No Human Being is Illegal

Immigration Reform is one of the most divisive debates in our nation today and xenophobic sentiment, fueled by an ailing economy, is at an all time high. But the backlash against immigrants is not new in our nation’s history and its causes are not economical, as people today may claim.

In truth, the only underlying cause for this behavior is the same that led us to devastate our Native American tribes; that led us to condone the enslavement of people based on the color of their skin; that kept women as a sub-citizen for centuries. Is that same condition which still reprimands sexual feelings and sexual orientation, which pitches neighbor against neighbor because of their different beliefs, nation against nation because, somehow, one’s successes have become incomprehensively dependent on someone else’s failure. We call this underlying cause fear and because of fear, this nation is turning its back on itself.

America is moving away from its own core values whereby all men are created equal, whereby all men are endowed by their Creator with unalienable rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. These same values have brought immigrants to our shores in centuries past and keep bringing them in today. But how do we reconcile this ideal of equality amongst ourselves with the state of the immigrants in our society today? How did the signers of the Declaration reconcile the substance of that document with the reality of slavery at the time it was written? They didn’t. They chose to ignore the problem. Likewise, leaders in this country have been ignoring social reform of our immigration system.

In the absence of the rule of law, human passions will undoubtedly find refuge in fear. People who aren’t lead in the right direction, will very likely steer in the wrong direction. How many undocumented women in labor will we have to tie to their hospital beds before we understand that this is not the right path for America? How many American born children will be left in schools because their parents were arrested during an immigration raid? How many immigrants have to fear, or become a victim of a hate crime, before we address the issue? Are we waiting for a new generation of “strange fruits” hanging from trees before we decide to act?

This fear of incorporating new cultures is not a novelty. Fear brought about the Nineteenth Century Chinese Exclusion Act, fear created an Immigration Act that allowed only for “free white persons” to become citizens until very recent in our nation’s history. It was fear that allowed for a provision in the law banning immigration of individuals who are HIV-positive and fear is keeping us from reforming a system that is crippling this nation’s heritage and future. The times of ‘Irish Need Not Apply’ deserve no place in 0modern American society. Neither does the fear that America will cease to exist if we continue to incorporate new cultures.

Many will always use the argument that once a person broke the law, being such a person in the country “illegally”, he or she needs punishment in the form of automatic deportation, regardless of having established roots in this society. But is the law always right? Were the Jews aboard the ‘Exodus 1947’ wrong when they tried to “illegally” enter British controlled Palestine? Would someone argue today that the system that kept married women as property under common law, her rights relinquished to that of her husband, was a sound law? Can one affirm that blacks pursuing their liberty on Northern States were acting illegally or that the Fugitive Act which required citizens to assist in the capture of slaves in order to return them to their slave owners was morally correct?

In America, we are not taught to assume that the laws on the books are always correct. Our revered Constitution was amended several times because we should be able to change our minds about unsound policy. That is the reason why we have a legislature; that is why there is a judicial system in place. That is why we need to turn fear and prejudices aside and muster the courage to debate this issue.

Many may justify their position on immigration using the economic argument, that immigrants depress wages and flood the marketplace with cheap labor. If true, isn’t this is a great argument for reform? To bring people out of the shadows so that employers may not take advantage of them and so that employees are all playing by the same rules?

Today, opponents of immigration reform are pushing the argument that the country should be addressing issues like the suffering economy before deciding to give jobs to foreigners. But this is a false choice, for the millions of people living without proper documents are already in the country working. Furthermore, their presence is a true economic boost. After all, people here still have to eat, commute, pay for shelter and clothing, all activities that will benefit some industry and the country overall. The fact is that, for opponents of reform, there will never be a good time for reforming our immigration system, not in a good economy, not in a bad one.

Anti-reform advocates have perpetuated the myth that America has a great immigration system where anyone can enter legally if they fill the right forms and wait a reasonable period in line. The reality is that the laws on the book are outdated and do not reflect the needs of our economic engine. Arbitrary quotas in the employment-based system made it impossible for employers to fill the positions they needed with legal workers during the boom years. This created a black market of workers that kept coming in to fill the ranks of the American labor force. Long and unreasonable waits of a decade or more also plague the family-based system, making its goal of family unification completely useless. What does it say about our immigration policy when a foreign-born adult son of an American citizen has to wait 10-12 years to receive a permanent resident card, on top of additional five years if he is pursuing citizenship?

There is also a myth that immigrants come illegally to this country because they want to exploit our resources. A myth that states that undocumented immigrants have no commitment to our laws and thus no commitment to our society. They are portrayed living in ghettos, looking and dressing differently, making no effort to learn English or integrate into American culture. Stereotypes are plenty. There are indeed people who could not care less about American society, have no regards whatsoever to their neighbors. Some of them did cross the Mexican border, some of them flew in and overstayed their visa. Some where actually born and bred in American soil, for nationality is not a determinant of character.

Most undocumented people are your neighbors, people who wake up early in the morning and kiss their families goodbye to work. They are sitting at our side on buses and trains, they are taking communion with us at church, they are coaching our kid’s soccer teams, they are active in our schools, they are serving our meals, they are helping us build this country, brick by brick, like every immigrant generation before them. And most of them don’t take America for granted. They know this is the place that has given them the opportunity that they found not in the land they left behind. They work extra hard every morning because they have a sense of duty to their families and to this nation. Nobody will come this far to settle for failure. The immigrant story, through our history, is one of greatness and overachievement.

We carved it into our biggest symbol as to not ever forget where we come from. “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breath free”. Through the ages this issue has been challenging our social structure; it has been generating the fear of loosing privilege, the fear of moving into the unknown. But as James Baldwin once said, the rise of my brother does not mean the fall of another. Let’s fear not abolishing these divisions, between Undocumented and Documented, White or Black or Brown. We are all human beings. We are all flesh and blood filled with the desire to create a better world for our children. This nation was built under the ideal of greatness and, even though we are still far from perfection, we owe it to ourselves and those who come after us to insist in moving on that direction. America will only rise stronger if we contemplate and solve this challenge like we solved others before. It is time to realize our immigration system is broken and the American way demands only one solution: let us fix it.

It allows one to quickly determine that somebody isn't worth listening to anymore.

As if documentation was actually the issue.

doh, responded to myself.

illegal immigration with immigration, as this poster does in the first paragraph speaks volumes as well.

there is no "backlash" against immigrants.

there is a backlash against people who immigrated ILLEGALLY.

those are two entirely different things.

It's just as toxic as gun laws

is an argument against having a coherent nation. A nation has not only the right but the obligation to regulate its borders. The United States simply does not have the capacity to absorb the excess population of the third world while maintaining its standard of living. It's one or the other.

Surely, you admit that some people have immigrated to the US illegally?