Souring The Milk Of Illegal Immigration

By Charles Heller
6/15/07

No matter what side of the isle a person's on, they have to acknowledge we have a problem with illegal immigration. Many, many problems are caused or aggravated by it, from an increase in heretofore-eradicated diseases, to the loss of emergency rooms no longer fiscally capable of the strain, to hit and run accidents by illegals.

Illegal immigration is not good for those who come here, either, although it is better for them than the places from which they come. Illegals here, are often not in a position to report crimes against them, nor can they file labor complaints. Their journey across the desert, if they come that way, is fraught with danger both from dishonest people, and nature. In short, it's a bad trip for them, and several hundred die a year trying. No matter what side you're on, we can agree that illegal immigration is a bad thing, but how to solve it?

There is a wide range of opinion, from "deport them all," to "amnesty them all." Let's look at the simple practicalities of it.

"Put Troops on the border," some say. Well, we have a Southern border alone that is 1951 miles long. That would take more troops than we have to properly guard, not to mention pulling them from other areas of the world where they are needed. That does not count the Northern border or watching the coasts.

"Regularize them all," proponents do not understand that many if not most of the people here illegally, are here for money, not citizenship. They either wish to work and send money home, or be a part of the social welfare network of our country. If you can do either without being a citizen, why go through the trouble of being "regularized?"

"Deport them all," is an option that some of the most hard line people in the debate, espouse. Well, let's look at the practicality of that. There are about 1.2 million police officers in the United States, counting all uniform and non-uniform personnel, including FBI, Secret Service, Customs, Border Patrol, and every other local, state, and federal agency. That means that in any one shift, the very most officers on duty, on a good day are about 275,000. You cannot round up 12 to 20 million people with all those officers, let alone the few agents tasked with it.

"Fine or imprison the employers who hire the illegals," say some. Well, once again, we have an enforcement personnel shortage problem there, too. There are too many workplaces and job sites in America to police them all. Furthermore, this has the unfortunate consequence of putting employers in a terrible position. They have no effective way of checking, except the Social Security System, if an SSN is matched to the name of a perspective employee. Enforcing against them, would be a placing the de facto burden of enforcement upon the private sector. That is not a good way to run a "public/private partnership," is it?

"Build the fence," say many. Building a fence is a good idea. Paul Harvey says that, "good fences make for good neighbors." True. A fence is working well in Israel, as well, if we need an example, but it does not address the root cause of why people are coming here, and that is economic incentive. As long as that exists, people will find ways around a fence, through a checkpoint, and beyond their visa time period.

So what to do? Sour the milk!

The way you get people to not do a thing is to ruin their incentive to do it. It is that simple, though not that easy, to accomplish. People come here for the most part to earn money. They then send massive amounts of that money back to their home country. It is said that Mexico's second largest source of income, after oil, is money sent from abroad by individuals working outside their country. But how do you get people to stop doing what is in their interest to do? There are 6 points to sour the milk of illegal immigration. They are in the areas of money transfer, residence, automatic citizenship, health care, education, and sanctuary policy.

First, Congress passes a law that is completely within the ambit of their authority: a financial act that makes it illegal to send money out of the United States if a person is not here legally, or assist anyone not here legally in doing so. How would that work? Choke points.

Money must pass through certain areas that are monitorable in order to leave the country. People either send funds through a currency exchange, a bank, wire transfer, or post office. It is a simple matter to make sure that each agent transferring money outside the U.S., make sure that a person is here legally in order to make that transfer. It is also a simple matter to have Congress include in that legislation, a requirement that a person be here legally in order to have a bank account, and reject the use of the "Matricula Consular" card, as I.D. That is the main facet of "souring the milk" of illegal immigration.

Secondly, we sour the milk by impeding residency. As part of the legislation mentioned above from Congress, we make it illegal to rent or sell property to anyone not here legally, or assist anyone who does. We also include a provision that starting 180 days after the law takes effect, anyone found to have property in the U.S. while not here legally, will have it seized via criminal asset forfeiture. And the funds from proceeds of said sale go to building the fence.

Thirdly, we address the "automatic citizenship" area of concern. The 14th amendment says:
Section 1. All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside. No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

Notice that it says "subject to the jurisdiction thereof." Mexican citizens are subject to the jurisdiction of Mexico. The fact that they have come here illegally does not make them U.S citizens, neither should it make children of those born to illegals, citizens of the U.S. A law that says, "pursuant to amendment 14, all children born to persons legally in the United States, are citizens of the United States," would mitigate the "anchor baby syndrome."

In 1986, a law called EMTALA, the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act, required all hospitals which receive Medicare payments, to treat anyone who comes to them regardless of ability to pay or legal status. Change that law to say that in a life-threatening situation, they must treat, but not in non-life threatening situations if a person is not in the U.S. legally. That ends the unfunded mandate for healthcare for illegals, except in life threatening situations.

In the fifth place, Congress should enact a law that only requires the education of children legally in the United States. If local jurisdictions chose to educate the children of illegals they may, but no U.S. tax money may go to that purpose.

Lastly, Congress needs to pass a law that denies any federal money whatsoever to any city, county, political subdivision, or state, that enacts a "sanctuary" policy in terms of its police, fire, EMT, school, or other system of or within government.

What these 6 things do, taken together, is make it hard to transact money, get medical treatment for non life-threatening injuries, get education, or a place to live for people who are not here legally. If you remove the economic incentive, how many will still come illegally?

This still does not address the needs of business that claim that there are jobs "Americans won't do." If that need still exists, it can be handled with an I.D. card, which contains an electronic scan of the temporary worker's fingerprints, retina, and other biometric identifiers, provided that that I.D. is prohibited by law from being used on American Citizens.

A computer database of jobs, run by a non-profit company, can then be used to match jobs with applicants. It should be required by law that anyone not a citizen, working in the U.S., either has a job before they come to the U.S or a bond if they are coming here to run their own business, and the I.D. to swipe just like a credit card at said employer. A person losing his job or moving to another has 14 days to either get a new one or leave the country, or re-apply for more work through the database.

The database could be authorized by Congress 18 - 24 months after the border has been secured, and the secretary of homeland security has certified that less than 3,000,000 illegal aliens are within the borders of the United States.

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