No matter who is elected president in November, the nation will see another big debate over immigration policy come January. Not even the war in Iraq generates as much emotion or attracts as many people to rallies and demonstrations as does immigration.
With this in mind, I have invited Peter Brimelow, a widely recognized critic of unlimited immigration, to debate Jacob Hornberger, an equally well-known advocate of open borders, to debate the issue at Heartland’s 24th Anniversary Benefit Dinner in Chicago on October 2. I hope you can attend, because it promises to be the liveliest Heartland debate ever.
Political Gridlock
Last summer, Congress failed to pass a “comprehensive immigration reform” plan negotiated by Sens. John McCain and Ted Kennedy and endorsed by President George W. Bush. The plan would have granted citizenship to as many as 12 million illegal aliens now living in the U.S. while increasing border security to stop some of the estimated 500,000 aliens from entering the country illegally every year.
That plan collapsed when the public grew suspicious that the promise to increase border security would be broken – as it was the last time immigration reform was passed by Congress – and when word got out that giving citizenship to the illegal aliens already here meant automatically extending it to all their relatives back in the old country who might choose to join them here.
Federal gridlock has led to a torrent of state laws attempting to deal with the situation. According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, 171 immigration bills became law in 41 states during the first six months of 2007, more than double the 84 laws approved in all of 2006. State and local governments have a major stake in the debate because they bear the brunt of the cost of public services used by illegal aliens, including schools, hospitals, mass transit, and criminal justice.
Where Do You Stand?
Which of the following statements best expresses your views on immigration?
- Immigrants are a blessing, both economically and culturally, to America and to the world. Deporting 12 million illegal aliens and building fences and issuing national ID cards to prevent approximately 500,000 more from entering the country each year would pose a major and unacceptable threat to our liberties. Let ‘em come, and let ‘em stay.
- Immigration is fine in theory, but 12 million illegal aliens living and working here in defiance of the law, using public services without paying for them, and refusing to learn our language and our customs is just too much of a good thing. It’s time we secure our borders, raise the standards for who can enter and who can stay, and focus on “Americanizing” the immigrants who are here legally. Keep ‘em out, and send ‘em home.
The anti-immigration folks can point to compelling evidence that today’s immigrants, particularly those from Mexico, impose a tax burden on native-born taxpayers, compete with them for an ever-growing share of jobs, and are failing to assimilate to the same degree or at the same pace as past generations of immigrants. Are we at risk of losing our culture, prosperity, and perhaps our freedoms to a wave of poor and illiterate immigrants from developing countries?
The open-immigration folks counter that the economic benefits of immigration outweigh the tax costs imposed on natives by a factor of between 10 and 100 to one. They say the cost to taxpayers of securing our borders would be immense – Bush asked for $13 billion last year, and it wasn’t nearly enough – and the damage to our civil liberties caused by identifying, arresting, and removing illegal immigrants would be enormous. Do we want a national ID card? Do we want “sweeps” of workplaces and door-to-door searches for illegals? These aren’t hypothetical possibilities: National and state government policies are already heading down these paths.
Common Ground?
Immigration is an issue that divides even libertarians. Ron Paul, the one-time Libertarian Party candidate for president and more recently a candidate for the Republican nomination for the same, comes down on the anti-immigration side on most issues in the debate. Daniel Griswold at the Cato Institute stakes out an opposite position.
While far from an expert on immigration policy, I think I can discern some common ground in the debate:
- Racism and prejudice ought to have no place in the debate. As Ruben Navarrette Jr., a syndicated columnist, recently put it, “Hispanics are the new Germans, the new Irish, the new Italians.” Each ethnic group in its time was chided for being too poor, too ill-educated, and too slow to assimilate.
- What is good for big business and agriculture in the U.S. is not necessarily consistent with individual freedom. Freedoms and rights are inalienable – they aren’t subject to cost-benefit analysis. Economic arguments don’t trump all other arguments.
- “Sealing the borders” may be impossible, but so too is granting amnesty to millions of illegal immigrants and then entitling all their relatives to come here and qualify for services and pensions paid for by native citizens. Both sides need to get real.
- The right to migrate is a key human liberty that ought to be subject to limits only as a last resort. But the failure of institutions in the U.S. to assimilate new immigrants is real, and it makes unlimited immigration a threat to our own freedom. Both sides in the debate have “freedom arguments” on their side.
- The poor design of government programs in the U.S. – the way we fund schools, health care, and retirement – makes unlimited immigration from Mexico a genuine burden on many taxpayers. Shouldn’t we be debating how best to reform our entitlement and public service programs, instead of locking immigrants out?
Meet the Debaters
Jacob G. Hornberger is founder and president of The Future of Freedom Foundation. He was born and raised in Laredo, Texas and received his B.A. in economics from Virginia Military Institute and his law degree from the University of Texas.
In 1989, Mr. Hornberger founded The Future of Freedom Foundation, dedicated to “advance freedom by providing an uncompromising moral and economic case for individual liberty, free markets, private property, and limited government.” He is a co-editor or contributor to the eight books that have been published by the foundation and a regular writer for the foundation’s publication, Freedom Daily.
Fluent in Spanish and conversant in Italian, he has delivered speeches and engaged in debates and discussions about free-market principles with groups all over the United States and around the world. His editorials have appeared in the Washington Post, Charlotte Observer, La Prensa San Diego, El Nuevo Miami Herald, and many others, both in the United States and in Latin America.
Peter Brimelow is a native of England. After graduating from the University of Sussex and Stanford University Graduate School of Business, Brimelow became a senior editor and writer for Forbes and a contributing and then senior editor at National Review. He has written for MacLean’s, Financial Post, Fortune, and Barron’s and has appeared in The Wall Street Journal, New York Times, and Washington Post.
Mr. Brimelow is the author of The Worm in the Apple (HarperCollins 2004), a devastating critique of teacher unions in the U.S. He is also author of Alien Nation: Common Sense About America’s Immigration Disaster (Random House, 1995), a controversial best-seller, and contributed to Debating Immigration, edited by Carol M. Swain (Cambridge University Press, 2007).
Mr. Brimelow is currently the editor of VDARE.com, a senior fellow with the Pacific Research Institute, and a columnist for CBS MarketWatch.
Here’s Your Chance
Having studied the issue for quite awhile, I’m still not sure which side of the immigration debate I am on. Are you?
Heartland’s anniversary benefit dinner is a great chance to meet and socialize with hundreds of freedom-lovers from around the country. Besides the great food and open bar, here’s your chance to watch two brilliant free-market thinkers slug it out over one of the most important public policy issues of the day.
Who knows? They might even change your mind.
