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Winning the Battle, Losing the War
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12339 |
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Section : |
CURRENT ISSUES
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| Issue
Date : |
1 / 1987 |
2,345 Words |
| Author
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Patrick Burns
Patrick Burns is director of the William Vogt Center for U.S
Population Studies, a Washington-based nonprofit research
organization working on U.S. demographic issues. The views
expressed in this article are his own, and not necessarily
those of the William Vogt Center. |
In the 100 years since the Statue of Liberty was dedicated, the United States and the world have undergone dramatic changes. In 1886, U.S. army troops were fighting Geronimo, the Alaska Gold Rush had not yet begun, world population was just over one billion, and it took more than a month to sail across the Atlantic. Today, the American West is struggling with serious water shortages, we face a trillion-dollar deficit, world population has churned past the five billion mark, and the Atlantic can be spanned in less than four hours.
On November 6th, just days after the real 100th anniversary of Lady Liberty's dedication on Bedloe's Island, New York, President Reagan signed into law the Simpson-Rodino immigration reform bill, the most significant revision of U.S. immigration law in 22 years.
Unlike "the Lady's" dedication 100 years ago, the signing of the Simpson-Rodino bill was not celebrated with fireworks, cannon blasts, and pounding brass bands. It was a quiet, almost private, ceremony at the White House, attended by only a handful of Congressmen and Senators.
One reason for sobriety was pessimism that the bill would work at all. Though the legislative battle had been won, many immigration experts continued to express skepticisms that the "war" could be won in the field. Most important of all, Congress has yet to appropriate the millions of dollars necessary to enforce employer sanctions or draft needed technical amendments to the Immigration and Nationality Act. Profound skepticism also exists as to whether the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service is capable of adequately fulfilling its mandate to legalize millions of illegal immigrants while enforcing the employer-sanctions provisions of the
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