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Radley Balko’s question for anti-illegal immigration activists today illustrates some of what I don’t like about libertarian thought – and why I generally don’t get involved in libertarian activism anymore. The question,

If you’re adamant that you only oppose illegal immigration, then do you also support vastly expanding the number of legal visas the federal government grants to low-wage, low-skill workers (which at the moment is an exceedingly small number)?

reminds me of far-left/right assumptions about those who dissent from them. There’s sort of an implication that disagreeing with his belief means something other than it does.

Don’t get me wrong, Balko has always seemed to me to be a great guy; I tend to agree with him on many positions, and I think he’s one of the finest journalists in the country. It’s just that his post today reminded me of something I always disliked about being involved with libertarian politics.

For the record, I’m very strongly opposed to illegal immigration. I think people who break the law to come here are criminals, ought not to be coddled, and definitely should be deported. I think that some actions the Mexican government has taken on this issue over the years come very close to acts of war – and at the least amount to attempts to infringe the sovereignty of our nation.

That said, I do support vastly increasing legal immigration from all nations. Not only the numbers, but the ease of the process of immigration. I’ve met and often worked closely with people from so many countries I’ve stopped counting. Some got in because they had valuable skills, but most were essentially unskilled laborers. Regardless, as a class, immigrants tend to be some of my favorite people.

I’ve found them to be hard working and friendly – and I feel that my experience is enriched by what they share with me. Their language, culture, history… I’ve seen them weeping with joy on the day they’ve obtained their citizenship, and been myself moved to tears by it. And I’ve seen how hard it has been for some of them to get that citizenship – the costs can be immense. I’ve been offered $30k to marry their cousins and daughters – who don’t just want to come here for their families (as if that weren’t reason enough), but who genuinely want to partake of what our country offers.

One of the commenters had this to say:

Such a thing [people like me, essentially] may exist, but I have yet to find an anti-illegal-immigration advocate who is not opposed to immigration generally. Opponents of illegal immigration should feel just as strongly about our low caps on legal immigration and the profound bureaucratic delays and hassles put before legal immigrants. They don’t exhibit outrage at these things, and that has driven me to conclude that they’re just anti-immigrant.

Well I suppose I don’t feel outrage, but that’s because I’ve never had to deal with the issue on a personal level – and I happen to think that although immigration policy is very important, there are more pressing problems facing the country.

In my mind this comment is an example of something that is going very wrong in American politics. The inability to accept good faith on the part of one’s political/idealistic opponents. Somehow, to the detriment of our Republic, politically active people are becoming more and more radicalized.

Now to return to my problem with the common libertarian position on this subject: Open borders. I remain mildly concerned about terrorists and other security threats, but that’s not my big problem with open borders. The big problem, as I see it, is a question of nationhood. I believe that truly open borders will infringe on our sovereignty, and discourage immigrants from becoming true members of our society. If we are supposed to be a nation of laws, we ought to act like we mean it. (Not that we’ve had a very good track record… but there’s always some small hope.)

I also question the common libertarian assumption that our economy would take a massive hit if we either stopped illegal immigration or, stopped or greatly reduced unskilled worker visas. Just because I happen to agree that we ought to invite unskilled workers to join us, doesn’t mean I have to buy into the economic argument that we can’t function without them. In any case, I much prefer immigrants obtaining citizenship to merely working for a few years and then leaving.