Posted on 11/26/2010 6:47:59 AM PST by SeekAndFind
We know illegal immigration is no longer really unlawful, but is it moral?
Usually Americans debate the fiscal costs of illegal immigration. Supporters of open borders rightly remind us that illegal immigrants pay sales taxes. Often their payroll-tax contributions are not later tapped by Social Security payouts.
Opponents counter that illegal immigrants are more likely to end up on state assistance, are less likely to report cash income, and cost the state more through the duplicate issuing of services and documents in both English and Spanish. Such to-and-fro talking points are endless.
So is the debate over beneficiaries of illegal immigration. Are profit-minded employers villains who want cheap labor in lieu of hiring more expensive Americans? Or is the culprit a cynical Mexican government that counts on billions of dollars in remittances from its expatriate poor that it otherwise ignored?
Or is the engine that drives illegal immigration the American middle class? Why should millions of suburbanites assume that, like 18th-century French aristocrats, they should have imported labor to clean their homes, manicure their lawns, and watch over their kids?
Or is the catalyst the self-interested professional Latino lobby in politics and academia that sees a steady stream of impoverished Latin American nationals as a permanent victimized constituency, empowering and showcasing elite self-appointed spokesmen such as themselves?
Or is the real advocate the Democratic Party that wishes to remake the electoral map of the American Southwest by ensuring larger future pools of natural supporters? Again, the debate over who benefits and why is never-ending.
But what is often left out of the equation is the moral dimension of illegal immigration. We see the issue too often reduced to caricature, involving a noble, impoverished victim without much free will and subject to cosmic forces of sinister oppression. But everyone makes free choices that affect others. So ponder the ethics of a guest arriving in a host country knowingly contrary to its sovereign protocols and laws.
First, there is the larger effect on the sanctity of a legal system. If a guest ignores the law — and thereby often must keep breaking more laws — should citizens also have the right to similarly pick and choose which statutes they find worthy of honoring and which are too bothersome? Once it is deemed moral for the impoverished to cross a border without a passport, could not the same arguments of social justice be used for the poor of any status not to report earned income or even file a 1040 form?
Second, what is the effect of mass illegal immigration on impoverished U.S. citizens? Does anyone care? When 10 to 15 million aliens are here illegally, where is the leverage for the American working poor to bargain with employers? If it is deemed ethical to grant in-state-tuition discounts to illegal-immigrant students, is it equally ethical to charge three times as much for out-of-state, financially needy American students — whose federal government usually offers billions to subsidize state colleges and universities? If foreign nationals are afforded more entitlements, are there fewer for U.S. citizens?
Third, consider the moral ramifications on legal immigration — the traditional great strength of the American nation. What are we to tell the legal immigrant from Oaxaca who got a green card at some cost and trouble, or who, once legally in the United States, went through the lengthy and expensive process of acquiring citizenship? Was he a dupe to follow our laws dutifully?
And given the current precedent, if a million soon-to-be-impoverished Greeks, 2 million refugee North Koreans, or 5 million starving Somalis were to enter the United States illegally and en masse, could anyone object to their unlawful entry and residence? If so, on what legal, practical, or moral grounds?
Fourth, examine the morality of remittances. It is deemed noble to send billions of dollars back to families and friends struggling in Latin America. But how is such a considerable loss of income made up? Are American taxpayers supposed to step in to subsidize increased social services so that illegal immigrants can afford to send billions of dollars back across the border? What is the morality of that equation in times of recession? Shouldn’t illegal immigrants at least try to buy health insurance before sending cash back to Mexico?
The debate over illegal immigration is too often confined to costs and benefits. But ultimately it is a complicated moral issue — and one often ignored by all too many moralists.
— Victor Davis Hanson is a classicist and historian at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, and the author, most recently, of The Father of Us All: War and History, Ancient and Modern. © 2010 Tribune Media Services, Inc.
Well said!
Of course, most of the progressives who support illegal immigration themselves live safe in gated communities where they do not have to deal with the riff-raff.
Is it moral to support Mexican ethnic cleansing? Mexican illegal immigrants tend to come from the lower social castes while the Mexican power structure tends to be of higher castes and encourages those of the lower castes to get out of the country.
So by supporting illegal immigration, supporters are contributing to ethnic cleansing in Mexico.
No...it's illegal. Next question.
Very well written!!! You don’t see this side of the issue presented very often. Thanks for this post!
Very well written!!! You don’t see this side of the issue presented very often. Thanks for this post!
I like John 10-1. “Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that entereth not by the door into the sheepfold, but climbeth up some other way, the same is a thief and a robber.”
There is no morality to immigration. There is only law.
The question is purely legal
If morality must be considered, is it moral to protect society by killing the illegal trash hordes that are inflicting pain on the society?
It use to be under sever persecution the US would grant amnesty. Now not so much, which is horrible. Remember what Janet did to poor Elian, that was horrible. I don’t know how that woman sleeps at night.
Or would you rather determine if you want that person to enter your home, from the front door, what they are allowed to do in your home, and when they are required to leave?
We know illegal immigration is no longer really unlawful,
_____________________________________________-
WHAT ????????????
When did that happen ???
The real immorality of illegal immigration is that it allows the home country’s government and economy to never reform.
What Mexico does by exporting it’s poverty to another country so they never have to reform their own is immoral on it’s face and should be treated as such.
"There is no morality to immigration. There is only law.
The question is purely legal
If morality must be considered, is it moral to protect society by killing the illegal trash hordes that are inflicting pain on the society?"
There is morality associated with keeping the law or breaking it. God expects Christians to honor the government and to keep the laws:
Romans 13
1 Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers. For there is no power but of God: the powers that be are ordained of God.
2 Whosoever therefore resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God: and they that resist shall receive to themselves damnation.
3 For rulers are not a terror to good works, but to the evil. Wilt thou then not be afraid of the power? do that which is good, and thou shalt have praise of the same:
4 For he is the minister of God to thee for good. But if thou do that which is evil, be afraid; for he beareth not the sword in vain: for he is the minister of God, a revenger to execute wrath upon him that doeth evil.
5 Wherefore ye must needs be subject, not only for wrath, but also for conscience sake.
6 For for this cause pay ye tribute also: for they are God's ministers, attending continually upon this very thing.
The best way to get them to see the error of their ways is to include them in deportations.
The law reflects a society’s morality.
Well said. Once you break one law, it’s easy to continue breaking laws and making excuses why your doing it. For the most part, these people don’t give a rip about our country. They cost $500 a year from every taxpayer. Also, my gf daughter worked at a farm for awhile. She said the illegals would come in to pick crops and when they would leave they would break into homes, business and cars and steal as they went. I will have to say that some are like the Dog Whisper, Cesar Millan. He came here illegally.
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