An informed local
perspective on the Immigration debate
by Mike Kroll
Liz
Voyles operates New World Immigration Service here in Galesburg. She has worked
with immigrants, both legal and illegal, for 15 years now. First as an aide to
Congressman Lane Evans handling immigration issues for his constituents. Since
1994 Liz has operated New World where she Òassists those dreaming of one-day
becoming Americans.Ó She helps explain the process, leads her clients through
the blizzard of paperwork and coaches then across the many hurdles. In addition
to individual immigrants Voyles also works directly with businesses and other
organizations to help handle immigration issues for employers and even
colleges.
ÒMost
people are amazed that I run a business like this from a place like Galesburg.
What they don't realize is that Illinois home to the fourth largest population
of immigrants in the U.S. Only California, Florida and Texas (in that order)
have larger immigrant populations.Ó Voyles sees the immigration issue from
multiple up-close perspectives and is frankly confused about what all the fuss
is about right now. ÒI just don't see what has suddenly made this such a key
political issue right now. While many point to security issues post 9-11 I just
don't see the connection. The focus has been almost entirely on Hispanic
immigration from Mexico yet no one has ever documented any connections to
terrorists accessing this country that way. And while illegal immigrants are
breaking American law when they come here that is nothing new, far more of the
ancestors of most Americans arrived to this country illegally than legally.Ó
While
Voyles gets calls daily from people who think that some new law has been passed
she keeps telling them that not only has nothing changed yet, but she seriously
doubts much will ever come out of this current debate. ÒThis whole political
debate has absolutely no foundation in immigration reality. Everytime
Washington, D.C. fiddles with immigration issues they simply created more
problems and solve nothing. Anyone who understands the real issues knows that
much of the American economy is dependent upon maintaining the status quo. The
majority of the illegal immigrants working in this country today are employed
in three areas: agriculture, low-skill production and service industries. Most
are hard, productive workers despite substandard wages. There is much truth to
the statement that they hold jobs other Americans won't take because the
employers of these illegals don't pay enough to attract most legal workers.Ó
ÒAsk
yourself this, given the current world economy can these American employers
compete if they paid competitive wages and benefits? The President and many in
Congress say they fear increasing the minimum wage would destroy American small
businesses yet many illegal workers aren't paid near the present minimum wage.
Those that are paid the minimum wage not only get no benefits but they also pay
higher taxes than legal workers. All of us benefit from lower prices that would
rise substantially if somehow we swept away all illegal workers who are a big
part of America's working class today.Ó
ÒDid
you know that most of the active social security numbers in today's American
economy belong to dead people? The most important piece of documentation needed
by an illegal immigrant worker is a social security number and the going price
for a fraudulent social security card bearing the number of a deceased American
is ten bucks. According to the Social Security Administration's own data they
collected more than $7 billion in payroll taxes in 2003 from over 8.8 million
workers who used mismatched social security numbers. And that doesn't include
all the federal and state income tax that was withheld from these same
paychecks of people who will never claim the tax refund most are due or obtain
disability or retirement benefits from social security. It burns me up when I
hear how illegal immigrants are getting a free ride in this country, they paid
well for a ticket that's just not in their name.Ó
Politicians
have long recognized the business interest in the availability of illegal
immigrants. Why do you think so few businesses are ever accused of violating
rules against hiring undocumented workers? In 1986 the Immigration Control Act
was passed specifically to target illegal immigration from Mexico. The act
criminalized hiring illegal workers and established fines and penalties for
companies violating the law. Despite thousands of immigration raids annually
since then with thousands of illegal workers rounded up and deported only three
employers were accused violating the law in 2004, the last year with available
data.
Voyles
also questions the logistics of enacting any real immigration reform. ÒEven if
Congress or the President determined that the economy be damned, 'we're going
to round up the illegal immigrants and ship them out,' the task just couldn't
be done. The 1986 Act created a one-year amnesty program that was poorly
thought out and never properly implemented because the Federal bureaucracy
simply wasn't up to it. All the additional paper work clogged up the system and
delayed everything going through immigration at the time. Can you imagine what
demands would be placed on the bureaucracy if they were suddenly tasked to
identify, round-up and deport every illegal immigrant now in this country? Just
counting those who are working and some estimate we are dealing with over 20
million and growing. Add in dependents and make your own estimate. It would be
an impossible task and I can't imagine what it would cost to implement.Ó
ÒThe
people in this country have to come to the realization that leaving things as
they are is better for the longterm health of the American economy as well as
our standard of living. There are numerous small fixes or tweaking that can and
should be done to our immigration law to make it fairer and simpler to enforce.
There is no advantage to anyone to making the immigration process protracted
and cumbersome but if we make it too easy or grant another form of amnesty we
will just create more problems. We need to establish a system of documentation
that works and is at least as resistant to counterfeiting as American currency.
Most of all we need to recognize that fairness is critical, there can longer be
room for prejudice in American immigration policy.Ó
A
history of U. S. immigration policy
By Mike Kroll
The
United States of America is a nation of immigrants. People from around the
world have gathered in America for at least the last half century, and most
probably longer. What may surprise you is that before 1882, when the blatantly
racist Chinese Exclusion Act was signed into law, almost anyone could come to
the U.S. and eventually establish citizenship. The immigration law that we
follow today was passed by Congress and signed by President Lyndon Johnson in
1965 at a time when a growing sense of shame over civil rights in this country
led to reform of an immigration policy that reflected the basest of bigotry and
prejudice. At the time few foresaw just how far reaching those changes would be
yet it is ironic that today there is once again a clamor for immigration reform
spurred by fear and motivated by thinly disguised prejudice toward Hispanics.
The
first relevant Federal law concerning immigration was the 1790 Naturalization
Act that established the legal procedure to become a naturalized American. This
law mere defined the process of naturalization dictated by the Constitution and
reflected it's time by permitting only Òfree white personsÓ of Ògood moral
characterÓ to apply for citizenship after two years residence. Basically you
were welcome only if you were a European male (woman were seen as dependents
and having no independent vote citizenship was irrelevant) and not indentured
as a servant or apprentice.
In
1790 the length of residence was increased to five years and the naturalization
process was changed to force a declaration of intent, called your Òfirst
papers,Ó that could be made after two years of residence but required an
additional three years before you could renounce your former citizenship and
pledge and oath of allegiance to the United States. This two step process
remains today. Five years later the naturalization process was changed once
again to lengthen it to at least 14 years of residence with the declaration of intent
formally made at least five years prior to achieving citizenship. Even back
then national security was cited as the reason for these changes while most
historians now say the real motivation was to help maintain the then-dominant
Federalist party who feared the influx of Irish immigrants would support the
opposing Democratic-Republicans.
The
Chinese Exclusion Act reflected the predominant racism of its time not unlike
the focus of today's parallel immigration debate on Hispanics. Huge numbers of
Chinese immigrated to the U.S. Due to both political unrest and the prospect of
wealth in the west, particularly building railroads but also included gold
mining in California. The act banned new ethnically Chinese immigrants for ten
years regardless of their last country of residence and joined similar
immigration bans targeting Chinese in Canada, Australia and New Zealand. In
1892 this act was extended and strengthened by requiring Chinese residents to
carry a residence permit and grossly limiting their legal rights. To its shame
these policies were upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court a year later. In 1917 the
aptly named Asian Barred Zone Act extended this immigration ban to cover most
Asian countries as was forced through overwhelmingly despite the veto of President
Woodrow Wilson and followed an informal agreement with Japan to block Japanese
immigration to the U.S.
In
1921 and then 1924 additional Immigration laws were passed that for the first
time established nationality-based quotas and sought to place a cap on the
total number of new immigrants to the U.S. Both reflected the isolationist
movement here following the First World War and created quotas that greatly
favored western and norther Europe.
Many lawmakers were influenced by what was then referred to as Òracial
hygieneÓ in a 1916 book entitle The Passing of the Great Race by eugenicist
Madison Grant. Views that would soon lead a defeated Germany to a new leader
possessing an even more efficient sense of racial hygiene. We should be
reminded that between the wars Antisemitism and other prejudices were just as
alive on both sides of the Atlantic but due to the economic exigencies of
American agriculture no limits were placed on Hispanic immigrants crossing our
now infamous southern border with Mexico. It was just that while inter-marriage
between various white Europeans was viewed as a problem no reasonable
legislator could imagine such race mixing between whites and blacks or
Hispanics or Asians. It would be unthinkable!
While
the immigration quotas were altered during the Korean War and the ban on Asian
immigration was lifted, albeit permitting only small quotas, in 1943-- it
wasn't until the 1965 Immigration Act that this quota system was dismantled.
Alas, that same well-intentioned Act also placed limitation on Mexican
immigration for the first time as the cap on total immigrants was not lifted
with the quotas. Following this Act the proportion of Asian and Latin American
immigration increased substantially while European immigration dropped off.
According to INS statistics by 1988 Asia accounted for 41 percent of legal
immigrants while Europe claimed only 10 percent, while in 1955 those numbers
were 8 and 50 respectively.
Curiously,
there has never been much attention focused on Canadian immigration, legal or
otherwise. While the nature of illegal immigration precludes hard numbers, many
experts estimate that contrary to popular believe half of all current illegal
immigration is done across the Canadian border. ÒWe have just as many illegal
Canadian immigrants in the U.S. today as Hispanic but they largely go
undetected,Ó notes Liz Voyles. ÒThe key difference is that Canadians blend in
by skin color, language and education. While immigrants from Europe, Africa and
Asia have to cross oceans to get here and Hispanics have to cross a patrolled
Mexican border immigration from Canada is virtually effortless!Ó
05/11/06