Your Tired, Your Poor, Your Huddled Masses

Remember when America was a nascent nation and people from all over the world came here looking for opportunities? I don't either, I hadn't been born yet, but I read about it. Put tritely, we are a nation of immigrants, at least those of us who are not of Native American ancestry. We have always opened our arms to other who come to our country looking for opportunity. We have benefited massively because of this.

People still want to come to America. They come looking for opportunity, they come looking for freedom, they come looking for a better life. As in the past, we benefit from this influx of people. But we haven't really thought through the issue of immigration. Right now, we operate a largely patchwork system to address the various aspects of immigration. What should the overall goal of our immigration policy be?

There are a number of different things at play here, and so there are a number of different objectives.

1) To retain talent. People come here from all over the world to attend our colleges and universities. Some of them will inevitably return home, but many would love to stay. Unfortunately, the process for getting on the path to citizenship is arduous, and the number of green cards and permits we are willing to give is too low. We need to make sure that if talented people from elsewhere want to remain in America after they've obtained a degree from an American university that they have that chance.

2) To figure out what to do with the people who are already here. In the political realm this is a tricky issue and is marred by the word amnesty. Of course, only the far right could find a way to turn amnesty into a bad thing. In the real world, this is an easy issue to rectify, if perhaps more difficult to implement. Amnesty is the answer. Morally speaking, we can neither deport the roughly 11 million people living here illegally, nor can we continue to let them live in the shadows. On top of being morally unjust, neither of the proposed steps is economically feasible. Again, amnesty is the answer. I submit that the majority of illegal immigrants living here committed no worse crime than the genocide perpetrated centuries ago by the Europeans who first arrived here. We cannot afford to have an entire subclass of people living in our country. It is wrong and it is expensive.

3) Fix the border. For whatever reason, when we think of immigration, we focus immediately on the border with Mexico as though this is the sole issue to address. Truthfully, it needs addressing, but it is less of a priority than the aforementioned aspects of immigration reform. Having said that, tighter border control is good for two reasons. On the surface it appeases right wingers who lack a broader understanding of the issue. More importantly, it can help stem the cross border exchange of guns, narcotics, and slaves that is the real problem with the porousness of the southern border.

Done correctly, immigration reform can rectify a moral injustice and help America retain our competitive edge. There is an opportunity here. Let's seize it. Your tired, your poor, and your huddled masses are still welcome in America.