 More than a hundred million Americans across the United States can trace their ancestry to these immigrants.Ellis Island was the subject of a contentious and long-running border and jurisdictional dispute between New York State and the State of New Jersey, as both claimed it.The issue was settled in 1998 by the U.S. Supreme Court which ruled that the original island was New York State territory and that the balance of the added after 1834 by landfill was in New Jersey.