The Hot Topic of Immigration
By Wendy Wilson Spooner
Immigration a hot topic right now. And it has been for centuries.
EVERYONE has immigrants and refugees in their family trees, so what would our ancestors say?
And is there such a thing as the American dream anymore?
In my debut novel Once Upon an Irish Summer, my real-life fourth-great uncle, young Allen Hamilton, crosses the Atlantic alone to antebellum America to find a way to save his family—from starvation and typhus fever in his homeland. This true story took place in 1817, pre-Ellis Island by 75 years.
This was also 25 years before the potato famine. So, why did the people leave Ireland in droves at the end of the Regency era?
It was because of the heated situation with the English, including the aftermath of the Irish Rebellion of 1798 in which England sought to suppress the Irish spirit with heavy fees and tax laws that put many out of business. Food became scarce as farmers had to charge exorbitant prices and the average family couldn’t afford food.
So, many left the Emerald Isle in search of a better life, answering the call of the American dream. Including my 4th great-uncle, Allen Hamilton. And who he became in the U.S. is an astounding example of the opportunity he and so many others found in America.
And is there a similar reason people are still flooding United States borders today?
According to Bloomberg.com’s Exporting People: How Central America Encourages Mass Migration, the governments of El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras don’t help their poor. There aren’t programs to feed the hungry or help with medical care like there are in the U.S., so people leave to find a better life.
We not only take in the tired, the hungry, and poor, but most of the immigrants and refugees we absorb find jobs and become hard workers, who send money back to family members, adding to the fiscal stability of the homelands they just left.
Not a bad situation for those countries. And it’s one of the unseen ways the U.S. helps other nations.
The dictionary definition of the American dream says it’s, “The ideal by which equality of opportunity is available to any American, allowing the highest aspirations and goals to be achieved.”
THAT’S it. Right there. And the fact that people continue to walk, fly, and sail to these shores is solid evidence that the American dream still exists. In spite of where you were born or what class you were born into, you can achieve your own version of success in a society where climbing the proverbial ladder is endlessly possible.
For everyone.
What’s YOUR definition of the American dream? What immigration stories do you know of your own ancestors?
Wendy Wilson Spooner is the author of Once Upon an Irish Summer, the first book in a trilogy.
It’s the story of a gifted artist suffering from debilitating grief finding healing and inspiration in her Irish ancestry and going on to paint a masterpiece.
ONCE UPON AN IRISH SUMMER is a dual timeline novel of two teenagers, two centuries apart, in one city; the untold chronicle of Irish Allen Hamilton’s journey through antebellum America to find a way to save his family, woven with the struggle of his 15-year-old descendant, 200 years later, who battles through grief to find herself again.
Wendy is a Genetic Genealogist by day, a writer by night, and an artist in between.
Her love of what we can learn from history compels her to write the true stories she unearths during research, because she’s found that truth is indeed much more exciting and inspiring than fiction.
Wendy writes about family, faith, grief, art, and overcoming obstacles in life by coming to know who we really are—children of God, and the descendants of incredible people who paved the way for us—even if they really struggled. Wendy believes in learning from our ancestors, honoring them, and then standing on their shoulders to become someone even better.
As an award-winning author of professional articles and poems, Wendy has turned to novel writing to share what she knows with a much greater audience.
When Wendy is not researching or writing, she hikes, paints, loves being a church youth leader, binging on Bollywood movies, and hanging out with her greatest loves—her family.
You can purchase Once Upon an Irish Summer at Barnes & Noble, Amazon.com, and anywhere books are sold.
You can also visit the author at https://wendywilsonspooner.com/.