Introduction
From its very origins the American society was composed of those who came to settle down and build a new life: that is why American nation has been always considered the one composed mostly of immigrants. In different epochs their number could even prevail over those who had been born on American soil, but even the latter were successors of earlier immigrants and had roots outside America. Nevertheless, the contemporary immigration to the United States is often considered to be a negative phenomenon what is a typical feature of many societies but still it is surprising in the circumstances of the society composed of immigrants or descendants of previous immigrants.
Reasons of economic and social nature that make public attitudes towards immigration cautious and sometimes even hostile are well-known: immigrants often enhance competition over the scarce resources and in the labor market, contribute to existing social problems (e.g. poverty, unemployment), require elaboration of policies designed to smooth their assimilation into the already established society (the waste of additional resources). On the other hand, the positive impact of immigration onto economy and social life is often of long-run perspective and can be not completely understood by the majority of population.
In addition to these reasons one may not ignore political, cultural and even religious ones. Any society with established values has to find compromises with new-comers who often tend to misunderstand, not abide to or simply ignore these values. The negative reaction towards immigrants is often an example of preventive self-defense of the society against something that is theoretically able to change it.
Even the position of the first settlers towards new-comers was not totally friendly and welcoming: in May of 1637 the General Court of Massachusetts ordered that no town or person in the colony should receive or host any alien without permission from the authorities.
The reasons for such a decision were given explicitly:
"...If we here be a corporation established by free consent, if the place of our cohabitation be our own, then no man hath a right to come into us without our consent... If we are bound to keep off whatsoever appears to tend to our ruin or damage, then may we lawfully refuse to receive such whose dispositions suite not with ours and whose society (we know) will be hurtful to us?" (2)
The issue of investigation of this research project can be described as the attitudes towards immigration in the contemporary American society but one should underline that the main objective of the investigation will be to analyze public opinion dealing with immigration, especially focusing on its negative reaction and to find out its reasons and its incentives. Another objective consists in finding a possible way to prevent these negative attitudes, in particular optimal solutions that may smooth assimilation process of the new-comers in the American society.
The research deals with the following terms that are to be defined in the framework of the introductory part of the research project: …