The Ghost of Barbara Jordan

The American Conservative ^ | May 11, 2013 | W. James Antle III

[OddLane]

How different would the immigration debate look today had Barbara Jordan lived? It’s a question frequently pondered by those of us who believe the answer to every problem concerning immigration isn’t necessarily more immigration.

Jordan was the first woman elected to Congress from Texas and the first Southern black female ever elected to the House. She compiled a similar record of firsts in Texas state politics and was active in the civil rights movement. But Jordan capped her career chairing the U.S. Commission on Immigration Reform.

The commission’s vision of immigration reform was very different than the “comprehensive” variety pushed by a bipartisan gaggle of senators. To understand how different, consider Jordan’s contention in early 1995 congressional testimony that “deportation is crucial.”

“Credibility in immigration policy can be summed up in one sentence: those who should get in, get in; those who should be kept out, are kept out; and those who should not be here will be required to leave,” Jordan said. “The top priorities for detention and removal, of course, are criminal aliens. But for the system to be credible, people actually have to be deported at the end of the process.”

Today’s comprehensive immigration reformers think it is an abomination to deport anyone but criminal aliens. The Obama administration has celebrated such deportations while announcing that most of the remaining illegal immigrant population isn’t an enforcement priority.

[OddLane]

ping

[goat granny]

I remember her and she was one smart american....she goes way back.....her race didn’t matter then and it doesn’t now..The days before speech codes and politically correct speech....

[tomkat]

Yep .. back in the day when Dems could still be patriots .. it’s been a long, disgraceful fall.

[Huskrrrr]

I remember a quote from her after Clinton’s first election: “We all want change....but change to what?”

[hinckley buzzard]

Barbara Jordan was on the House Judiciary Committee during the Watergate hearings. Her statements for the record were nonpartisan, lucid and Constitutional.