Which sentence in the passage should be revised for clarity?

Question

  In the years following World War I, there was a great deal of anti-immigrant sentiment in the U.S. As a result, the United States government enacted various laws that restricted immigration. The Immigration Act of 1924 established a quota system. The law stated that no more than two percent of the population of each nationality living in the U.S. could be admitted as immigrants. Eliminating immigration from Asia, it also limited immigration from Europe, Russia and Italy in particular.

Answer 1

The last sentence should be modified.

Let's express this phrase in 2 parts: A and B:

"Eliminating immigration from Asia" = A.

"it also limited immigration from Europe" = B.

When you have a sentence in this format: "A-ing , B" it basically means that "As a result of A, B happened."

Let me use another phrase with the same format to help you understand what I am explaining. Consider this sentence: "Exercising in the morning, I was able to lose weight and have more energy throughout the day." You can see that this phrase is basically the same as saying "Because I exercise in the morning, I have lost weight and have more energy throughout the day."

In this case, the sentence "eliminating immigration from Asia, it also restricted immigration from Europe.." makes no sense because the first part, A, did not cause B. Eliminating immigration from Asia did not cause or result in immigration from Europe to be limited.

This is somewhat complicated but when you break it down you can start to understand why the last phrase is not correct.

Answer 2

The last sentence should be revised because the beginning of the sentence contains what is called a "dangling modifier," and it almost sounds like a verb until you get to the comma. It is unclear what that phrase There should also be a semicolon before Russia and Italy. However it really should be a separate sentence.

Here is an alternative: "This law completely eliminated immigration from Asia and also limited immigration from Europe, especially in Russia and Italy."

Hope that helps!