Thomas L. Nichols

Although many Americans supported the nativist movement of anti-immigration, many others defended immigration. One such defender was Thomas L. Nichols, a doctor, social historian, and journalist, who gave a speech in New York in 1845 in which he defended a person’s right to emigrate from one country to another. Nichols contends in the following viewpoint that those who have decided to immigrate are usually the best candidates for making a new life in a strange land—people who are strong- minded, brave, enterprising, and intelligent—and their efforts at making a new life in America have resulted in great contributions to the United States in terms of both wealth and labor. Furthermore, Nichols argues that Americans have little reason to fear “foreign influence” at the ballot box since most...