[RobRoy]

Immigration was pretty open in the first half of the 20th century. Heck, my grandfather’s job before WWII was to carry truckloads of Mexicans to the fields in western Washington state. But there were no services for them to drain back then. We needed the labor and they were willing to provide it for a living wage.

My, how times have changed.

[Lonesome in Massachussets]

I remember as late as the 1990’s Jamaican temporary workers who came up to Massachusetts during harvest time to pick apples. (The policy goes back to World War II.) The Jamaicans were clean, orderly and workmanlike in appearance and behavior. They lived in “bunkhouses”, essentially barns, on the farms. They made about $400 a week for a coupla few weeks a year. The farmers preferred them to Americans and the Jamaicans treasured the temporary work visas as family heirlooms, passed from father to son. Some busybody in Washington must have seen to it that they are no longer exploited; we don’t see them anymore.