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The Case against an Open Immigration Policy
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12341 |
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CURRENT ISSUES
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1 / 1987 |
2,577 Words |
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Roger Conner
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After decades of indecision and special-interest obstruction, Congress has finally passed a law to stop employers from hiring illegal aliens. The Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 was signed by the president in November. Its major features--penalties against employers who knowingly employ illegal aliens and amnesty for illegal aliens who can prove continuous residence since January 1982--take practical effect early in 1987.
Why immigration reform?
Illegal alien apprehensions by the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) have increased 1,600 percent in the last 20 years. No one can know exactly how many illegal immigrants are in the United States. Many observers place the number between 4 and 8 million, although some immigration officials insist this is far too low. Illegal immigrants are found in every sector of the U.S. economy, where their presence depresses wages and working conditions for American workers at the bottom of the economic ladder. There is also increasing public concern over use of social services by illegal aliens and widening perceptions of crime and lawlessness on the southern border.
Public opinion, in poll after poll over the years, shows that the overwhelming majority of Americans want to halt illegal immigration, support the notion of punishing employers who knowingly employ illegal aliens, and oppose amnesty for illegal aliens. In 1983, in the first major poll of black and Hispanic opinion on immigration, it was confirmed that both groups solidly favored employer sanctions and better efforts to control the border. Not only does the public want to end illegal immigration, a large majority favors a reduction of legal immigration.
Reform pending for 34 years
Final passage of a reform package in 1986 was termed nothing short of "miraculous." Employer sanctions have been pending since the major immigration law revisions of 1952. In that year, Congress stiffened penalties for harboring or transporting illegal aliens. At the behest of Texas farmers, however, Congress added the notorious "Texas Proviso": "However, the normal incidents of employment shall not be deemed harboring." So, it was an offense to enter the United States illegally, but it was perfectly legal for an employer to employ illegal aliens knowingly, a situation correctly described by immigration reform sponsor Sen. Alan Simpson as an "absurdity."
For some years after 1952, illegal immigration was held in check by massive and sometimes indiscriminate deportations combined with an agricultural "guestworker" program (the Bracero program), methods unthinkable in today's America. In 1965, when the Bracero program was terminated the INS apprehended a mere 110,371 illegal aliens. From 1965, illegal immigration continually increased and began to involve much more than temporary Mexican entrants in the fields.
As the problem became more apparent, as employers exploiting illegals began taking over entire local occupations, organized labor began pushing for "employer sanctions," prohibition of knowing employment of illegal aliens. Led by liberal Democrats, the House of Representatives resoundingly passed employer sanctions in 1972 and again in 1973, each time only to have the notion killed in the Senate at the
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