U.S. immigration reform: Let the American Indians decide

A woman in her mid 60s told me recently how illegal immigrants are destroying the economy because they’re taking jobs from Americans, not paying taxes and not contributing to the local economy because they send all their earnings back to their home country. Of course this is true to some extent, but I can’t help but think that this opinion is one of the most asinine and selfish perspectives on a reality that harkens to the founding of this country.

America, the north and south parts, was “founded” by illegal immigrants. Europeans came here, uninvited, stripped the land of resources and its people of dignity, placed a flag in the ground, drew some lines on a map, wrote some ideas down on paper and voila! A nation of savage tribes became instantly assimilated into the grand idea of a civilized country.

Now, my woman friend, let’s call her Agnes, tells me that this point is irrelevant, because “two wrongs don’t make a right.” Just because we did it to the Indians, doesn’t mean the Mexicans should do it to us, she said. By Mexicans, she means Latinos, basically.

“How do we fix the problem now?” Agnes asks.

True immigration reform requires a thorough examination of how American history, culture, business, politics and public policy have created a perfect storm for illegal immigration and undocumented employment.

Tightening our belts through increased security measures, stricter punishments to offenders and convoluting the legal immigration process will only lead to more problems. As the entrance barriers placed by the United States intensify, more and more people will be forced to enter this country illegally because the current system is already the strictest it’s ever been, especially since Sept. 11, 2001. Dirt poor immigrants face thousands of dollars in government and legal fees to obtain a green card today, and they would be even less equipped to engage in the legal process should it become more complicated and costly.

Imagine if the immigration process became harder… Fewer people would be eligible, and more people would try the illegal route. The harder the government makes it to do something, the more people are going to do it, like when prohibition ended, drinking and drinking-related crime actually decreased dramatically. Fewer people wanted to booze once it became legal.

It’s a shame how history is so quickly forgotten, and how we’re doomed to repeat it because of our intentional ignorance. The first step toward true immigration reform is acknowledging that immigration law in the United States — created by illegal European immigrants — is, at its core, a fundamentally hypocritical concept.

This would mean that immigration law should be completely rewritten from the ground up, and leading this re-write of the law should be the indigenous American people — the Native Americans, the American Indians, First Nation people, etc. Who should decide who comes into this country? The people who were here first.

Ironically, many Latinos are more closely related to American Indians than the average U.S. American. So, really, they probably have more right to be here than many of us. That being an extreme position, it seems only fair to fall in the middle, and make it easier for all immigrants to make it to the U.S. Especially since the 2010 Census indicated that Spanish would be the dominant language in 50 or 80 years, it only makes sense that we embrace this change to minimize harm and maximize socioeconomic and cultural benefits.

For those who are scared at this concept: perhaps the easing of rules would actually slow the influx of all legal and illegal immigrants, because as stated before, if more people do things when the government makes something harder (prohibition) then it stands to reason that fewer people will actually immigrate to the U.S. if it becomes easier. Everyone is happy.

Diversity is what makes the United States of America the great country it claims to be. The story goes that America was founded by people who were persecuted in Europe, which is, as it turns out, only a small part of the truth. The public relations part. But if that is the perception that we want our people and the world to have about our beginning, then why can’t we live up to that ideal and be more welcoming? Many people might not remember what it's like to be a stranger in a strange land, but people should remember that the Europeans who settled this country went through the same fears and sacrifices that the Latino immigrants are going through today.

Let me tell you about what I went through. I married an Italian citizen and we spent three years and around $5,000 in government fees alone, with no lawyer, to get her 10-year green card. Our file contains a two-inch thick mass of paperwork, scanned birth certificates and passports, blood types, biometrics, correspondence. We went to four or five different places for interviews, photos, fingerprints, DNA, God knows what else. We interviewed with a woman who needed to determine that our marriage was real, and not a ploy to get my wife into the country.

“Have you consummated the marriage?” She asks us. Umm, the consummation part preempted the marriage. Does that mean we’re not eligible for a green card under the Family Rights clause?

It was embarrassing. Her questions became increasingly intrusive. She interviewed us separately, and asked my wife to tell her something private that she had shared with me, something to prove our relationship was not a scam, and my wife told her the private thing. Then when I was with the woman, alone, she described the incident, not in detail, but only to give me a clue so she could be sure I wasn’t lying. I knew what it was, I told the woman, and with a great humbling sigh, a complete stranger was now privy to one of the most personal and devastating things two people in love can go through, something that I hadn’t told hardly anyone, friends or family.

But this woman, this stranger, she knew our secret. And with the stroke of a pen, the pounding of a stamp, she OK’d our application. I was somewhere between elation and violation, like I was happy to have been raped.

Is this the kind of welcome that new United States residents can expect? No wonder why people come here illegally.

Streamlining the immigration process is a crucial first step to fixing the problem. Second, we provide incentives for businesses to not hire illegal immigrants. Punishing businesses will only make those businesses more hostile to those illegal workers, because now they can use the threat of job loss (which would certainly occur if the business was caught with undocumented workers) to ensure that the workers don’t complain about low or unpaid wages or harsh work conditions.

As long as there is an economic incentive to hire illegal immigrants, and as long as there is poverty in other countries (caused in part by the futile drug war of the United States and other gringo policies, but that’s another set of stories), the perfect storm will continue. Businesses will hire illegals because it’s cheaper and there is absolutely no safety net for those workers — no union, no health standards, no health care, no pension, no paid vacation, nothing. No extra overhead. It’s cash under the table, and it’s even tax deductible, if your accountant has any inkling of creativity.

Yet many U.S. citizens think these illegals are stealing jobs from “real” Americans. Very few U.S. American workers would work under the same conditions that the market demands. This was proven in Georgia when it cracked down on illegal immigrants, and the farms suffered because U.S. American workers couldn’t last more than a few days picking tomatoes in the scorching southern heat.

United States Americans don’t consider themselves lazy, but compared to many migrant workers, U.S. Americans are the epitome of sloth. U.S. citizens should change their attitude about work and lose their entitlement mentality if they expect U.S. businesses to hire them and not illegal immigrants.

But this requires a culture shift, and to shift a culture as ingrained as this, it would likely require a catalyzing event or a swell of ground-level dissatisfaction with the status quo. Either way it would be painful to let go of old ways, but that’s the same leap of faith illegal immigrants undertake when they leave their country and head toward the unknown opportunities waiting for them in the U.S. Fear should not impede progress.

The only way to change it, is to make the market demand something different. Something better. How does one affect change to the market? Public policy? A lassaiz-faire approach? A combination?

As any economist knows, markets respond to incentives. There must be a reason for the market demands to shift. Public policy can be established so that businesses are rewarded for hiring people and playing by the rules, in the form of tax breaks, public recognition, something, anything that gives that business something tangible, an asset, a reward for doing what’s right.

Any company that’s caught hiring illegals should be punished severely. However, the illegal immigrants working there should have full access to becoming documented workers. Not citizens, but legal workers, an improvement on the current work visa system. There could even be a relaxed taxation system for these kinds of workers, to incentivize businesses to only hire people authorized to work here.

Citizenship eventually, maybe. I know, I know. Amnesty, bleeding hearts, blah blah blah. The American Indians gave the Europeans amnesty, and look at how they’ve been repaid for their kindness.

Unlike the welcoming arms of the Native Americans who embraced their illegal immigrant brothers, modern men and woman who come to our country searching for a better life have the odds stacked against them. And when they come illegally, they’re met with hostility, even though there is an absolute zero chance for many of them to come here legally, all things considered. Many foreigners who are here legally are met with the same hostility. Sometimes it’s even worse.

These hero immigrants leave their homes and families to their trash-stacked shacks and common toilets, living on two dollars a day if they’re lucky. They leave this loathsome paradise and journey north to the promised land, where hard work makes dreams come true. Where opportunity lies. Where the security of your family lives, waiting for you to grab it by the horns. If you stay, your family suffers. If you go, you risk deportation or imprisonment or both. Some are killed making the trek, caught in the crossfire of a country at war as factions battle for the power to control the supply of illegal substances to meet the demand in the United States. To add iron to the tragedy, these immigrant heroes are often killed by weapons made in the U.S.A. Forget about a personal burial with family to see you off, now you’re merely another statistic on a CNN screen roll.

They trudge through hell for a chance to make a better life. And it’s the only chance they have. They are heroes, risking everything for their family. Few things are more heroic.

How can a person of privilege see a person of poverty trying to better himself and look down upon it? But that’s what many U.S. Americans do. This is “our” country, “our” land, which is separate and distinct from “your” country, and “your” land. It’s hypocrisy, especially given this country’s history. The U.S. American way is to pull oneself up by one’s bootstraps, and if one can’t do it, it’s only because one isn’t working hard enough. Yet, when an illegal immigrant embodies this sentiment more so than most of her U.S. American contemporaries, it is seen as an affront to the U.S. American way.

No one is more American than illegal immigrants — this country was founded by them.

The businesses that hire illegal immigrants are the problem, not the immigrants. But the culture for businesses to hire illegals is strong and runs deep, and the only way to change the culture is to change the immigration process and incentivize businesses to play by the rules, while hoping that the U.S. American worker will evolve. With the Native American people leading the way toward immigration reform, maybe we’ll find a way to balance the economy once and for all, but that’s another story.