Law Change Produces Big Hike in Legal Immigration : Reform: Under a 1990 statute, 810,635 people legally moved to the United States last year, a 15% increase over 1991. Forty-one percent of them came to California.

WASHINGTON —  Two years after Congress changed the nation’s immigration laws, the United States admitted 810,635 legal immigrants in 1992, representing one of the largest one-year increases since the turn of the century, according to a report released Monday.

A total of 336,663 of these newcomers, or 41%, relocated in California. The figure was higher than the sum of new immigrants in New York, Texas, Florida and New Jersey--the states with the next-highest counts. The Los Angeles-Long Beach area became home to 129,669 of the immigrants.

The leading countries of origin were Mexico, with 91,332 emigrants; Vietnam, 77,728; the Philippines, 59,179, and the republics of the former Soviet Union, 43,590. Mexico and Vietnam also had the largest percentage annual increases--73% and 40%, respectively.

The figures are part of the first comprehensive portrait of legal immigration under the Immigration Act of 1990, which produced the first major changes in legal immigration in 25 years.

The 1992 Statistical Yearbook of the Immigration and Naturalization Service does not include numbers for illegal immigration, estimated to be 200,000 to 300,000 a year.

The INS report documents a mixed initial record in achieving some of the intended goals of the 1990 law--which were largely to reunite families and increase the skilled and unskilled labor pool. In some cases, said INS Commissioner Doris M. Meissner, who released the yearbook at a news conference here, it is still too early to determine the act’s ultimate effectiveness.

The 1990 law was enacted before immigration exploded as a political issue. Restrictionist groups and some lawmakers are now urging Congress to roll back the increases in legal immigration and to stem illegal immigration.

The most notable immediate success of the 1990 reform has been an increase in the number of highly skilled workers admitted under an employment-based preference. The total nearly doubled, from 59,525 in 1991 to 116,198 in 1992. Although this influx still failed to fill all of the 140,000 available slots, Meissner said preliminary figures indicate that the maximum will be reached this year.

This group, defined by professional and educational qualifications, included engineers, university professors and scientists, INS officials said. About 42,000 Chinese who became permanent residents through the Chinese Student Protection Act in the aftermath of the 1989 Tian An Men Square uprising have been counted under this provision this year.

Family reunification, however, remains the leading reason for legal immigration. This figure was 450,000 for both 1991 and 1992.

The new law also resulted in a dramatic reduction in the waiting time for admission of the spouses and children of citizens from Mexico and the Philippines. The delay for Mexico was cut from 14 years to about two years. The wait for family members from other countries increased by four months.

The least-utilized reform under the 1990 act has been a so-called millionaires’ provision that grants entry to as many as 10,000 individuals a year who agree to invest $500,000 in the United States in a business that will create 10 or more jobs. Only 57 immigrants applied under these conditions in 1992; the figure is expected to be about 600 this year.

This proposal sparked debate in Congress amid objections to the principle of allowing foreigners, in effect, to buy their citizenship in the United States.

“People who want to invest in this country tend to want to invest without becoming immigrants,” Meissner said. Still, she said, “it’s probably too soon to tell” how many well-heeled newcomers eventually will immigrate under this provision.

The number of legal immigrants in 1992 was an increase of 15%, or 106,630, the second-highest jump in the last 70 years. A larger rise was recorded in 1978 when many Cuban and Southeast Asian refugees were allowed to apply for citizenship.

The 810,635 figure for 1992 does not include another 163,342 people granted legal status that year under the 1986 amnesty law.

Michael Hoefer, chief of the INS demographic statistics branch, said that 800,000 to 900,000 legal immigrants are expected to arrive each year over the next several years.

Asked about legislative proposals to cap legal immigration at 300,000 annually, Meissner responded: “It’s very difficult to keep the number to 300,000.”