What walls should America be building?
First of two parts
By UYLESS BLACK
Guest Opinion
The first responsibility of a national government is to protect the nation’s borders. The United States government has failed in this responsibility. However, it is not just the federal government that is to blame. No one has benefited more from having our borders breached than businesses.
Count this writer among this company. In the 1980s, my partners and I may have hired illegal immigrants. I say “may” as we did not check their credentials. So, I am not casting stones from a glass house.
Recently, oversight has tightened on hiring illegal immigrants and the 2008 financial breakdown led to the decline of immigrant flow across the border. But for many years, there were few restraints on hiring an illegal entry into this country. Before I retired, I spent much of my time traveling and staying in hotels. I came to know several hotel managers.
During our conversations, they would sometimes express that they benefited (as did their customers) from having low-paid immigrants (many of them illegal) cleaning rooms, doing yard work, repairing facilities, and staffing kitchens.
Of course, many hotels and hotel chains adhered (and still adhere) to the letter of the law. Nonetheless, I am speaking of facts about illegal immigration that still exist today.
For example, the prevalence of illegal immigration workforces in America is huge. Whether we like or dislike Uncle Sam’s oversights is not the issue. Underground economies are detrimental to any nation’s government and that nation’s citizenry.
In America, as studies show, this activity continues to be subsidized by the government to the tune of billions of dollars a year (health care, food stamps, and such). The illegal immigrant flood has slowed down some, but this inundation has altered the cultural landscape of much of America.
A huge, sudden influx of immigrants into any country creates a culture of balkanization: one of fragmentation and associated conflicts. These large foreign populations do not weave easily into the fabrics of their new country.
I feel like a foreigner when I visit my hometown in New Mexico. The two “cowboy” museums in the town are destined for the dustbin. Why should Latin Americans care about America’s cattle drives or the Lincoln County Wars and Billy the Kid’s involvement?
Nonetheless, I am in favor of legal but gradual immigration. I also favor immigration based on merit. A potential immigrant possessing skills should be given first preference on entering our country. I recognize many people may oppose this idea. They are looking for low-wage, low-skilled labor. After all, someone has to plough the furrows of America’s gardens.
I have empathy for those souls trying to get to America. In their shoes, I would be following their tracks. But the practice of illegal immigration is detrimental to the welfare of this nation.
Whatever their situation was in their native countries, and many of their lives were imperiled, their plights must be subordinated to our country’s well-being, If not well-being, then for fairness to those seeking legal entry.
Why do I take this stand? Among others, for practical reasons. America cannot absorb a continuous, massive influx of immigrants. Consider modern day Belgium, France, Germany, and Sweden. Not only are their cultures changing, the huge immigrant population is breaking-down their social services and their cultural heritages.
A country cannot take care of its citizens if it cannot take care of its borders.
See part two on Friday.
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Uyless Black lives in Hayden with his wife Holly and his French Poodle, Milli.