The USCIS History Office preserves and promotes understanding of the history of USCIS and its predecessor agencies and programs. USCIS benefits from a legacy of over 100 years of federal immigration and naturalization administration. Below you will find a brief chronology of USCIS’s institutional history. | 1891 | Office of Superintendent of Immigration created and placed in the Treasury Department | | 1895 | Office of Superintendent of Immigration upgraded to Bureau of Immigration | | 1903 | Bureau of Immigration transferred to the newly created Department of Commerce and Labor | | 1906 | Naturalization Service created and Bureau of Immigration became the Bureau of Immigration and Naturalization | | 1913 | Bureau of Immigration and Naturalization divided into separate Bureaus – the Bureau of Immigration and the Bureau of Naturalization – and placed into the new Department of Labor | | 1924 | US Border Patrol created within the Bureau of Immigration | | 1933 | The Bureau of Immigration and the Bureau of Naturalization reunited into a single agency, the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) | | 1940 | The INS transferred from the Department of Labor to the Department of Justice | | 2003 | The INS abolished and its functions placed under three agencies – US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), and Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) – within the newly created Department of Homeland Security (DHS) | Researchers interested in the history of USCIS, its predecessor agencies, and immigration and nationality law may contact the History Office by writing to cishistory.library@dhs.gov or calling 202-272-8370.
| 
Share This Page