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New Mexico offers glimpse of old
By Andrew Flohr-Spence
spencand@mscd.edu

Having passed the U.S. House, the Secure Fence Act of 2006 landed in the Senate this week as the congressional tennis match over illegal immigration continued. The word on the street is that the back-and-forth game will conclude sometime near Nov. 7, when an apparent effort to keep the public focused on something other than war and wiretaps is no longer needed.

If passed, HR 6061 would institute “operational control over the entire international land and maritime borders of the United States” by building 700 miles of double-layered fence complete with cameras, sensors and lights. As reported in The Denver Post, Sen. Wayne Allard, R-Colo., called the measures “the tools to effectively combat illegal immigration,” while his counterpart, Sen. Ken Salazar, D-Colo., referred to the fence as a “a one-dimensional attempt to address a complex problem.”

The bill’s proponents might ask: Who are these foreigners to come to our country illegally, work everywhere, and bleed our social system dry?

Its detractors might wonder what would force a human being to risk life and limb to sneak across a border – through deserts, over fences and across rivers – to a place where toil and difficulty await?

Reports of the financial drain on our schools and health services, as well as the illegality of it all, are more than concerning. But statistics show that millions of dollars in sales tax and unclaimed income tax come from immigrants, a fact that is rarely mentioned, but happily accepted by the IRS.
So what’s a poor fool to think?

This summer I got another perspective on the situation when my wife and I took a back-road trip through New Mexico.

Standing in front of a Spanish mission-looking building, the Santuario de Chimayo, in the shadows of beautiful bell towers, I wondered what it was doing in the middle of the U.S. of A. I went inside to find out.

To my surprise I found out that the Spanish, in the 18th century, had wandered up here to settle. For a long time, in fact, the whole American Southwest up to northern California was known as New Spain. But in the early 1800s, Mexico won independence from the Spanish. It wasn’t until 1848, after we rolled out the machine guns and cavalry, that the United States forced Mexico to give up the territory. In fact, the whole west side of Colorado was included in the deal.

Driving through the state of New Mexico today means reading street signs in many languages: English, Spanish, the German of Carlsbad and Hagerman, the French of Raton and Grenville, and a myriad native languages.

The history of the Land of Enchantment, like the history of every state in the Union, is a story about welcoming folks from all over. The history of the United States is the history of a country formed by a mix of people from around the world who were all at one time pressed to leave home and undertake a difficult journey to find a better life in a new land. For many, human nature is to stay at home with family and friends. It is only under great pressure we make cross-border journeys.

The only good news about the Fence Act is it will be a big boon to fence contractors in Arizona. I don’t imagine the gentlemen who traffic in illegals were too upset by the news either. The price of their services is sure to rise too.

The bill will do nothing but drive up the price of building materials and rides over the border. The source of the problem is not being addressed.

Illegals will still come by sea, land, tunnel or whatever means possible. They have few alternatives.

If we want to fix immigration, we have to change the economic factors that force these people to leave their loved ones and make the long and dangerous trip to an unknown country. We should work with Mexico and Central America to give the people there the ability to stay home (i.e. jobs and a better economy). Only when we deal with the source of the problem instead of just hacking away at the symptoms will the situation change.