Heat in Arizona

The news from Arizona has spread like wildfire across the nation. Their response to the problems they face from illegal immigration has sparked fiery reactions within their state and throughout the country.

The borders around the United States have been porous over this country's history. The attitudes of Americans, especially in the west, have generally been formed by the wide open spaces. The cowboys sang "Don't fence me in" and the school children sang "This land was made for you and me!" Another characteristic of Americans is the expectation that, unlike many other countries, we do not have to justify our presence with identity cards.

Once our nation virtually filled the continent, the east and west borders had oceans for boundaries. By and large, our northern neighbors were satisfied with their lives as Canadians so that borderline was uncontentious. It is the southern border that has become a greater problem of late.

Reports of the lawless conditions in border towns, such as Ciudad Juárez, are frightening. Drug cartels are responsible for kidnappings, extortion, and brutal murders against Mexican law enforcement, competing gangs, and ordinary citizens, in order to keep them in submission. This violence is beginning to spill over the border and has residents on the US side anxious.

One result is a law that allows Arizona law enforcement to require people whom they suspect, to show proof of legal status. It defines presence without appropriate documentation as a crime, in fact, a misdemeanor not to carry the documentation.

The controversy this bill has sparked is interesting. Opposition voices predict that members of the Spanish-speaking community will be unwilling to call the police for help, to speak up as victims or witnesses to crime. There is also fear that this will result in racial profiling by police, since only race and language can give an appearance of a non-citizen. It is seen as a racist bill. The Governor who signed it into law says that we must trust law enforcement more than that.

I have been asked my position on this bill and it is somewhat conflicted. On the one hand, I can understand the frustration of the people of Arizona who created it. The fear of the lawlessness they are seeing spill over the border is provocative.

The question of the same sort of law in other states, including Utah, is a separate matter. I am unconvinced by those who justify the requirement we all carry identification documents by saying that we are burdened by the cost of social services to the undocumented. The undocumented all pay sales taxes and often Social Security and income taxes, but are unwilling to claim benefits or tax refunds for fear of being detected. We do have crime among the people in our state and some can be traced to undocumented immigrants but it is not at the level that the border states must deal with.

This Arizona bill has sparked nation-wide responses, both in favor and in opposition to the law. The best result may be that it motivates the Federal Government to craft immigration reform that addresses the fears of violent or property crime, the needs of labor for agriculture and business, and the values we place on freedom from governmental scrutiny of its law-abiding citizens. If this is what comes of the Arizona law, it will be worth the uproar it has caused.

When I mentioned to a neighbor that I felt the Arizona law was draconian, he asked me how I would answer to the immigrants who had made the decision to come to the United States through legal means. I don't know that I will ever be asked to answer to them. I am convinced, however, that there will come a time when I will be asked to answer for my attitudes toward my neighbors by one who has said, "For I was an hungred, and ye gave me meat; I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink: I was a stranger, and ye took me in."