​Scholars have expressed growing interest in the relationship between legal status stratification and health. Nevertheless, the extant research often lacks theoretical underpinnings. Authors propose the life-course perspective as a theoretical lens with which to understand relationships between legal status stratification and health outcomes. In particular, the life-course perspective guides researchers' attention to historical contexts that have produced differential social, political, and economics outcomes for immigrants based on legal status, and to the potentially long-term and inter-generational relationships between legal status stratification and health. Authors review four key dimensions of the life-course perspective and make recommendation for future directions in public health research on legal status and health.