Immigration: Is it harmful or helpful?Immigration situation

Topeka Capital-Journal, The, Feb 3, 2008

For anyone interested in the history and complexity of immigration's role in the history of the United States, I would urge you to read "A Forgetful Nation: On Immigration, and Cultural Identity in the United States."

Its author, Ali Behdad, a professor of English and comparative literature at UCLA, legally emigrated from Iran and is a U.S. citizen. However, he has come to the following realization: "As a Middle Eastern subject I continue to be viewed as a threatening other."

According to Behdad, "The myth of immigrant America, I argue, not only obscures the ideological underpinning of national formation and the political economy of immigration but also disavows the importance of xenophobia in the founding of the United States."

For those of you skeptical of this claim, I offer the following example written in 1751: "Thou art called our MOTHER COUNTRY, but what good mother ever sent Thieves and Villains to accompany her Children; to corrupt some with their infectious Vices, and murder the rest?"

Surprisingly, these aren't the words of Republican Congressman Tom Tancredo or CNN anchor Lou Dobbs. They came from the pen of our beloved Benjamin Franklin. Instead of Mexicans, Franklin feared an invasion by Germans and other non-English speakers. Not all walls need be made of stone.

Thankfully, Franklin's views were in the minority. In 1787, Tench Coxe wrote, "The present situation of America renders it necessary to promote the influx of people; and it is equally clear, that we have a right to restrain that influx, whenever it is likely to prove hurtful to us."

This is precisely the point I argued in last week's column. The question is whether or not the current immigration situation is on balance harmful or helpful.

Many readers of that column claimed Mexican immigrants are to blame for nearly every social ill affecting America, with the possible exception of global warming. However, noticeably absent from those rants was any hard evidence to substantiate the claims.

On the other hand, abundant evidence exists to counter the supposed negative consequences of immigration. A 1997 National Academy of Sciences report notes that immigration has a "significant positive gain" to the United States, upward of $10 billion yearly. This same report found an immigrant and his/her children will pay $80,000 more in taxes than they receive in government aid, including welfare. If these immigrants earn a college degree, the disparity between taxes and services rises to $198,000.

Regarding Social Security and Medicare, a 1998 Social Security Administration report makes the following observation: ''The cost of the system decreases with increasing rates of immigration because immigration occurs at relatively young ages, thereby increasing the numbers of covered workers earlier than the numbers of beneficiaries."

As the conservative columnist George Will once wrote, "Most of all, America passes the critical gate test. Open the gate and see where people go - in or out. This is still the country people flock to."

It is unimaginable to me that anyone would want to tarnish this legacy.

Nicolas Shump is a doctoral student in American studies at The University of Kansas. He can be reached at Nico1225@sunflower.com.