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The Mexican Revolution
The violence and political unrest caused by the Mexican Revolution drove thousands of Mexican refugees north across the U.S.-Mexico border. While some refugees were denied entry under the general immigration laws, most refugees were inspected and admitted for permanent residence by Immigration Bureau officers, who allowed for “humane considerations” when interpreting these laws. -
League of Nations
The first international co-ordination of refugee affairs came with the creation by the League of Nations in 1921 of the High Commission for Refugees and the appointment of Fridtjof Nansen as its head. Nansen and the commission were charged with assisting the approximately 1,500,000 people who fled the Russian Revolution of 1917 and the subsequent civil war. -
Treaty of Lausanne
The 1923 population exchange between Greece and Turkey involved about two million people (around 1.5 million Anatolian Greeks and 500,000 Muslims in Greece) most of whom were forcibly repatriated and denaturalized from their homelands. -
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The rise of Nazism
The rise of Nazism led to such a very large increase in the number of refugees from Germany that in 1933 the League created a high commission for refugees coming from Germany. -
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War World 2
The Nazi persecution of Jews and other minorities during the 1930s, World War II, and the Holocaust created a massive global refugee crisis. More people became refugees than many nations could or would accept into their populations. -
The United Nations Established
President Truman authorized displaced persons and refugees to receive expedited admission into the U.S., within the framework of existing immigration law. Ultimately, the INS collaborated with the U.S. military, the U.S. Public Health Service, the Department of State, and numerous charitable organizations on a plan that allowed over 40,000 displaced persons to enter the U.S. under the existing quota regulations.