Lux Lucet

Ruth and Naomi Leave Moab, 1860, by Julius Schnorr von Carolsfeld (1794-1872).

Immigration, long an issue in American politics, has in the past year been moved from the back to the front burner. This is due in no small part to the presidential campaign of Donald Trump, who has placed immigration reform at the very center of his platform.

In Trump’s case, the most notable reform proposals are 1) his promise to build a wall along the entire border between the US and Mexico and have Mexico pay for it, and 2) his pledge to step up the deportation of illegal immigrants, that is, to forcibly those individuals who are in the country in violation of US immigration law. You can read his full immigration platform here.

Donald Trump – The Good

On Trump’s campaign website under the heading “Immigration Reform That Will Make America Great Again” are listed “three core principles of real immigration reform.” They are:

1. A nation without borders is not a nation. There must be a wall across the southern border.
   
2. A nation without laws is not a nation. Laws passed in accordance with our Constitutional system of government must be enforced.
   
3. A nation that does not serve its own citizens is not a nation. Any immigration plan must improve jobs, wages and security for all Americans.
   

I would like to being the discussion of Trump’s immigration stance by taking up point number three. For though it is the third “core principle” listed, it is the most noteworthy of the three.

Usually when the subject of immigration comes up, any logical thought is quickly swallowed up in a fog of altruistic sentimentality replete with buzz words such as “nation of immigrants,” “give me your poor,” “the Statue of Liberty” and “Ellis Island.”

Trump, on the other hand, is not at all sentimental. He holds that any immigration laws passed must be passed with a view to what is good for “all Americans.” This is an excellent statement and one fully in line with the Bible and the Constitution, the preamble of which reads,

We, the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America (emphasis added).

The Constitutions was written, not to make the world safe for democracy, nor to establish social justice, nor to promote the common good of all humanity, but to secure the blessings of liberty to actual American citizens and to their posterity. This means that any laws passed by Congress, including immigration laws, must have in view first what is good for the American people.

This represents a radical departure from the sort of altruistic thinking – altruism, as John Robbins tells us, is the idea that “the poor [are] somehow entitled to the property of others” (The Ethics and Economics of Health Care) – that usually dominates any debate about immigration reform.

Now what laws ought to be passed and even what constitutes the best interests of all Americans must be settled by an appeal to the Scriptures. But Trump is surely correct to put the interests of the American people first, seeing that it was for the benefit of the American people that the federal government was established to begin with.

Another excellent point in Trump’s immigration platform is his call to end birthright citizenship. Birthright citizenship is the principle that any individual, with a few exceptions, born on American soil is automatically granted American citizenship. Trump’s website reads,

End birthright citizenship. The remains the biggest magnet for illegal immigration. By a 2:1 margin, voters say it’s the wrong policy, including Harry Reid who said “no sane country” would give automatic citizenship to the children of illegal immigrants.

The way American law is currently interpreted, if a pregnant woman from Mexico enters the US – legally or illegally, it doesn’t matter – and has her baby on American soil, the child is automatically granted US citizenship. And with US citizenship, that baby is entitled to the benefits of the American welfare state, even though the parents are not US citizens. As Judicial Watch notes, “Food assistance and Medicaid are the programs most commonly used by illegal immigrants, mainly on behalf of their American-born children who get automatic citizenship.”

How many anchor babies are born in the US annually? The National Review reports,

According to the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) legal policy analyst Jon Feere…between 350,000 and 400,000 children are born annually to an illegal-alien mother residing in the United States – as many as one in ten births nationwide. As of 2010, four out of five children of illegal aliens residing in the U.S. were born here- some 4 million kids.

Not all anchor babies are born to illegal immigrants. Some are born to parents who deliberately traveled to the US to have their baby. This phenomenon is so common that there’s even a name for it, birth tourism. The practice, while not wholly on the up-and up, is one many parents from China, South Korea and Russia are willing to undergo to secure the benefits of American citizenship for their children and ultimately for themselves as well. As Benjamin Carlson notes in his piece detailing a Chinese couple’s decision to have their second child in the US,

But when Ellie found out she was pregnant in 2014, Peter said he wanted to have their second child in America. “It’s for him to ge a good education,” Peter says. “But it’s also for us – to find business opportunities and to make friends. Chinese who do this tend to be well-connected….

The decision had made Ellie uneasy from the start. It seemed potentially dangerous for the baby and expensive. A friend with permanent residence in the U.S. told them the process was also legally fraught. U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) had turned pregnant women away at West Coast airports (Welcome to Maternity Hotel California, Rolling Stone)

The call to end birthright citizenship puts Trump on the moral high ground. Unfortunately, he has chosen not to feature this aspect of his immigration reform platform, preferring instead to build popular support for the border wall.

Donald Trump – The Bad

Perhaps the best know of all of Trump’s reform proposals is his promise to build a border wall along the entire border between the US and Mexico.

While it is easy to understand the popular appeal of such a wall, there are several reasons why I believe it is a bad idea.

The basic immigration stance of the Bible is open immigration. As John Robbins noted in a Q&A session following his lecture The Educational Establishment Versus Civilization, “We can keep out criminals because they are evil doers. But other than that…there should be no restrictions on immigration…it is not a legitimate function of government to decide where people will live.” The purpose of the wall to restrict immigration/migration, which is not the province of governors to regulate.

Please note, Robbins’ position, while appearing similar to what the Roman Church-State teaches, is quite different in that Robbins was very much opposed to the welfare state. As far as Robbins position on birthright citizenship, I am unaware of his ever addressing this topic. My belief is that he would have opposed it on the Biblical grounds that, Lord willing, I will set forth in a future installment of this series.

Second, it sends an ugly message about the US to the rest of the world. America has long had a welcoming reputation. That reputation, far from being in conflict with the ideas on which this nation was founded, is really a part of our Protestant heritage that emphasizes what a man believes over his ethnic heritage.

Third, the wall is a distraction from real immigration reform. Those who would like to see real, constructive immigration reform should focus their political capital on revoking birthright citizenship and ending the welfare state. Accomplishing these two ends would do more to correct the current immigration mess than any border wall ever could.

Fourth, the wall in the long-run likely will not accomplish its stated goal of reducing illegal immigration. This is especially true as long as the great immigration magnets of birthright citizenship and the welfare state remain in place. Where there’s a will there’s a way, and as long as the US provides perverse incentives to foreign citizens to sneak into the country, they will find a way.

Fifth, the wall likely will become a rallying point for Social Justice Warriors (SJWs), for whom it will become an easy target to protest. One can imagine the SJWs lying down in from of the bulldozers as workers attempt to go about constructing the wall, getting pepper sprayed and dragged off by the police. That would be, as they say, bad optics. But not only that, it would serve to discredit any sort of immigration reform, even much needed changes such as ending the welfare state and revoking birthright citizenship.

Sixth, and objection put forth by Ron Paul is that the border wall could be used to keep people in who wish to flee the country. That may seem a little far-fetched to most Americans, but with ever growing American police state, it would be foolish to dismiss Paul’s warning.

Another objectionable point in Trump’s immigration reform proposals is his call for nationwide e-verify. According to Trump’s website, “This simple measure [e-verify] will protect jobs for unemployed Americans.”

What is e-verify?, you ask. In short, it’s a national ID card that every American would have to carry and provide to potential employers, in order to get a job. As Ron Paul put it, e-verify would require “every American [to] ‘show their papers’ in order to obtain federal permission to hold a job’ and this is “incompatible with a free society.”

And please note, e-verify is not just another Social Security Number either. It is a biometric database and represents “A huge step toward a permission-slip society.” While the biometrics in the e-verify program are limited to a photograph of the individual rather than fingerprint or retinal scans, it nonetheless provides the federal government with a database unlike any it has had in the past. Further, what is to stop the government in the future from requiring these “enhancements”?

Conclusion

Donald Trump’s immigration platform has garnered him tremendous attention. It is audacious and speaks to the heart of many Americans who rightly perceive there are serious problems America’s immigration laws, and that those concerns are not being addressed by mainstream politicians in either party. Further, Trump’s policies, at least in part, are on solid Biblical and Constitutional ground.

Unfortunately, while some of Trump’s immigration reform ideas are right on target, his signature immigration program, building a border wall between the US and Mexico, is fraught with problems. Likewise, e-verify creates a national photo ID database and would require all Americans to “show their papers” just to get a job. That Trump has elected to focus on the wall and promote e-verify rather than on removing the birthright citizenship provision and ending the welfare state strongly suggests that his efforts at immigration reform will come up short.

– Up Next: Hillary Clinton’s immigration reform proposals