Immigration Laws

Immigration Laws are the federal policies which are designed to put a check on human movement from the country of permanent residence of which one is the native resident to any foreign country, where he becomes an immigrant. Different nations have different nationality and immigrant laws which allow people to live, work and/or become the permanent residents of the country.

Immigration laws differ from nation to nation, and also the political stability of a nation. As per the mandate of United Nations International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, it is promulgated that all the world nations should and will allow entry of their own citizens.

Again depending on nation to nation, immigration laws also vary. There are certain countries in the world where acquiring citizenship is a no more than solving a crossword puzzle. Some of these countries include, France, Germany, Finland, US, UK, etc. These countries have stringent immigration laws to control the entry of any immigrant, the duration of stay, and moreover, having the say in the socio-political system of the country.

For example, in UK, the control over immigrants is promulgated through Immigration control began with the Aliens Act 1905. The law was put into effect in order to control immigration of Jews. The law was made more stringent in 1960s. However, British citizenship can easily be obtained by anybody who is born and brought up in Britain or British overseas territory, or has any one of the parents as UK citizens.

In US too, several laws were enacted to thwart the immigration activity. Some of them were Naturalization Act of 1790, The Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952, Chinese Exclusion Act etc. Year around US Federal government has a method of Diversity Visa Lottery, offering citizens of the nominated countries legal entry to United States of America.

Furthermore, many world nations have a formal naturalization process through which immigration is granted to the citizen. However, this process is time consuming and takes away many precious years of one’s life.