Emergency Quota Act
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In the United States, the Emergency Quota Act of May 19, 1921 limited the annual number of immigrants who could be admitted from any country to 3% of the number of persons from that country living in the United States in 1910, according to Census figures. That was 357,802 people. Of that number just over half was allocated for northern and western Europeans, and the remainder for eastern and southern Europeans, a 75% reduction from prior years. The act was passed in a time of swelling isolationism following World War I.