I'm pleased that you respected the sincerity of my comments. By way of reciprocation, tell me about your life experiences with immigrants.
Where do you live?
What is the current immigration situation in your area?
Do you have any friends who are or are connected with fairly recent immigrants?
Under the Constitution, the "progeny" are citizens. I'll grant some problems. There were problems, in the past, with certain ethnic and racial groups, and still are.
Basically, I disagree with your fears about "progeny." Maybe I have simply seen good examples, and you have seen either bad examples or no examples.
Respectfully,
I have no fears about 1st and 2nd generation Americans.
My point was that the overpopulation problem in California, which is at the root of it's eceonmic woes, has been seriously aggrevated by illegal immigartion during the past 50 years.
Theoretically California would have 25% less population and an almost 60% reduction in it's public service responsibilities should immigration laws have been substantially enforced since 1960.
True but I disagree with the consequences of the interpretation of the 14th Amendment.
As I have repeatedly stated on this forum, the location of the birth of the children of illegal immigrants sould not be an automatic threshold to citizenship, it should simply be the first step on the way to citizenship.
Anyone who thinks the majority of 19th and 20th century European immigration came legally through Ellis Island is deluded. There has always been a "guy" in a European or Asian city, who for a draconian fee, arranges transport for a go-getter looking for economic opportunitues to a undocumented port in Boston, New York, New Orleans or San Francisco, and that "guy" gave the immigrant the name of a different "guy" in Boston or New York that he needed to go see to be taken care of. That's how it worked. They arranged employment, housing, etc within their ethnic communities. I don't think a lot of the strapping lads from County Cork and the slave "volunteers" from Shanghai and Peking who were busy working and dying building the intercontinental railway had all their papers "in order". Vlassi Sczyblski busting his ass 16 hours in an 1890 era Chicago slaughterhouse probably forgot to apply for his "green card".
It didn't matter, the immigrants, whether they be French, Russian, Italian, Irish, Chinese, German or Dutch, Jew, Catholic or Protestant, all worked honestly, they took the worst crap jobs or started businesses, and they were a net benefit to the economy. They didn't burden the established and tenured citizens in any way. As they built their personal and community economic foundation, they brought family over. They could economically support them. Eventually, they stopped speaking Cantonese, German and Italian. They assimilated, because assimilation was a natural evolution.
The labor market acted as a filter on immigration, if the new guy had no skill or suitability for a job on the docks, or in the mills - he wasn't wanted. Government largesse poisons that dynamic. People who have no productive value are now coming into our community, and it is a burden to all. This insidious political element is discouraging assimilation, because isolated groups who are identified by their ethnic heritage are dependent on the generosity and protection of ... yes ... Bill Clinton, Al Gore, Hillary, Gray Davis etc. That's what's happening here.
Immigration is good. Except Hungarian Gypsies. They can't be trusted. Let's deport Peter Jennings too. Send him to Saskatoon.
In an area that is the most impacted in the United States.
What is the current immigration situation in your area?
The community in which I live is approximately 60% US citizens of Mexican ancestery and 25% Mexicans. The remaining 15% are a mixture of 3rd and 4th generation Americans whoes ancestors settled in this area after the turn of the century.
This area has always depended upon the immigrant to supply cheap labor but prior to the rise of public welfare in the 1960s these immigrants were male and seasonal. After the recent escalation in public welfare benefits these immigrants were able to stay year around with their families because of the public largess avaliable when the seasonal work stopped.
Do you have any friends who are or are connected with fairly recent immigrants
The vast majority of my friends and neighbors are 1st, 2nd and 3rd generation immigrants.