Fairness and the Dream Act

According to U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), “It just isn’t fair” that illegal immigrants can’t receive amnesty and taxpayer subsidized college tuition to boot. The message behind all this … illegal immigrants are a protected class, a victim class. Thus illegals deserve in-state college tuition rates, even in those states where U.S. citizens who have migrated from one state to another are denied access to the lower tuition rates.

Just when did illegal immigration turn into a civil rights issue? This leads us to the single most important question regarding illegal immigration: Do immigrants from one country have a right to immigrate into any country they choose? If so, what is this right based on? International law? But that would be absurd because international law is an attempt to codify the responsibilities that sovereign, independent countries have toward one another. Natural law? … surely Pelosi doesn’t even know what natural law is. Conventional law? But conventional law in the United States prohibits illegal immigration.

In other words, Pelosi can point to no objective standard to support her claim that denying illegal immigrants amnesty — and college tuition — is “not fair.”

In the same report, Pelosi declares that a border fence “is a terrible idea” because it divides local communities. By this she means border towns, such as Laredo and Nuevo Laredo. Again, what is the hidden message here? … National sovereignty is irrelevant. What is important is the sense of community that binds people together. But isn’t this sense of community at the basis of national sovereignty to begin with? You can’t have it both ways. Communities require borders. Communities require a sense of self-identity. Communities, in other words, require fences of one kind or another.

One final word … If you want to read more about why U.S. citizens who actually live on the border want a fence, read this shocking article in Time Magazine.

All this is to say that comprehensive immigration reform must begin with … securing the border.