# (Almost) all across the spectrum, most Americans favor "path to citizenship" for illegals **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [June 19, 2011, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/almost-all-across-the-spectrum-most-americans-favor-path-to-citizenship-for-illegals/586061 "2011-06-19T19:56:51Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Rodgers01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/b19c9b/32.png) [@Rodgers01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rodgers01)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2011, 5:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/almost-all-across-the-spectrum-most-americans-favor-path-to-citizenship-for-illegals/586061/41 "2011-06-20T05:22:44Z")
> [@CitizenPained](#): > > I agree. Making the US an exclusive club with an indentured-servant system like we have in the US with undocumented immigrants is inherently racist, ethnocentric and nativist. Racist? Even among _legal_ immigrants, the great majority come from different races and ethnicities. I’m glancing at the [2010 Yearbook of Immigration Statistics](http://www.dhs.gov/files/statistics/publications/LPR10.shtm) which shows that in that year, many more people were granted legal permanent residence from Mexico _alone_ than from the entirety of Europe, including Russia. (More Africans were also granted legal permanent residence than Europeans.) And our immigration system is racist…? Anyways, the same poll the OP quotes says that a majority favor “a both a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants currently in the country and for **stronger enforcement of immigration laws and border security**.” So - figure out a way to give citizenship the illegal immigrants that are already here, but take serious measures to stop the inflow. Would others agree to that? ---
**Author:** ![Chen019](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f19dbf/32.png) [@Chen019](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chen019)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2011, 5:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/almost-all-across-the-spectrum-most-americans-favor-path-to-citizenship-for-illegals/586061/42 "2011-06-20T05:34:04Z")
> [@Rodgers01](#): > > Racist? Even among _legal_ immigrants, the great majority come from different races and ethnicities. I’m glancing at the [2010 Yearbook of Immigration Statistics](http://www.dhs.gov/files/statistics/publications/LPR10.shtm) which shows that in that year, many more people were granted legal permanent residence from Mexico _alone_ than from the entirety of Europe, including Russia. (More Africans were also granted legal permanent residence than Europeans.) And our immigration system is racist…? > > Anyways, the same poll the OP quotes says that a majority favor “a both a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants currently in the country and for **stronger enforcement of immigration laws and border security**.” So - figure out a way to give citizenship the illegal immigrants that are already here, but take serious measures to stop the inflow. Would others agree to that? No the measures to stop the inflow have to come first, otherwise you’re likely to end up with the same issue that followed the 1986 amnesty - [inaction](http://www.aei.org/article/26324). > [@](#): > > So what happened? The short answer is: It’s all Bob Bartley’s fault. The legendarily pro-open-borders editor of the Journal liked to give his staffers “beats.” Bartley assigned me the income-inequality debate. From 1989 to 1991, some of the most dramatic and exhilarating years of the 20th century, while my colleagues covered wars and revolutions, I was trudging my way through reports from Brookings and AEI on what exactly was happening to the American middle class. Always the glamour jobs! > > And yet, in their way, those studies and reports contained information as unexpected, startling, and radical as anything coming out of Eastern Europe. I had never appreciated the sheer scale of the immigration surge: almost 2 million legal entries in 1991–close to half the number of births that year–plus who knew how many illegals. And, in stark contradiction to all my preconceptions about immigration, the immigrants who had arrived in the United States since 1970 were not doing very well. They were arriving poor, and they were staying poor for decades. Ominous warning signs were gathering that their children would stay poor too. > > It was customary to draw a sharp line dividing (bad) illegal immigration from (good) legal immigration. But the more closely you studied the issue, the more problematic that line became. “Illegal” immigration was not “illegal” in the same way that, say, illegal drugs were. Since the 1970s, the U.S. government had tacitly allowed illegal immigrants a quasi-protected status. In 1979, the Immigration Service ended its long policy of raiding residences in search of illegals. In 1982, the Supreme Court ruled that children present in the country illegally nonetheless possessed a constitutional right to a free public education. **The promises of effective enforcement that accompanied the 1986 amnesty were never honored. I began to think that it made more sense to think of immigration policy as a whole, with a tacitly accepted “illegality” just as much a part of the structure as the genius visas for aliens of extraordinary ability. Immigrants could start legal (by entering on, say, a temporary visa), become illegal (by overstaying their visa), and then legalize themselves again (by marriage or sponsorship or amnesty).** > > I also began to learn that you could hardly name a social problem without discovering that immigration was aggravating it to the point of unsolvability. > > Health insurance? Immigrants accounted for about one-quarter of the uninsured in the early 1990s, and about one-third of the increase in the uninsured population at that time. > > Social spending? The Urban Institute estimated in 1994 that educating the children of illegal aliens cost the State of California almost $1.5 billion per year. > > Wage pressure on the less-skilled? The wages of less-skilled Americans had come under ferocious pressure since 1970. How could you even begin to think about this issue without recognizing the huge immigration-driven increase in the supply of unskilled labor over the same period? > > Competitiveness? How could the U.S. remain the world’s most productive nation while simultaneously remixing its population to increase dramatically the proportion of poorly educated people within it? > > A 1997 study by the National Academy of Sciences found virtually zero net benefit to the U.S. economy from immigration. Immigration yielded benefits, true–but also costs in the form of lower wages and higher social-welfare burdens. Balance costs and benefits against each other, as a rational policymaker should, and you arrived at a favorable balance of $10 billion, less than a tenth of a percentage point in a $12 trillion economy. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2011, 6:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/almost-all-across-the-spectrum-most-americans-favor-path-to-citizenship-for-illegals/586061/43 "2011-06-20T06:57:31Z")
> [@Rodgers01](#): > > Racist? Even among _legal_ immigrants, the great majority come from different races and ethnicities. Yes, ever since the [Immigration Act of 1924](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immigration_Act_of_1924) was repealed and replaced with the [Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965.](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immigration_Act_of_1965) And you know what? Some Americans don’t **like** that. But any who says so plain justly forfeits all credibility. So they pound at the problem kinda sideways. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2011, 7:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/almost-all-across-the-spectrum-most-americans-favor-path-to-citizenship-for-illegals/586061/44 "2011-06-20T07:01:34Z")
> [@Chen019](#): > > No the measures to stop the inflow have to come first, otherwise you’re likely to end up with the same issue that followed the 1986 amnesty - [inaction](http://www.aei.org/article/26324). Any failure of enforcement of the [Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immigration_Reform_and_Control_Act_of_1986) can almost certainly can be laid at the feet of influential business interests hiring immigrant labor. That’s the GOP’s political problem here: Its mass constituency is heavily nativist, but its **real** constituency has entirely different priorities. ---
**Author:** ![Chen019](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f19dbf/32.png) [@Chen019](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chen019)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2011, 8:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/almost-all-across-the-spectrum-most-americans-favor-path-to-citizenship-for-illegals/586061/45 "2011-06-20T08:53:11Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Any failure of enforcement of the [Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immigration_Reform_and_Control_Act_of_1986) can almost certainly can be laid at the feet of influential business interests hiring immigrant labor. > > That’s the GOP’s political problem here: Its mass constituency is heavily nativist, but its **real** constituency has entirely different priorities. Yes, and those business interests are just as powerful now as they were then. Until there is some evidence that enforcement is meaningful then amnesty should not be considered. btw. Did you find any data on African Americans supporting amnesty? > [@](#): > > While Sanchez’s decision to enter the country illegally and remain seems perfectly rational, Carens’s use of his story as part of a defense of amnesty loses some of its moral force because of his failure to take into consideration the impact of illegal immigration on the most vulnerable members of American society: native-born Americans and legal immigrants with low skills and low levels of education. > > Who are the people harmed? Obviously, it is not university professors, members of Congress, journalists, lawyers, or doctors. The most vulnerable people are U.S.-born blacks and Hispanics with high school educations or less. Unlike Carens, who ignores these groups, I would argue that their moral claim to justice trumps the moral case of Miguel Sanchez and the unknown millions who are in the country illegally and have taken jobs and opportunities to which they were not entitled… > > Currently, there are an estimated six to seven million illegal immigrants working in low-wage, low-skill positions that could be filled by U.S.-born workers with high school educations or less. A detailed breakdown of U.S. Census unemployment data released by the Center for Immigration Studies in February 2009 reveals startling levels of unemployment for U.S.-born blacks and Hispanics without a high school education. Blacks had a 24.7 percent unemployment rate and Hispanics were at 16.2 percent. Meanwhile, the unemployment rate for legal and illegal immigrants without a high school education was 10.6 percent. > > It can be argued that illegal immigration is a form of theft in which the longest law-breakers should be given the harshest penalties—not membership rights. Instead of being rewarded with amnesty, perhaps they should be fined, sent home, and placed at the end of the line. Immigration law should favor those immigrants who have shown respect for the rule of law and those who have made good-faith efforts to comply with its rules and regulations. I would place into this category those immigrants who have fallen into illegal status due to no fault of their own. > **[The Case Against Amnesty for Illegal Immigrants: A Response to Joseph Carens](http://carolmswain.blogspot.com/2009/05/case-against-amnesty-for-illegal.html)** > > http://bostonreview.net/BR34.3/swain.php ‘Apply compassion offered illegal immigrants to the most vulnerable citizens’ Carol M. Swain This a... ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2011, 1:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/almost-all-across-the-spectrum-most-americans-favor-path-to-citizenship-for-illegals/586061/46 "2011-06-20T13:01:56Z")
> [@Simplicio](#): > > The actual question was: > > > [@](#): > > > > Providing a way for illegal immigrants currently in the country > > to gain legal citizenship if they pass background checks, > > pay fines and have jobs? > > So what the “path” would consist of was at least broadly outlined. How is this “path” realistic in the slightest? No illegal immigrant can legally work, so the fact that they “have jobs” is going to be a difficult condition to meet – of course, they DO have jobs, but in order to show that a given illegal immigrant has a job, he will have to expose his employer as having violated the law. Unless the “path” also includes amnesty for employers, it strikes me as a difficult condition to meet. ETA: channelling **John Mace** , I must have been. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2011, 1:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/almost-all-across-the-spectrum-most-americans-favor-path-to-citizenship-for-illegals/586061/47 "2011-06-20T13:36:03Z")
> [@Chen019](#): > > Yes, and those business interests are just as powerful now as they were then. Until there is some evidence that enforcement is meaningful then amnesty should not be considered. A nonsequitur. There is no reason why amnesty **needs** to be linked to any form of “enforcement,” that’s just how they wrote the 1986 bill. Amnesty, you must understand, is (in the eyes of the majority of Americans) a good idea for **one** set of reasons, and border control is a good idea for a **completely different** set of reasons, and that is why so many responders can favor both – it is not that they do not notice the contradiction (that would be the reason why millions of Americans both favor tax cuts, and object to deficit spending or to any named spending cuts), it is that there is none. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2011, 1:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/almost-all-across-the-spectrum-most-americans-favor-path-to-citizenship-for-illegals/586061/48 "2011-06-20T13:42:23Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > How is this “path” realistic in the slightest? No illegal immigrant can legally work, so the fact that they “have jobs” is going to be a difficult condition to meet – of course, they DO have jobs, but in order to show that a given illegal immigrant has a job, he will have to expose his employer as having violated the law. Unless the “path” also includes amnesty for employers, it strikes me as a difficult condition to meet. Hmmm . . . If only there were some (constitutional) way, in such situation, to reward the illegal with amnesty and the **employer** with deportation to Honduras. ---
**Author:** ![Simplicio](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c37758/32.png) [@Simplicio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Simplicio)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2011, 3:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/almost-all-across-the-spectrum-most-americans-favor-path-to-citizenship-for-illegals/586061/49 "2011-06-20T15:16:59Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > How is this “path” realistic in the slightest? No illegal immigrant can legally work, so the fact that they “have jobs” is going to be a difficult condition to meet – of course, they DO have jobs, but in order to show that a given illegal immigrant has a job, he will have to expose his employer as having violated the law. Unless the “path” also includes amnesty for employers, it strikes me as a difficult condition to meet. Yea, you’d have to either give amnesty to employers (or at least promise not to use info gathered as part of the amnesty act to prosecute them). Which makes sense in its own right, if we’re going to give amensty to current illegal immigrants, we’re probably better off using resources to crack down on new employment of illegals, rather then going after people after the fact for hiring the now legal immigrants. Did the proposed reform of 2006 have a work requirement? I know it included the other parts of the “path” (residency and fees) mentioned in the question. If so, how did they deal with it there. ---
**Author:** ![Chen019](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f19dbf/32.png) [@Chen019](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chen019)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2011, 11:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/almost-all-across-the-spectrum-most-americans-favor-path-to-citizenship-for-illegals/586061/50 "2011-06-20T23:15:17Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > A nonsequitur. There is no reason why amnesty **needs** to be linked to any form of “enforcement,” that’s just how they wrote the 1986 bill. Amnesty, you must understand, is (in the eyes of the majority of Americans) a good idea for **one** set of reasons, and border control is a good idea for a **completely different** set of reasons, and that is why so many responders can favor both – it is not that they do not notice the contradiction (that would be the reason why millions of Americans both favor tax cuts, and object to deficit spending or to any named spending cuts), it is that there is none. It’s a question of whether the US actually wants to have borders like normal countries (Mexico for instance). Providing amnesty rewards rule breaking & will naturally lead to more illegals. So that begs the question - what to do with the anticipated influx? ---
**Author:** ![Ibn\_Warraq](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/e19b73/32.png) [@Ibn\_Warraq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ibn_Warraq)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2011, 4:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/almost-all-across-the-spectrum-most-americans-favor-path-to-citizenship-for-illegals/586061/51 "2011-06-27T04:14:04Z")
> [@Chen019](#): > > What about African Americans? What is [their take](http://www.zimbio.com/Illegal+immigration/articles/GwpvL5ZWq_l/Polls+Show+Amnesty+Undocumented+Aliens+not) on a path to citizenship for illegals? Since you’ve repeatedly made it clear how much you despise African-Americans as a group why do you care what they think on this isssue? ---
**Author:** ![Chen019](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f19dbf/32.png) [@Chen019](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chen019)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2011, 4:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/almost-all-across-the-spectrum-most-americans-favor-path-to-citizenship-for-illegals/586061/52 "2011-06-27T04:29:47Z")
> [@Ibn\_Warraq](#): > > Since you’ve repeatedly made it clear how much you despise African-Americans as a group why do you care what they think on this isssue? Because it’s weird that liberals seem to discount their opinion on the subject. ---
**Author:** ![JKellyMap](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jkellymap/32/15880_2.png) [@JKellyMap](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JKellyMap)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2011, 6:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/almost-all-across-the-spectrum-most-americans-favor-path-to-citizenship-for-illegals/586061/53 "2011-06-27T06:06:28Z")
> [@Chen019](#): > > It’s a question of whether the US actually wants to have borders like normal countries (Mexico for instance). Providing amnesty rewards rule breaking & will naturally lead to more illegals. So that begs the question - what to do with the anticipated influx? Wrong. Mexico is very similar to the US in this respect. It treats its illegal Central American immigrants (most of whom have the US as their goal, but many end up staying in Mexico) pretty much the way we treat our undocumenteds – including some nativist sentiment, and army-manned checkpoints near borders, but in the end not much enforcement of immigration laws. Cite: I could come up with cites quickly, but trust me on this – I lived for five years in Mexico, within a few hours’ drive of the Guatemala border. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2011, 1:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/almost-all-across-the-spectrum-most-americans-favor-path-to-citizenship-for-illegals/586061/54 "2011-06-27T13:48:10Z")
> [@Chen019](#): > > Because it’s weird that liberals seem to discount their opinion on the subject. I think you’ll find liberals lump AAs’ opinions together with white Americans’ opinions on this subject. As is appropriate. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/almost-all-across-the-spectrum-most-americans-favor-path-to-citizenship-for-illegals/586061.md?page=2)