Today I'€™m going to talk about illegal immigration, mainly but not limited to Latinos, mostly Mexican, looking to receive amnesty in the United States. The idea for this blog came from a video that I watched on MSNBC, Video: Bilingual signs spark controversy. The video talks about a town in New Hampshire where a city wide debate sprung up because Latinos were breaking park rules because the signs they said were not in Spanish. The reporter acknowledges that this may be a bogus excuse, but also recognizes that this does bring up a very profound issue in this country dealing with immigration.
Immigration has been a part of U.S. history since before the U.S. was a country. The first settlers from Europe for example were Puritans seeking religious freedom from the Church of England. It is written into our constitution, "We hold these truths to be self evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness."€ Ever since then there has been a steady from off immigrants entering the country from all over the world.
But why are these immigrants doing it illegally where one hundred years ago there was Ellis Island and other such facilities that helped process immigrants and even gave them $10.00 to help them out in their new country. In 1924 with the passing of the National Origins Act, the only immigrants to pass through Ellis Island were displaced persons and war refugees. This act essentially closed America’s open door and set up the grounds for the immigration debates.
Most of the immigrants to pass through Ellis Island were European, mainly Irish, German, and Italian. These people were not received well, the Irish were treated lower than the newly freed black slaves and often had to resort to gangs to survive. Meanwhile on the other coast immigrants from China trying to escape England's national forced opium abuse settled in San Francisco and began working on the railroad, also treated worse than newly freed slaves.
More recently, in New York was the "White Flight"€ and in many American suburbs "€œBlockbusting."€ The two are very similar and are essentially whites moving out of neighborhoods in the city because of minorities moving in. It would be funny if this had any correlation with the fact that the majority if the population living in suburbs are white. For more information on race in suburbs check out this Chicago Sun-Times article, http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4155/is_20010408/ai_n13902748
All thought out American history a trend emerges, it seems that what ever minority is at the time moving into the country and getting adjust will be viewed as a scapegoat for most of America problems. Many minorities are blamed for violence and the slowing of the economy. If history does in fact repeat itself then you could predict that in fifty years the government will have moved on from Latino and found another minority to combat.
This debate does raise a profound moral issue though, should we let just anyone into our country. I believe that mainly because it is part of our cultural history, and also because we supposedly set examples for the rest of the world that we should let people into our country. We are no where near the most crowded country in the world (which is Bangladesh, they manage to fit over 150,000,000 people into 55,000 square miles), nor are we the poorest (Malawi with a GPD of $600, the US GPD is $13.13 trillion). There have been occurrences in the past of immigration ruining our country and culture, in fact both are built on the idea of our country being a place in the world that doest judge and will grant amnesty to those seeking it. I would like to finish this blog with a cartoon, this was a video submitted into a youtube contest entitled, "MPA/MPP You Tube Public Policy Challenge: Change the World in 1 Minute"€, I think it is worth watching, and don’t worry like the title says it'€™s only minute. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PxhLjizL6qY (682).
