The notion of an Italian American immigration is to some extent anachronistic. When immigration began from southern Europe in the 1880s, Italy was only newly formed into a single republic, and the regionally and linguistically diverse population making their way to the United States identified themselves according to the town or village from which they came. This tendency was accentuated by the fact that many of the early immigrants were seasonal migrants, returning to their home-towns frequently moving back and forth between their homes and the United States and Argentina. Once Italians began to settle down in the United States and confronted the high degree of nativism among native-born Americans, this local identification began to change.

By 1972, 8.8 million Americans claimed Italian origin, while a further 14 million had Italian heritage. Most came in waves between 1880 and the First World War, and from 1919 until the terminating of large-scale immigration in the 1920s. They concentrated in areas where there were jobs, primarily Northeastern cities, though a few rural communities of Italians were established like Tontitown, Arkansas, Asti, California (where a number of winegrowers from Italy established themselves), and Roseto, Pennsylvania. As the formerly cyclical migrants began to settle, marrying in the United States, or more commonly bringing their families from Italy Italian enclaves (commonly referred to as “Little Italy”) emerged in Boston, MA, New Haven, New York City, NY, Philadelphia, PA in the northeast, Chicago, IL and Pittsburgh, PA in the Midwest and San Francisco, CA, Los Angeles, CA and San José in California.

Italians arrived in the US at a time when the Irish already controlled local politics through machines like Tammany Hall, and had established themselves through patronage networks on police forces. Stereotypes quickly emerged of the Irish cop and the Italian mobster, which were common in 1930s movies down to Once Upon a Time in America (1984). Italians have endeavored to combat this stereotype, focusing on the success of police commissioners like Frank Rizzo in Philadelphia and noting other ethnic groups’ connections with organized crime, but the task has been made difficult by the fact that the best-known novel by an Italian American is Mario Puzo’s The Godfather (1969) and by Frank Sinatra’s well-known connections with the underworld.

Italians witnessed considerable upward mobility after the Second World War, like other European ethnic groups using the GI Bill to finance their moves out of cities and into expanding suburbs. Italian neighborhoods survived in cities, however, often tied to the Catholic parishes which remained in place, when Protestant churches had sold out to incoming African American migrants. Considerable animosity was noted between Italians and blacks in cities, partly because they were in close proximity on the social hierarchy but also because Italian Catholics were more reluctant to leave their congregations than were Jews and Protestants.

Politically Italian Americans voted Democrat like other Catholic immigrants. Fiorella La Guardia was the first Italian to rise through this party to be elected to Congress in 1916, before becoming mayor of New York City and John Pastore became the first Italian to be elected a governor (of Rhode Island). By 1950 all three candidates in the mayoral election for New York City were of Italian origin. Mario Cuomo, governor of New York between 1983 and 1995, was for many years the best known Italian American politician.

The 1970s economic downswing brought a period of turmoil for many Italian Americans. This was captured in the popular 1977 disco movie, Saturday Night Fever, and more recently by Spike Lee in Summer of Sam (1999). During the 1970s, Italian Americans moved towards the Republican Party, part of Nixon’s “Silent Majority,” remaining economically liberal but becoming increasingly socially conservative in the wake of the sexual revolution and abortion. Italian immigrants had been noted for being more restrictive towards women than other immigrant groups, and with the continuation of strong communities and allegiance to the Catholic church, these became the foundation of more conservative voting patterns. Following the Reagan era, the best known Italian American in politics may be the Republican mayor of New York, Rudolph Giuliani.