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Chapter 1 Introduction: “Family Reunification Has Been the Cornerstone of Our Immigration Policy” In 1903, Rihei Onishi, an immigrant from Japan, began a rice farm in Pierce, Texas. He achieved enough economic success that by 1906 several dozen men from Japan had joined him in Texas, leasing land from him. In 1909, when Onishi went to Japan for a visit, six of his tenant farmers asked him to bring their fiancées and wives back to the United States. As “settled agriculturists,” summoning their wives, Onishi’s tenant farmers were allowed to bring over these women.1 Their success in reuniting with their wives was fortunate, and perhaps unexpected, for their request was made following the Gentlemen’s Agreement of 1907, which banned further immigration of Japanese laborers. It was also a period of growing anti-immigrant attitude and the passage of ever more exclusionary policies. Within a few short years, Congress would deny entry to Asian immigrants—first through passage of the Asiatic Barred Zone Act of 1917, which used a language of longitudes and latitudes to deny entry to anyone from Asia, then through the Immigration Act of 1924, which excluded anyone unqualified for citizenship. The Supreme Court declared Asians ineligible for citizenship in Takao Ozawa v. the United States (1922) and United States v. Bhagat Singh Thind (1923).2 Despite increased hostility toward immigration, men like those on Onishi’s land who were already here used available family provisions in the immigration policy to bring their spouses and children to the United States as well in an effort to settle more permanently. Nearly one hundred years later, in 2006, the New York Times reported the fourteen-year effort of Isaac Owusu to be reunited with the four sons he left behind in Ghana. After becoming a citizen in 2002, Owusu petitioned to have his sons join him in the United States, a right afforded to him as a naturalized citizen. When given the opportunity to prove his familial claims by taking a DNA test, Owusu confidently swabbed the inside of his cheek. Test results quickly dashed his hopes for reuniting with his children when government officials notified him that the test could verify paternity for his oldest son only. With these test results, Owusu FICTIVE KINSHIP 2 learned that his deceased wife had been unfaithful and that he was not the biological father of his three younger sons. The government permitted the admission of his oldest son, but the younger three were denied entry. The only recourse Owusu had was to petition for the younger boys’ admission as his stepsons. Genetic tests rendered null and false the affective ties of the familial bond between father and sons that the Owusu family had unequivocally known for nearly two decades.3 Today there are broad legal provisions— the most expansive and inclusive in American immigration history— that permit family reunification for permanent residents, and particularly citizens like Owusu. There are nevertheless hurdles for exercising such rights, and in Owusu’s case DNA test results failed to provide the definitive proof of familial ties necessary for his effort to reunite his family. The experiences of Onishi’s men and Isaac Owusu highlight the often unrecognized but essential role of family reunification in periods of both exclusion and expansion in American immigration policy, which has included informal and formal family reunification provisions. Over this long history, family reunification has been a critical method for making a claim for entry, formulating immigration policy, and regulating immigration in the United States. From the mid-1800s to today, the United States has had some semblance of family reunification as a part of its immigration policy. Prior to 1924, family reunification provisions were briefly in place for Chinese merchants and Japanese laborers. In addition, a family preference system existed within the national origins quota system enacted in 1924. In 1965 Congress replaced national origins policy with one favoring family reunification, and today about 70 percent of all visas for legal immigration are reserved for family reunification. In exercising these family unity provisions, Onishi’s tenant farmers, Owusu, and others like them have sought to identify and prove themselves not only as legitimate families but also as legitimate members of the nation, worthy of inclusion in the national fabric. This book examines the centrality and significance of family reunification —provisions aimed at preserving or supporting family unity during or following migration—to the development of American immigration policy and the construction of race and nation. Although...

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