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| Immigrants entering NYC circa 1850s |
People often reach for Abraham Lincoln when talking about immigration today. Sometimes the comparisons are fair. Sometimes they’re not. The truth is more interesting than either side usually admits.
To understand what Lincoln can teach us now, we have to start with the world in which he lived — then look at the world we live in now — and resist the temptation to pretend they are the same.
🌄 Immigration THEN: A Growing Nation With Land to Fill
In the mid‑19th century, the United States was a young, expanding country with enormous stretches of unsettled land. Railroads, farms, mines, and cities needed workers. Immigration wasn’t just tolerated — it was often desired.
Lincoln saw newcomers as a source of national strength. He opposed the nativist Know‑Nothing movement and welcomed immigrants as partners in building the country. Speaking to German-born citizens in 1861, he said:
“If there are any abroad who desire to make this the land of their adoption, it is not in my heart to throw aught in their way.” [1]
His support for immigration was rooted in the needs of a growing nation and in his belief that America’s promise was universal.
⚠️ Immigration NOW: A Political Fear Lever
Today, immigration occupies a very different place in American politics.
Instead of filling a vast frontier, immigration is often used as:
- a symbol of cultural anxiety
- a tool for political mobilization
- a way to frame “us vs. them” narratives
- a pressure point in elections
But the material conditions have changed; the political incentives have changed; the national conversation has changed.
So no — the immigration debate of the 1850s is not the immigration debate of the 2020s.
And that’s exactly why Lincoln’s relevance requires careful handling.
🔍 So Is There a Modern Lesson? Yes — But Not the One People Expect
The lesson is not:
- “Lincoln welcomed immigrants, so we should too.”
- “Immigration was good then, so it’s good now.”
- “The situations are identical.”
They aren’t.
The real lesson — the one that does travel across time — is this: Lincoln refused to let or use the fear of outsiders as a political weapon.
The Know-Nothings
Even when it was popular. Even when it was politically useful. Even when the Know‑Nothings — a "nativist" party [*] — was gaining influence and trying to claim Lincoln as its figurehead, he refused to be used.
They believed Lincoln might be tempted by what they could offer — not a presidential nomination, not real leadership, but something subtler. They wanted his name. His reputation. His moral authority. His ability to draw ordinary voters. They hoped he would lend them credibility, soften their harsher edges, and give their movement a veneer of respectability. In short, they wanted to borrow Lincoln’s integrity to legitimize their cause.
But Lincoln saw the deeper danger. He understood that their anti‑immigrant, anti‑Catholic and anti-black ideology — and the exclusionary spirit behind it — violated the very promise of the Declaration. He refused to trade principle for convenience, or to let his popularity be used as a mask for exclusion.
In a letter to a friend in 1855, Lincoln reassured him that he wasn’t interested in joining them at all. "I am not a Know-Nothing. That is certain. How could I be?" [2]
He warned that if the country continued drifting toward the Know-Nothings' spirit of nativism, the nation’s founding promise would be hollowed out. He wrote that if they ever gained political control, the Declaration itself would soon read:
"'all men are created equal, except negroes, and foreigners, and catholics.'"
And then, with his signature dry wit, he added what would happen if they ever gained control:
“I should prefer emigrating to some country where they make no pretense of loving liberty — to Russia, for instance, where despotism can be taken pure, and without the base alloy of hypocracy [sic].”
He wasn’t talking about acreage.
He was talking about character.
🧭 The Compatibility Question, Answered Plainly
You’re right to sense a mismatch. The conditions of immigration then and now are not compatible. But the temptation to weaponize fear is absolutely compatible.
That’s where Lincoln’s relevance lives.
He believed that degrading immigrants violated the nation’s founding principle of equality. He believed that liberty could not be selective. And he believed that a republic built on fear would eventually destroy itself.
Those beliefs are not tied to the 1860s.
They are tied to human nature.
⭐ The Modern Lesson Isn’t About Immigration — It’s About Integrity
Lincoln’s stance teaches something broader and more durable:
- Don’t trade principle for political convenience
- Don’t weaponize fear
- Don’t degrade people to win power
- Don’t abandon equality when it becomes inconvenient
These are not 19th‑century lessons.
They are democratic lessons.
They apply whether the country is 30 states or 50, frontier or metropolis, agrarian or industrial.
✨ Closing Reflection
The America of Lincoln’s time welcomed immigrants because it needed people. The America of our time debates immigration for different reasons entirely. But the lesson that survives is not about land or labor — it’s about character. Lincoln refused to use fear of outsiders as a political weapon, even when it was popular. That refusal, not the demographics of the 1860s, is the part of his legacy that still speaks to us.
A topic in the archives of Abraham Lincoln, Storyteller.
Mac
[*] The American or "Know Nothing Party" was an anti-immigrant political party of the 1850's. The term nativism is the political use of fear of immigrants to protect the political power of the native‑born voters.
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