ABSTRACT
As legal and illegal immigration surged anew in the 1980s and 1990s, the trendrenewed old fears and concerns about the ability of new immigrants to assimilate and about how willing American society should be to absorb them. As the nation struggled to cope with the renewed immigration, public opinion pressured Congress to do something about what many felt to be a lack of control of the borders. Congress passed several immigration laws designed to restrict illegal immigration and otherwise discourage immigration. It increased the border patrol, strengthened provisions aimed at document fraud and alien smuggling, tightened detention, deportation, and employee verification procedures, restricted access to a number of public benefits, and tightened asylum, parole, and short-term visa provisions.
