Prescott F. Hall
Prescott Farnsworth Hall was an American lawyer and author who championed nativism, eugenics and anti-immigration views.
Career
After preparation at G. W. Noble's School in Boston he entered Harvard, graduating from the college in 1889 and from the Law School in 1892. In May 1894, he became one of the founders and first secretary of the Immigration Restriction League, today considered the first anti-immigrant think tank in the United States. He was also a member of the American Society for Psychical Research, the Bostonian Society and the American Genetic Association.An advocate of scientific racism and eugenics, he is known today primarily for his role in lobbying for the passage of what became the Immigration Act of 1917, which created a federal framework for restricting immigration—by imposing a literacy test, levying an $8 charge on every immigrant, and creating a massive exclusion zone with the Asiatic Barred Zone.
Works
- Henry Holt and Company, 1906.
- * In Albert B. Wolfe, ed., Readings in Social Problems, Ginn & Company, 1916.
- * In Philip Davis, ed., Immigration and Americanization, Ginn & Company, 1920.
- William J. Nagel, 1908.
- with a foreword by Madison Grant, The Knickerbocker Press, 1922.
Articles
- Gunton's Magazine, Vol. XXVII, 1891.
- Harvard Law Review, Vol. 8, No. 5, Dec. 26, 1894.
- "Italian Immigration," The North American Review, August 1896.
- "Immigration and the Educational Test," The North American Review, October 1897.
- Harvard Law Review, Vol. 11, No. 8, Mar. 25, 1898.
- Publications of the American Statistical Association, Vol. 6, No. 48, Dec., 1899.
- "New Problems of Immigration," The Forum, January 1901.
- Harvard Law Review, Vol. 15, No. 7, Mar., 1902.
- The New Englander Magazine, Vol. XXVIII, March/August 1903.
- Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, Vol. 24, Jul., 1904.
- Journal of Social Science, No. 44, September 1906.
- "The Immigration Problem," The Outlook, November 10, 1906.
- "The Future of American Ideals," The North American Review, January 1912.
- Journal of Political Economy, Vol. 21, No. 8, Oct., 1913.
- Proceedings of the American Society for Psychical Research, Vol. VIII, 1914.
- Proceedings of the American Society for Psychical Research, Vol. XIII, 1919.
- Journal of Heredity, Vol. X, 1919.
- Journal of Heredity, Vol. X, 1919.
- Proceedings of the American Society for Psychical Research, Vol. XIV, 1920.
- Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, Vol. 93, Jan., 1921.
- The North American Review, Vol. 213, No. 786, May, 1921.