Letters to the Editor | Immigration issues extend beyond law enforcement

I have a few problems with the On the Fence column “Immigration policy a key issue for 2006 elections” (published on 4.7.06). First, Ian Saxine claims that “Liberals, for their part, have employed the tiresome logic...any suggestion that illegal immigration should be stopped is inherently racist.” This is untrue on two accounts. One, I’m not certain anyone on either side is for extralegal immigration. Two, the overarching “liberal” argument isn’t that enforcement is “inherently” racist but rather that proposed legislation is inhumane and impractical. The liberals and some conservatives are outraged chiefly by the criminalizing provisions of HR 4437—making criminals out of clergy, doctors, and essentially anyone isn’t practical. (Note: being critical and conscious of racism isn’t “tiresome” namely because immigration restriction has historically been racist and racists such as Hal Turner, as Saxine observes, aren’t alive and well.)

Second, Saxine provides us with an “easy answer”: America should start enforcing existing laws. Yet existing laws are obviously not effective solutions—hence current debate, and significant increase in migrant deaths (2005 claimed 460 lives). I strangely suspect Saxine would agree. (Note his insightful comment: “Anyone who has an easy answer...hasn’t thought things through enough.”)

Finally, let us not, as Saxine suggests, let capitalism “work its magic”—it generally hasn’t helped (see endemic immigration). Instead, I agree, “people need to start talking about all” of the “issues of race, language, and nationality” that “play a part in the immigration issue.” This dialogue starts with the critical analysis of existing institutional forms of racism, nationalism, and the political dialectics which deter us from questioning the fairness, morality, and reasonableness of attitudes toward immigration, legal or otherwise. It doesn’t start with gut-responses or enforcement only.

Are we a nation that shoots first and asks questions later? Do we want to add more deaths to the 4,000 of the past decade? I hope not. It’s not a good way to treat one’s neighbors.

—Mikey Velarde ’09