Immigration

The Chavez Tragedy

by Sheldon Richman March 1, 2001

PRESIDENT BUSH’S first choice for secretary of labor, Linda Chavez, was forced to withdraw when it was learned that 10 years earlier a Guatemalan woman who was then in the United States illegally lived in her home. Chavez caused herself trouble by saying she did not know until later that the woman was an “illegal alien.” Then she conceded ...

Emigration to Mexico

by Jacob G. Hornberger February 1, 2001

"We may have a big problem down in Mexico. A couple of days ago, the Washington Post reported that an increasing number of Americans are settling in Mexico--600,000 according to the U.S. Embassy in Mexico City. Why is this a problem? Well, consider these points: (1) The Americans are not ...

No Border Debate in the Presidential Race

by Jacob G. Hornberger November 1, 2000

When Mexican president Vicente Fox visited Washington last August, he raised an idea that caught presidential candidates Al Gore and George W. Bush totally off guard. Fox suggested that it was time to consider opening the borders between Mexico, the United States, and Canada to the free movements of ...

Rooting Out the Trade in Human Misery

by Andy Falkof September 1, 2000

WHEN DEATH is the result of smuggling immigrants across borders, is the root of the problem the smugglers or the laws that make immigration and human transport crimes? British customs officers recently stumbled upon a poorly ventilated Dutch truck containing the bodies of 58 suffocated Chinese immigrants who had tried to enter England illegally. People all over the world condemned ...

Ambush at the Border

by James Bovard August 1, 2000

More Americans than ever before are traveling abroad this summer. Yet few people realize the rude surprises they could face upon returning to America. The Customs Service has become one of the nation's most intrusive, abusive agencies and the average traveler is at the feds' mercy. You might think that you ...

The Rule of Terror

by Jacob G. Hornberger June 1, 2000

THE HORRIFYING SEIZURE of Elián Gonzalez is one more reflection of the depths of depravity to which the U.S. government has plunged in our lifetime. The episode also reflects the extent to which all too many Americans continue to deny the reality that beneath the velvet glove of the benign welfare state lies the iron fist of a brutal, ...

America’s National Culture on the Border

by Jacob G. Hornberger June 1, 2000

People who rail that America's "national culture" is threatened by immigrants never explain which national culture they are referring to. I recently visited my hometown of Laredo, Texas, which is located on our nation's Southern border. In grocery stores and department stores half the signs are in Spanish and store ...

It Didn’t Start with Elián

by Michael A. Ledeen June 1, 2000

MOST AMERICANS probably believe that it is wrong for the U.S. to return a refugee to an evil tyranny from which he has escaped even if they question whether this principle applies to a small child like Elián Gonzalez. Most Americans probably also believe that our government has generally acted in accordance with this principle. Not so. Our history of ...

The Conservative Shame on Immigration

by Jacob G. Hornberger May 1, 2000

The moral decline of the conservative movement was recently reflected in a syndicated column entitled "Goofy may be a Libertarian" by Don Feder, one of the conservative movement's leading lights. Feder's critique, which in part took the Libertarian Party to task for its position favoring open immigration, displayed not ...

Understanding the Passion of Cuban-Americans

by Jacob G. Hornberger April 1, 2000

Last year, I spent a week in Cuba with the official permission of the U.S. Treasury Department and the Cuban Interest Section in Washington, D.C. (the diplomatic agency that is "hosting" Elian Gonzales's father, Juan Miguel Gonzalez). The purpose of my trip was to conduct an informal ...

Elian’s Fate: It’s Not America’s Decision

by Sheldon Richman February 1, 2000

Imagine an American father-a widower-deciding that he wants to move himself and his 6-year-old son to Cuba. Should the U.S. government permit it? Many strong arguments could be raised against the father's decision. Cuba is a communist dictatorship where Fidel Castro's word is law. His Marxist philosophy squelches the most ...

Let’s Stick with Traditional American Values!

by Jacob G. Hornberger February 1, 2000

Upon reading Hans-Herman Hoppe’s article “On Free Immigration and Forced Integration,” I couldn’t help but wonder whether he first reached the conclusion that he wanted to reach and then constructed a set of arguments to support that conclusion. Hoppe begins his article by correctly pointing out that from a ...