Anna Pegler-Gordon
In Sight of America: Photography and the Development of U.S. Immigration Policy
American Crossroads, 28.
Berkeley:
University of California Press,
2009.
344 pp.; 57 b/w ills.
Paper
$24.95
(9780520252981)
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In Winslow, Arizona, an immigration inspector stopped a consular official and asked him to produce identification. Despite the card provided, the inspector doubted the official’s status and demanded to see a laborer’s certificate, perhaps hoping to verify identification through the photograph that was mandatory on such certificates. Although this scene sounds like it could be taking place today under SB 1070, the exchange occurred in 1903, and the consular official was not of Mexican descent....