I'll type slower for you.
There were no existing laws to comply with. They came the same way that illegals come today.
It's common to cite sources when you copy (nearly) entire articles as you did.
I find it amusing that you are lecturing on ethics of law, and scoffing at ethics.
An obvious falsehood. There are laws to comply with today so they don't come the same way.
Luis, Luis, Luis. I can only respond to what you write. You said, "So to say that the Irish were legal immigrants is a stretch, considering that there were very few laws establishing the legal status of immigrants at the time of the Irish diaspora."
The Irish were not violating the existing laws of the United States when they came here. They were, by definition, legally here. Illegal aliens who come here today are violating the existing laws of this country. That is why they are called illegals. Are you a charter member of DENSA?
It's common to cite sources when you copy (nearly) entire articles as you did. I find it amusing that you are lecturing on ethics of law, and scoffing at ethics.
It is indeed laughable to see you lecture me about ethics. You are the one who defends illegals and equates them to legal immigrants, past and present. I suspect that you had to verify that the Irish had actually worked on the transcontinental railroad and not just the Chinese. That is such a common and well-known fact that I don't understand why such research was necessary, unless of course, that you didn't know it, hence the photo of chinese laborers captioned by you sarcastically as being Irish. As I have said previously, you need to learn your American history and not rely on the Leftist, revisionist version of it.
FYI: I am not lecturing on the "ethics of law." I am making the distinction between legal and illegal, not right or wrong.