Immigration
Some basic, but telling statistics reveal the urgency for a new, aggressive, national immigration policy:
-In 1986, the United States Department of Immigration estimated that there were some 5,000,000 illegal aliens in the country. When amnesty was granted by the U.S. at that time approximately 3.5 million people took advantage of the policy and became legal citizens.
-Government officials now believe that there could be as few as 10-12 million illegal immigrants living in the United States, or as many as 20 million.
-The City of Los Angeles currently has the largest number of pending “removal” cases of any region in the country. There are 42,000 cases awaiting judicial review and 35 judges to adjudicate them. Nationwide, 330,000 immigration cases a year are reviewed by U.S. immigration judges. Thirty-thousand are currently on appeal. Six-hundred thousand illegal aliens who have received final “removal” orders from the U.S. Department of Immigration are believed to have “disappeared” into our communities rather than be deported.
-The laws of the United States permit all illegal aliens due process before deportation, and permits the right to appeal all the way up to the Supreme Court. The cost of appealing legal status is $110 to illegal immigrants. Expensive transcript fees and such are born by the U.S. Government. This process can be stretched out as long as 21 years.
The juggernaut of illegal immigration in this country is that it is both supporting and destroying our economy. If you have ever taken a sudden trip to the emergency room you know. Hospitals are the gathering place for needy members of our underground economy who either don’t hesitate to partake of free social services, or who know nowhere else to go. Yet the numbers are so overwhelming that U.S. hospitals are strapped and many are responding by discontinuing emergency care and sometimes maternity care as well.
Our public schools are another place where the huge and rapidly increasing numbers of illegal immigrants weigh on our economy and absorb our tax dollars. Every child in America has the right to attend public school. Receive free school lunch. Apply for free transportation. Even receive special education services. But when the monthly total of illegal immigrants in the U.S. reaches about 100,000 per month, as it has in some states, it is easy to see that government agencies, school campuses, hospitals and labor markets cannot possibly absorb the numbers or serve all of the wanting faces before them.
Yet America also benefits from the huge class of illegal immigrants who hunger for any kind of work. Fruits and vegetables across the country are cheaper because they are harvested by illegal immigrants. Gardening and housekeeping services, restaurants, factories, hotels and small businesses prosper because there is no shortage of willing and inexpensive labor. While businesses are currently held responsible for hiring illegal workers, it is a standard that is almost impossible to enforce and even harder to prosecute. As long as the United States is a source of jobs to illegal immigrants, our country will continue to be a magnet to people willing to cross the borders for a better life.
As late as 1870, the United States of America actually encouraged immigrants to come to this land of promise. Today the words “bring us your tired, your poor….” still can be read while visiting the Statue of Liberty but are seldom sung any more.
The vision of American citizenship was first defined in the United States Constitution, guaranteeing anyone born on U.S. soil the gift of being an American. The first U.S. Census overseen by Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson was conducted in 1790. The population of the United States at that time was less than four million people, including nearly 700,000 slaves.
New York City, with the largest state population at the time, was home to 33,000 people.
Today the United States accommodates 360 million people, with more coming every month. It makes sense that the privilege of citizenship and the opportunity to immigrate must reflect the world we live in today. Pathways need to be created requiring every and any resident of the U.S. to contribute, not just benefit from our country. It makes sense that 230 years and 355 million people later, Congress should quit stalling and protect weary taxpayers by confronting the nation’s laws regarding immigration and citizenship in the United States.
