The way Americans treat immigrants has been one
of the most consistent ironies throughout the history
of the United States. In the 18th century, John Adams
and the Federalists used the Alien and Sedition Acts
to control the growing numbers of French immigrants.
In the 19th century, employers up and down the East Coast made signs that said No Irish Need Apply; in the west, railroad companies conscripted legions of Chinese immigrants to build hundreds of miles of rail line. For a nation where each generation is composed almost solely of the descendants of immigrants, we have a funny way
of treating newcomers.
President Bush insisted this week, though not in so many words, that his new proposal for immigrant workers is an exception to the trend of distrusting or abusing people who come to this country, and part of the tradition of welcoming them. Bush's plan would allow immigrant workers to apply for a new type of temporary legal status in the United States, enabling those who had come here illegally to work jobs for a short while and be protected by labor laws. If employers and workers could prove no American wants a particular job, the newly legal immigrant could keep it. The president was characteristically vague about the details - Bush is a big-idea man, not a fine tuner - but said he would work with Congress to determine exactly how many people could apply for the new status, what incentives his plan would offer and how Americans would be affected. This sketchiness is only part of the reason to look warily at Bush's plan.
The big idea here is solid: Illegal workers, who could account for as many as 14 million people in the United States, represent an inescapably large part of the U.S. workforce and deserve the same rights and wages as Americans. Illegal immigrant workers are the backbone of many good old American industries, taking jobs in hotels, meatpacking plants, construction and elsewhere. They often work the foulest, most unpleasant jobs that even unemployed Americans don't want, and they frequently work for illegally low pay. As it stands, illegal workers often live as much in fear of their employers as of the new U.S. Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which could burst in at any time to deport them. But if the president is legitimately concerned about immigrant workers and not just hoping to appear sensitive to Latino voters, then his big idea will take a lot of fine tuning.
To make the plan viable, the president and lawmakers must offer some protection for everyone concerned if they are to come forward and admit they have been breaking the law. No company or illegal alien will approach the government to apply for the new legal status if there is a chance they will be penalized for having broken the law before. And more fundamentally, will the immigrants - many of whom speak no English, dread encounters with immigration authorities and whose employers routinely lie about labor regulations - trust anyone involved in this process?
In this contretemps about immigration lawbreakers, we cannot lose sight of the other set of transgressors: companies that knowingly employ illegal workers. Agribusiness giants, convenience-store empires and hotel chains benefit from immigrant employees, however much they might deny it. But given its new concern
for the welfare of immigrant workers, perhaps the
Bush administration could advocate a new crackdown on known employers of illegal workers. Only when ICE agents raided ConAgra's meat-cutting plants in rural Colorado, the government could offer the new three-year amnesty to the illegal workers instead of deporting them. Then, Labor Department officials could ensure the employees were being paid minimum wage and working in safe, sanitary conditions.
Bush's family has been in New England since colonial days, according to the George H.W. Bush Presidential Library, and so has had the benefit of being the establishment each time a new wave of immigrants has arrived in this country. The president's father, of course, was a president, and his grandfather a prominent, long-serving senator. But because his people have found great success in the United States does not mean Bush should forget they were once newcomers here too.
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