Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965

The Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965, also known as the Hart-Celler Act, is a federal law passed by the 89th United States Congress and signed by President Lyndon B. Johnson on October 3, 1965, at Liberty Island, New York. It abolished the national-origins quota system that had governed American immigration policy since the 1920s and replaced it with a seven-category preference system favoring relatives of United States citizens and permanent residents, skilled professionals, and refugees; effective July 1, 1968, the quota system was fully replaced by hemispheric numerical limitations. The act reshaped the demographic makeup of the United States: the foreign-born share of the population rose from about 5 percent in 1965 to roughly 14 percent by 2016. This description is adapted from Wikipedia contributors under CC BY-SA 4.0; changes were made. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/