Prejudice Against Catholics (C) Christian Campbell

            Nativism (hostility towards immigrants) increased in the late 1800s which led to anti-immigrant organizations. An anti-Catholic organization, named The American Protective Association, vowed not to hire or vote for Catholics. The organization was founded by Henry Bowers in 1887.

            Among the immigrants it seemed to be the Irish that suffered most from the anti-Catholic feelings. Many Irish immigrants were illiterate and only found jobs such as miners, dockhands, factory workers, and ditch-diggers. Irish women worked as cooks, servants, and millworkers. British culture in America, which was the dominant protestant, considered Irish poverty a result of laziness, ignorance and superstition, and ultimately had no use for the Catholic Irish.

            In 1882, due to the prejudice against immigrants, a law that banned convicts, paupers, and the mentally disabled from immigrating to the U.S. while taxing each newcomer 50 cents was enacted.