being New York, Being Irish

‘Unintended Consequences provides an essential chronology on the history of U.S. immigration policy as it pertains to the Irish. Full of fascinating insights, O’Hanlon’s journalistic style makes it an engaging read about an era that has been rather understudied to date.’
Miriam Nyhan Grey PhD, Global Coordinator for Irish Studies, Glucksman Ireland House, New York University

‘Unintended Consequences is meticulously researched and beautifully written. The legislation that systematically closed the door to Irish immigrants is skilfully juxtaposed against multiple delightful vignettes that remind us of the humanity and diversity of the emigration experience over the last seven decades.’
Professor Christine Kinealy, Director, Ireland’s Great Hunger Institute, Quinnipiac University, Connecticut

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Ray O’Hanlon is the editor of the New York City-published Irish Echo newspaper. A native of Dublin, O’Hanlon has reported from four continents in a newspaper career spanning forty-one years. In addition to his work as a reporter and editor, O’Hanlon has been a frequent contributor to US, Irish and British media outlets reporting on Ireland, Irish American affairs, and Anglo-Irish relations. His book The New Irish Americans (1998) was the recipient of a Washington Irving Book Award, and The South Lawn Plot, his first fiction work, was published in 2011.