The Immigration Act of 1924, also called the Johnson-Reed Act, was the federal law that imposed the first permanent numerical limits on immigration to the United States. Signed on May 26, 1924, as Pub. L. 68-139, it capped total annual immigration at roughly 165,000, distributed those slots through a national-origins quota system that favored Northern and Western Europe, barred nearly all immigration from Asia, and created the overseas visa system still in use today.1govinfo. 43 Stat. 153 – An Act to Limit the Immigration of Aliens Into the United States It shaped who could enter the country for the next four decades, until Congress repealed the quota framework in 1965.
How the National Origins Quota Worked
The heart of the law was a formula that tied each country’s annual allotment to the number of its natives already living in the United States. Each nationality received a quota equal to 2% of its foreign-born population as counted in the 1890 census, with a floor of 100 visas per country.2United States Statutes at Large. Immigration Act of 1924 The total ceiling came to about 165,000 per year, less than half of what the earlier Emergency Quota Act of 1921 had allowed.
The choice of the 1890 census was the point. That baseline predated the large wave of Southern and Eastern European arrivals, so it locked in generous quotas for countries whose emigrants had settled earlier and small ones for everyone else. Great Britain, Ireland, and Germany received large allotments. Italy’s annual quota fell from over 42,000 under the 1921 law to fewer than 6,000. Once a country’s quota filled for the fiscal year, no more immigrants of that nationality could enter until the next year began.
Restrictionist lawmakers had built on the 1921 Emergency Quota Act, which used a 3% figure keyed to the 1910 census. Lowering the percentage and moving the baseline back twenty years was a deliberate tightening. The congressional debate made the goal explicit: freeze the country’s ethnic composition close to what it had looked like in the late nineteenth century.3Office of the Historian. The Immigration Act of 1924 (The Johnson-Reed Act)
The 1929 Permanent Formula
The 2% rule was always meant as a bridge. Section 11(b) directed that a permanent formula take effect on July 1, 1927, later delayed to 1929. Under that permanent system, each country’s quota was proportional to the total number of Americans who traced their ancestry to that country, as measured by the 1920 census, and the overall annual cap dropped to 150,000.2United States Statutes at Large. Immigration Act of 1924 Counting ancestry rather than the foreign-born pushed the advantage for Northwestern European nations even further, because their descendants had been in the country for generations.
Who Was Exempt From the Quotas
Section 4 of the act carved out several “non-quota” categories that could enter without counting against any country’s number. These included the wife or unmarried child under 18 of a U.S. citizen, previously admitted immigrants returning from a temporary trip abroad, clergy and professors who had practiced their vocation for at least two years, and students aged 15 or older enrolled at approved schools.2United States Statutes at Large. Immigration Act of 1924
The largest exemption covered the entire Western Hemisphere. Anyone born in Canada, Mexico, Cuba, Haiti, the Dominican Republic, the Canal Zone, or any independent country in Central or South America was a non-quota immigrant.2United States Statutes at Large. Immigration Act of 1924 Immigration from Latin America and Canada was not numerically capped by this law at all.3Office of the Historian. The Immigration Act of 1924 (The Johnson-Reed Act) A Western Hemisphere ceiling would not appear in federal law until 1965.
The Ban on Asian Immigration
The act handled Asian immigration through outright exclusion rather than small quotas. It prohibited the entry of any person “ineligible for citizenship” under existing federal law.3Office of the Historian. The Immigration Act of 1924 (The Johnson-Reed Act) Naturalization law at the time, tracing back to 1790 and amended in 1870, limited citizenship to “free white persons” and people of African birth or descent.4Constitution Annotated. ArtI.S8.C4.1.2.3 Early U.S. Naturalization Laws Most people from East, South, and Southeast Asia fit neither category, so they could not naturalize and, under the new law, could not immigrate.
The diplomatic fallout with Japan was immediate. Since 1907, the two countries had operated under the Gentlemen’s Agreement, an informal arrangement under which Japan limited emigration in exchange for dignified treatment of Japanese nationals in the United States. Codifying exclusion into statute ended that understanding. Japan’s ambassador protested before passage and warned of “grave consequences.” The letter was characterized in the Senate as a threat and helped accelerate the bill.3Office of the Historian. The Immigration Act of 1924 (The Johnson-Reed Act) Both the Japanese ambassador and the American ambassador to Japan resigned in protest once the act became law.
A New Overseas Visa System
The law also changed where immigration screening happened. Before 1924, inspectors at Ellis Island and other ports decided each new arrival’s fate after the ocean crossing was already complete. The act moved that decision overseas. Prospective immigrants now had to apply for a new document called an “immigration visa” at a U.S. consulate in their home country before boarding a ship.5U.S. Law and Race Initiative OER. Immigration Act of 1924
Consular officers reviewed each application against the relevant country’s quota, verified documents, and either approved or denied entry before departure. The visa consisted of one copy of the application bearing the consular officer’s approval and had to specify the applicant’s nationality, quota status, and expiration date. Applicants had to submit two recent photographs, one of which was permanently attached to the visa, and pay a $9 fee that went to the U.S. Treasury.2United States Statutes at Large. Immigration Act of 1924 After 1924, Ellis Island’s role shrank; the facility mostly handled paperwork problems, suspected contagious diseases, and displaced persons rather than mass processing.
Creation of the Border Patrol
Two days after Johnson-Reed became law, Congress passed the Labor Appropriation Act, which established the U.S. Border Patrol within the Bureau of Immigration on May 28, 1924.6U.S. Customs and Border Protection. 1924 – Border Patrol Established Congress set aside at least $1,000,000 that year for a “land-border patrol,” with $100,000 made immediately available.7Immigration History. Labor Appropriations Act of 1924 The agency expanded to 450 officers at annual pay of $1,680.8U.S. Customs and Border Protection. Border Patrol History
Contrary to a common assumption, most early officers were assigned to the Canadian border, where liquor smuggling during Prohibition often accompanied illegal crossings. The new agency’s purpose was to secure the spaces between designated ports of entry, patrolling remote stretches of desert, forest, and riverbank. Continuous physical surveillance of the border became a permanent federal function from that year forward.
Repeal in 1965 and What the Law Left Behind
The national-origins system lasted forty-one years. In 1965, Congress passed the Hart-Celler Act, amendments to the Immigration and Nationality Act that abolished the country-by-country quota framework the 1924 law had built.9Congress.gov. H.R. 2580 – An Act to Amend the Immigration and Nationality Act Hart-Celler replaced nationality quotas with a preference system organized around family reunification and labor force needs, and it imposed the first numerical cap on Western Hemisphere immigration at 120,000 per year.
The racial and ethnic criteria are gone, but the administrative machinery the 1924 act created is still in place: an overseas visa application filed at a consulate, a numerical ceiling on annual admissions, and a dedicated border enforcement agency. For Southern and Eastern Europeans and for virtually all Asians, the law meant a generation of exclusion whose demographic effects reached well into the second half of the twentieth century.