Miami, January 6, 2004 - An unusual thing happened in Los Angeles last week end: A massive crowd estimated by local police at 500, 000 people but by the event planners at well over a million, marched in protest at proposals in Congress intended to severely restrict immigration, and in particular, an attempt to criminalize immigration violations in the United States. The organizers of the protest include church leaders and other immigration rights advocates who wish to roll back a powerful and virulent movement in this country that seeks to deal harshly with illegal immigrants. Politicians on both sides of this issue see opportunities as well as risks as they try to advance their proposals to deal with what many see as a very divisive matter.
At the heart of the immigration debate is the presence in the United States of some 11 million illegal and undocumented persons, sometimes referred to "illegal aliens". Some have lived here peacefully and have been gainfully employed in their host country, performing tasks such as harvesting produce, janitorial services, and other menial jobs at minimum wage which most Americans would not do. The latter fact prompted Mexican president Vicente Fox to commit a racial gaffe when he asserted recently in one of the most politically incorrect statements of his presidency: Mexican immigrants are taking on jobs that "not even blacks would do". The Mexican president's subsequent apology may have soothed the raw nerves that his comments touched but the controversy and the politics of immigration has not abated; in fact it has become a veritable wedge issue, threatening to disrupt traditional political alliances, while creating opportunities for social conservatives such as conservative talk show host Patrick Buchanan to advance their anti immigration agenda. The controversy is also producing some strange political bedfellows, as they say; witness the awkward alliance between the liberal senator, Edward Kennedy, and foreign policy hawk John Mcain, a presumed presidential hopeful, who have teamed up to put a "compassionate" face on the immigration proposals. And of course, one cannot ignore the position of the original "compassionate conservative", president Bush himself, the former governor of the border state of Texas who made immigration reform an important pillar of his domestic agenda but who seems to be marginalized on the issue due in part to his enormous loss of political capital over the Iraq war, even if his guest worker program has tremendous appeal in some quarters.
Like most controversial issues in America, the immigration debate is extremely emotional and a solution may be nearly impossible to arrive at, given its nuances and the passion it evokes in a country that is caught in the throes of social and economic changes. Some diehard social conservatives see illegal immigrants as pests that should be exterminated at all costs. They fear a compromise position as a sell out that would amount to granting "amnesty" to law breakers that would only encourage more law breaking. Other social conservatives fear the inevitable consequences of diluting the racial purity of America, as the vast majority of the new arrivals are people of color who would forever change the demographic landscape and as a consequence, the political calculus in the future. The Hispanic vote, long a significant base of the Democratic Party, has of late been an attractive fishing ground for Republicans. And of course, there is the business community that has benefited enormously from cheap immigrant labor, not to mention the nation's farms that could not operate successfully without cheap labor. Add to this the fact the American consumer has come to depend on a reliable supply of fresh farm produce at low prices which illegal immigrants make possible, you begin to understand the nuances and complexity of the issue and the passion it generates.
A NATION OF IMMIGRANTS
Lost, or perhaps forgotten in the immigration debate, is that historically this country has been a nation of immigrants. The nation's history has been characterized by waves of immigrants fleeing their homelands, initially and predominantly from Europe, for one reason or the other. The Irish potato famines of an earlier era gave rise to a flood of immigrants from that country, for instance. These earlier entrants seemed not to have provoked the same level of ire that the hordes of Mexicans and other non Caucasians are now provoking. Some might say that the issue is really the illegality of the new immigration but beneath the surface a racial component is certainly discernable, especially in the rhetoric of the social conservative Pat Buchanan, himself an Irish American. The earlier immigrants melted into the larger culture with relative ease even if they maintained their distinct cultural identities.
But as we ponder the hard line adopted by the likes of Pat Buchanan we cannot help but recall the historical reality in Ireland from whence they came. An English client of mine informed me recently of the origin of the English expression: beyond the pale. For the record, this was an English concoction that reflected the social and class disparities between the native Irish and the English in Ireland a couple of centuries ago. The English, who seemed to have invented and perfected the art of class distinction and class discrimination, occupied a compound in Ireland called "The Pale" to which the Irish were not admitted. If there was a crime, or some other socially unacceptable behavior committed elsewhere, the English would say: Oh, this was done beyond the pale. Over the years the expression evolved to include any rude or deviant behavior, not quite in keeping with established social mores. The expression reflected the inherent sense of superiority that the English felt relative to their Irish cousins. The English consumed Scotch whisky; the Irish consumed Irish whisky, but the differences did not end there. This is why it is easy for me as an Afro Caribbean American to understand why Irish Americans with whom I work are the least comfortable with blacks. People who have been discriminated against are very likely to discriminate against others. Adolf Hitler reportedly sought to exterminate Jews because he was once mistaken for a Jew.
A GLOBAL PHENOMENON
The immigration fatigue felt in the United States is not confined to the borders of this great and prosperous country. A similar phenomenon is evident across the European continent as waves of immigrants from Africa and significant numbers from Muslim countries pour into the cities of Paris, London, Amsterdam and elsewhere. The inevitable consequence is social tension and social unrest. Sometimes the tension spills openly unto the streets, as the recent racial confrontation in France has demonstrated. What we are witnessing is the unavoidable dynamic of social change. Human beings, by nature, hate change. People naturally feel more comfortable living a life to which they have become accustomed. Change represents a rude awakening to which mankind does not very easily adapt. Immigrants bring with them a different culture: their music, their religion, and their social mores. They also do something else; they take jobs away from their host country's citizens. And this is the most contentious element, even if immigrants enter at the bottom rung of the economic ladder. Most people will agree that racial tensions are multiplied exponentially when there is an economic component. It's no wonder that the most virulent racists in America and elsewhere are those whites who are largely economically deprived.
Additionally, immigration world wide is a partly related to globalization, a phenomenon that has become more evident in recent times. Displaced or marginal workers cannot resist the allure of migrating to greener pastures, or to the shining cities they see on television. Economic deprivation at home gives rise to the necessity of migrating to a destination to earn sufficient capital to subsidize relatives left behind. Mexico, for instance, has disclosed that funds repatriated by its citizens in the United States amount to some $20 billion annually, an amount significant enough to cause an economic collapse in that country, should the flow be suddenly interrupted. Jamaica recently disclosed that remittances from its Diaspora, is at least equivalent to, if not in excess of its earnings from its tourism industry. Although no official figures have been for Dominica, it seems fair to assume a similar statistic.
WHERE YOU STAND DEPENDS ON WHERE YOU SEAT
The disparate voices in the American immigration debate reflects not only the complexity of the issues at stake but also the reality that various publics view the issue from their own paradigms. The business community, with its bottom line considerations, is less inclined to view the issue from a law enforcement perspective that seems to be the focus of social conservatives, or from the perspective of the likes of Pat Buchanan who are worried by the prospective racial and cultural changes facing the country. The Roman Catholic Church, a major organizer of the Los Angeles demonstrations, wants to give fresh meaning to the admonition to 'love thy neighbor as thyself". In the middle are politicians, forever jockeying for position, based on their own calculus of how their stand would influence their own political fortunes.
There is also the matter of duplicity in this immigration debate. Americans complain about low skill illegal immigrants while they are willfully bind to the morality of importing workers with critical skills from developing countries, especially those in short supply in the United States. Among these are nurses and other health care workers who are offered attractive salaries to migrate, leaving behind a critical shortage and abject misery in many developing countries, including the Caribbean. And some politicians are even advocating a significant increase in H1B visas, the type issued to highly skilled foreign technical workers such as engineers who are also in relatively short supply in an economy that is increasingly technological in orientation. No one in America seems to be complaining about this. It fits the national agenda.
Sadly, President Bush is incapable of providing effective leadership on this explosive issue because, as I alluded to earlier, he has foolishly allowed his Iraq tragedy to consume all of the political capital he claimed to have earned in the last election. Given this political reality, it is unlikely, in my view, that the immigration matter will be resolved in a meaningful or comprehensive manner any time soon. Meanwhile, millions of unregistered workers will continue to pour in from the southern borders and elsewhere while conservatives fret about the outcome even if they continue to benefit from cheap illegal immigrant labor. The not so practical alternative is to deport 11 million people.