By Tom Rodgers, KERA 90.1 Commentator
http://stream.publicbroadcasting.net/production/mp3/kera/local-kera-586988.mp3
Dallas, TX –
We have a vivid drama unfolding with the Farmers Branch anti-immigration ordinances, where the city council wants to outlaw ineligible immigrants from living in the town at all, even fining landlords who rent without proof of citizenship. Local taxpayers have already spent almost half a million dollars in legal fees to fight widespread opposition to the ordinance and would likely spend much more trying to enforce it after the May 12th vote on the measure, money that could have been spent on infrastructure and growing their economy.
Immigration opponents tell us they just want to enforce the law. We need to remember that only 50 years ago some state laws prohibited blacks from drinking at a whites-only water fountain, or prevented Caucasians from marrying someone of African descent. 50 years from now the Farmers Branch ordinance 2903 will seem just as ridiculous, a tangled web of bureaucratic doublespeak that's degrading to citizens and immigrants alike. Let's be honest with ourselves: these new rules aren't likely to check blue-eyed immigrants from Canada. They are a thinly veiled racism, a local apartheid based on your nation of birth.
We have very low unemployment in the United States despite record numbers of workers crossing over from Mexico. The resource shortages of public hospitals and schools are not the fault of these workers, but result from decades of insufficient funding and neglect. Do we really believe that building a 700-mile wall along our border or segregating immigrants out of a suburb will solve these health and education issues?
If we may freely move goods between nations, if American corporations are headquartered overseas, why forbid labor to move freely across borders? Labor is a commodity in the free market just like manufactured goods, software or entertainment. Not only is this restriction on labor unethical, it's bad for business, and as Texans we should know better with our entrepreneurial spirit.
If we really want immigrants to assimilate, don't we want them to attend school, rent apartments, buy homes, drive cars - to put money back into the local economy? Retailers and advertisers already accept this reality, and they have no prejudice in marketing to Hispanic consumers. Our globalized economy is the Great Equalizer. Dollars and cents, pesos and euros, rupees and yen money itself doesn't care where you were born.
In the last analysis, we degrade the quality of our own lives as citizens by supporting anti-immigration laws, which at their root are simply racist. Dr. Martin Luther King envisioned a nation where people are not "judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character." We should also stop judging people by the nation where their soul enters upon the path of life.
Imagine a future where we have the freedom to travel everywhere and in every direction, where members of the human family can know and appreciate each other. Imagine a world where passports and visas become obsolete, because they are tired old symbols of separation and ignorance.
Writer and consultant Tom Rodgers grew up in Farmers Branch, but currently lives in Arlington.
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