In the decades leading to the twenty-first century, American society underwent many changes that affected the way people lived and changed the face of America. Congress passed the Immigration Act in 1965 that removed restrictions based on natural origin, resulting in an increase in the number of immigrants coming to America. During the last two decades of the century nearly one million new immigrants entered the country every year. While the immigrants who had come to America in the 1800s and early 1900s were primarily European, these new immigrants were mostly from Asia and Latin America.
During the 1980s, the number of Asian-Americans in the U.S. was increasing at a rate seven times that of the population in general. During that time, approximately 46,000 immigrants arrived from the Philippines and another 45,000 came from Hong Kong, Taiwan, and mainland China. Still others arrived in the U.S. from Vietnam, Korea, Cambodia, Iran, India, and Laos. In 1990, the U.S. census counted 22 million Hispanics living in America. Of these, 60 percent were Mexican-Americans, 12 percent were of Puerto Rican origin, 5 percent had come from Cuba, and another 23 percent were from other countries. A decade later, the total number surged to 32.8 million or 12 percent of the total population, making Hispanics the largest minority group in the country.
As Latinos entered the country, they settled throughout the continental United States. However, many Mexican immigrants settled in Illinois and in the border states of California, Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas. By the year 2000, Latinos constituted one-third of the populations in Texas, California, and Arizona. In New Mexico, Latinos made up half of the population. Other Latino groups settled elsewhere in the country. Puerto Rican immigrants, for example, often moved to New York and New Jersey, while Cuban immigrants frequently settled in Florida.
Although their origins were different, the new immigrants came to the U.S. for many of the same reasons earlier groups had come. They left behind countries with increasing populations and few opportunities to make a living. Since immigrants often settled in large enclaves within the U.S., they were able to maintain many of their cultural traditions. Soon the new immigrants, Latinos in particular, began to influence many aspects of American society.
As it had in earlier times, the influx of new immigration was accompanied by a resurgence in anti-foreignism. Conflicts also occurred between old and new minority groups. Many established Americans worried about the rising tide of new immigrants and whether America could absorb so many new people. Although no new laws were passed to stem legal immigration, Congress did pass the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986, which attempted to limit the number of illegal immigrants entering the country by penalizing employers who hired undocumented workers. The law also gave amnesty to many illegal immigrants who were already in the county.
Anti-immigration sentiment became especially strong in California during the early 1990s as the nation experienced a recession. Voters there approved a measure to reduce state expenditures on the approximately four million illegal immigrants living in the state. Proposition 187, passed in 1994, denied illegal immigrants access to social services such as public schools and non-emergency healthcare. Supporters of the reform hoped it would save the state of California a great deal of money; however, many critics felt racism was the actual motive for the measure.
In many ways, the new immigrants were similar to those that had come a century before seeking opportunity. Many immigrants made important contributions to their new nation. Asian Americans, for example, maintained higher median incomes per household than any other group in the country, and they attended some of the most prestigious colleges. Ironically, these achievements often led to more resentment.
In addition to conflicts over immigration, the end of twentieth century also became the setting for other racial and ethnic tensions. In 1992, riots broke out in Los Angeles after a mostly white jury found several white L.A. police officers not guilty of any crime, although they had been videotaped beating an African American suspect. Angered by the verdict, many residents of L.A.'s minority neighborhoods began looting and set fire to entire city blocks. Some also attacked Asian shopkeepers. The riots clearly demonstrated the complexity of ethnic and racial relations throughout America.
Related to these complexities was the resurgence of cultural conservatism that began in the late 1970s with Jerry Falwell's Moral Majority. The movement was re-energized in 1989 when Pat Robertson, a television evangelist, founded the Christian Coalition. Supporters of such movements, also known as the religious right, began to wield their political power by urging politicians to legalize school prayer and ban abortion. They also hoped to downsize government, prevent gay rights, and promote "traditional" family values.
This new conservative movement was reflected in the appointment of three conservative judges to the Supreme Court during the Reagan administration. In the 1980s several important cases concerning abortion and affirmative action came before the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court ruled in 1973 Roe v. Wade that states could not make laws limiting access to abortion at the beginning of pregnancies. These abortion rights were diminished by several Supreme Court rulings in the late 1980s and early 1990s that opened the door for states to establish certain limitations on abortion. In several affirmative action cases, the court made it easier for white males to argue reverse racism against affirmative action policies and made discrimination in hiring more difficult to prove. Some of the effects of these decisions, however, were reversed by the Civil Rights Act of 1991. Struggles over affirmative action continued, and in 1996 voters approved Proposition 209, which eliminated affirmative action in education and for government hiring.
As the century closed, the secondary school test scores and average household incomes of African Americans continued to be lower than their white counterparts. As America's workplace became more dependent on technology, education became more important, creating problems for students without access to a good education. Thus, although African Americans achieved the passage of the Civil Rights Act in 1964, the struggle for equality continued beyond the end of the century.
In addition to the challenges of a multicultural society, America faced other challenges such as a widening economic divide that continued to separate the rich from the poor. During the 1990s, the richest 20 percent of Americans garnered half of the nation's total income. Meanwhile, the poorest 20 percent fell short of earning four percent of the total income. According to 1998 estimates from the U.S. Census Bureau, just over 10 percent of white and Asian Americans lived in poverty, while over 25 percent of African Americans and Latinos lived in poverty.
Adding to the problems faced by America as it moved into the twenty-first century was the coming retirement of the baby-boomers, the generation of Americans born just after World War II. The aging of the American population guaranteed to put never before seen pressures on Social Security and Medicare. The concern that this generation's retirement needs would break the system became an increasingly important election issue as the new century dawned.
In addition to the many challenges facing American society at the beginning of the new century, technology had an increasing influence on the way Americans lived their lives. Technology, and in particular the Internet, were responsible for the booming economy of the late 1990s. Investors put up billions of dollars to fund new dot-com companies. The Internet also revolutionized the way "bricks and mortar" companies, or companies that existed outside of the Internet, operated. Employees could now communicate and conduct transactions around the world as quickly as they could in person. The Internet also brought change to people's everyday lives by giving them access to seemingly endless sources of information. Americans were soon banking, shopping, paying bills, learning, and voting on-line.