The Case For Abiding the Law

Most laws are meant to stop people from doing something, and to penalize those who disregard those laws. More generally, laws are meant to protect the society from the lawbreakers.

But our immigration laws are different. Here the whole focus is on the "plight" of those who have broken the laws, and on what can be done to lift the stigma and ease the pressures they feel, so that they can "come out of the shadows" and "normalize" their lives.

Merely using the word "illegal" to describe their breaking the law is considered to be a sign of mean-spiritedness, if not racism.

On the other hand, if an ordinary American citizen breaks a law, no one cares if he has to live in fear for years -- "in the shadows," as it were -- worrying that his illegal act will be discovered and punished.

No cities announce that they will provide "sanctuary," so that American law-breakers will be protected from the law. But, in some places, illegal immigrants are treated almost as if they were in a law-breaker protection program. What is even more remarkable about this special treatment is that you are not supposed to think about special treatment of illegal immigrants as special treatment. Somehow, they are awarded a special place in our concept of justice—a special brand of compliance with the law is applied to them.

It seems in the American mind that illegal immigrants may "earn" their citizenship. But an ordinary American citizen cannot “earn” his way out of complying with the law. Ordinarily, penalties apply to those who break the law.

Some have argued that all illegal immigrants should be found and deported. We are told that there is no way that the government can find all the people who are in the country illegally and deport them. Does anyone imagine that the government can find all the embezzlers, drunk drivers or bank robbers in the country? And does anyone think that this is a reason why the government should stop trying to enforce laws against embezzlement, drunk driving or bank robbery? Or…let embezzlers, drunk drivers and bank robbers "come out of the shadows" and "normalize" their lives?

Why are there immigration laws in the first place? For the benefit of the American people -- not for the benefit of people in other countries who want to come here.

Political and media elites treat the American people as if they are the problem -- a problem to be circumvented with pious promises about border security that have not been kept for decades.

All this argument ignores the fact that we, Americans, are faced with a serious humanitarian problem. Those of us who have dealt with illegal immigrants face to face for years, realize that these poor people just cannot be humanely dealt with by kicking them out. Christian ethics, also, indicate a kinder approach to the problem of illegal immigrants.  These unfortunate immigrants need our help; but circumventing our laws does not seem the right route to me.

I sincerely hope that any new immigration laws are not undertaken without securing the border first and then making a guest worker program that can be enforced to the benefit of both Americans and immigrant Mexicans. Living with chaos at the border is no way to run an immigration policy.