The immigration bill currently being debated in the Senate
““ like all anti-immigration policies ““ violates the
rights of both current and prospective Americans. For that reason
the borders of the U.S. should be open to all who wish to come,
with only minor restriction to search for terrorists and other
criminals.
In the tired defense of the subject, broad claims that
“we” don’t want “them” on
“our” land echo among the anti-immigration forces.
There is, however, no such “we” or land that is
“ours” ““ the U.S. is a country of private
property, not collective ownership. It is not the right of any
other person or group to determine whom private citizens may allow
onto their properties.
Restricting the access of foreigners to live and work in the
U.S. is antithetical to their rights as human beings and the rights
of the Americans who want to sell or rent property to them or offer
them jobs. The property and jobs are solely under the jurisdiction
of their owners.
One has no more a right to forbid the sale of property to or
employment of immigrants than one could justly forbid conducting
business with blacks, women or people born on a third Sunday of
March.
As a human being you have the right to allow whomever you want
onto your property or into your workforce (as long as they do not
pose an objective threat to others, such as known terrorists or
other criminals). And as an American you are entitled to the
protection of your rights by the government.
Any attempt by pressure groups, lobbyists or congressmen to
violate that right by forbidding or restricting immigrants from
working or owning land should be met with the most intolerant
dissent, as the rights to own property and earn a living are among
the most fundamental any human can possess.
One of the most common objections to open borders is that
immigrants are a drain on taxpayer-funded programs such as health
care, welfare and public education.
This argument only addresses the symptom ““ not the root
problem. Anti-immigration advocates are correct in denouncing the
availability of welfare programs to immigrants, but they are wrong
in not denouncing welfare as such.
These programs are funded with money taken from hardworking
Americans who deserve to be able to use it for themselves and their
families, not have it expropriated to satisfy the do-gooder whims
of some power-lusting bureaucrat.
Whether it goes to immigrants, residents or single mothers with
10 children, programs of the welfare state are wrong because they
steal wealth from those who produce it. Insofar as these programs
exist, however, immigrants have no less a right than any other
American to take full advantage of them.
Another common fallacy is contending that immigrants take jobs
from Americans ““ as if jobs were cash at a bank and
immigrants were merely bandits who steal it.
Quite the contrary, immigrants are often willing to work
low-level jobs cheaply, which enables the workers formerly in those
positions to advance in the workforce and businesses to cut costs,
expand markets, improve efficiency and boost production.
Far from being the zero-sum game immigration’s enemies
portray, the capitalist system of free enterprise enables virtually
limitless wealth to be produced ““ just witness the astounding
progress of the U.S. over the last two centuries compared with the
rest of the world.
The U.S. is the world’s hotbed of innovation partly
because its historic influx of immigrants expanded the workforce
with populations that fled the oppressive, state-controlled
economies of their former countries to become hardworking
competitors in the marketplace.
To the Senators now debating over whether to enforce the rights
of today’s and tomorrow’s Americans, I say: “Open
the borders and shut your mouths.”
Hurst is the chairman of L.O.G.I.C. and is a former Daily
Bruin columnist.