Further Thoughts on Illegal Immigration and Citizenship
Blog friend and law student Bruce Chang has done my work for me and written a very nice post. I agree very much with it (bravo, Bruce!), so please go read the whole thing.
Here is a brief excerpt about illegal immigrants, just to grab your interest:
They should be allowed to become "official" Americans, provided they can show, through their hard work and contributions to the life of the community. This is important; have you ever seen the giddiness a "newly minted" American exudes? While certain cultural values will always be shifting, others cannot be abrogated. Civic awareness, typically very low in non-Western nations, is important. Integration does not mean simply providing services and then hoping the immigrants sink or swim, as with the European model. Integration means actual involvement with the day-to-day civic life. Perhaps America doesn't need to reach out anymore to scour the planet for those who want to come here; but we need to make sure there are no delusions about what it takes to be an American, and no mistakes that the vast bounty of America's resources will not be doled out to those who would break American laws. I imagine some will be turned off by this. You can't please everyone. But I'm pretty sure that if someone is turned off because he has to (*gasp*) work at getting what he wants, America really doesn't want him around. We've got plenty of people who already do not believe in personal responsibility; we don't need more. |
Yes. We have to control the border. But what to do with the illegals already in the country? It is impossible and unrealistic to simply deport 12 million illegal immigrants. I like Bruce's idea of setting up a way to let the willing earn their citizenship over time. I still do not like the word "amnesty," and I do NOT favor, as some protesters want, the government to hand out citizenship like it is candy. Citizenship should be earned, just like it was earned by all the legal immigrants who followed the law to come to this country and worked hard to become citizens. NO SHORT CUTS. NO REWARDS FOR SNEAKING INTO THE COUNTRY. Besides, things that people get for free are things that they tend to undervalue and take for granted.
I had posted previously and briefly on the immigration situation here. If I have more free time in the near future, I'll post again (but I doubt it -- it is exam time at school!).
I end with this in passing: illegal immigration is a problem with two general causes: the "pull" factor and the "push" factor, in my humble opinion. The "pull" is that people want to come to the U.S. to get jobs. That's understandable, but of course we must have a decent border also, and we must stop the chaos there.
The "push" is something I hear very few people talk about. The poor, partly unskilled, partly uneducated, and unemployed of Mexico (well, largely Mexico -- we also have to think about other Latin Americans using Mexico as a transit point) want jobs in America. Why? Well, because they have poverty in their situation in Mexico and they are apparently unable to get jobs there in Mexico. Few people will leave their country if they are happy and prosperous there. The ultimate solution is to make Mexico a place that can support its own people. More jobs in Mexico! That government should be working hard to do that. But for now, the basic truth by default is that it is "exporting" its poverty and unemployment problems to the U.S.
This is a terrible thing for me to say (I know, I know), but I'm saying it anyway because I think it really is a factor in the current debate, and we should look clearly and honestly at all the factors involved if we want to formulate real solutions. Now please don't call me a "racist" or "xenophobe."