New Myths and Old Realities About Immigration : Dealing with this controversial issue will require adherence to fact, a reflection on history and the willingness to work together

Although we’re proud to be a “nation of immigrants,” Americans have never really been comfortable with foreign newcomers. Even in Revolutionary times, Thomas Jefferson worried that immigrants could undermine the new political culture of the nation. And Benjamin Franklin warned against letting German immigrants settle in Pennsylvania. Even great men underestimated the ability of the new nation, with the freedom it offered, to absorb people from all over the world and turn them into Americans.

Remembering the history of immigration to this country--and the often generous, sometimes mean-spirited response of native-born Americans to it--helps make it easier to remain calm amid the recent near-hysteria over illegal immigration, epitomized by the overreaction to news that two women whom President Clinton considered for attorney general, Zoe Baird and Kimba Wood, once employed illegal immigrants as baby-sitters. In Wood’s case, she did nothing illegal, but any association with “illegal aliens” was enough to send the Clinton Administration into a dither.

Wood’s case reflects the new Administration’s profound ignorance of the complex realities of immigration. That is not harsh criticism, however, because most Americans are in the same situation. And while no sin, this widespread ignorance has allowed myths about immigration to take hold. For many years this newspaper has tried to take a thoughtful and balanced stance on immigration issues. We remain convinced that there are humane and constructive ways to better regulate the flow of newcomers to this country. But before restating them, it is important to first refute some of the more egregious myths about immigration.

Myth: Illegal immigration is an out-of-control problem. A gross oversimplification. It is better to think of illegal immigration simply as a fact of life in Los Angeles and any other place close to the U.S.-Mexico border. To be sure, problems come along with it, like overcrowding, border crime and other forms of exploitation of illegal immigrants, but so do many benefits, such as low-cost labor that helps keep many small U.S. companies in business.

Myth: We are being silently invaded. In fact, the movement of people across our borders goes both ways--in and out. Although some foreigners come to stay, many are migrants who come to work for a time before returning home. This has especially been the case with Mexicans and other Latin Americans, many of whom live here just long enough to build nest eggs in a U.S. economy that, even in bad times, is far more robust that those of their homelands.

Myth: U.S. borders are out of control. Veteran Border Patrol agents say they have never had things under better control. Although controversial in many respects, the Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA) of 1986 increased the Border Patrol’s size and budget. The construction of a new, sturdier border fence with surplus Navy landing-strip material has reduced illegal border crossing dramatically. In fact, the Border Patrol is actually building new border access roads for its own use because agents are confident that smugglers won’t be able to use them even when border guards aren’t around.

Myth: The level of immigration today is higher than ever before in U.S. history. Though in some recent years the absolute number of immigrants to this country has reached the level of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the last great era of U.S. immigration from Europe, the actual immigrant percentage, relative to overall U.S. population, is a quarter of what it was a century ago because the population is much larger now.

Myth: Today’s immigrants are harder to Americanize. Even if one is willing to accept the insulting premise that today’s mostly Asian and Latin American immigrants are not as capable as the immigrants of our great-grandparents’ day--and we are not willing to do so--sheer numbers are once again on the side of Americanization. Not only are there more native-born Americans to help the process along but the influence of U.S. mass media--movies, music, et al.--is pervasive. And English is increasingly the world’s most popular language.

Myth: Immigrants take jobs. Myth: Immigrants take welfare. The contradictory nature of these two is obvious, but that doesn’t keep them from being repeated.

In fact, most foreigners do come here looking for work. But most of the jobs they take are so menial and low-paying that Americans won’t take them. Raising the pay to make those jobs more attractive to Americans isn’t as easy as it sounds. Research indicates, for example, that if wage scales in light manufacturing in Southern California were not kept low with immigrant labor, the jobs would be not here but in other countries where wage scales are even lower.

The immigrants-on-welfare myth stems from confusion over the benefits extended to refugees under a separate section of U.S. immigration law. Refugees from communist nations, like Vietnam, do get education and relocation assistance, although both the federal and state governments have been reducing it in recent years. As for illegal immigrants, they do not qualify for welfare. Period. Even the otherwise generous amnesty provisions of IRCA prohibited immigrants who legalized their status from receiving public assistance for five years.

All this is not to downplay in any way the real challenges posed by immigration for American society. As noted above, for all the benefits that immigrants bring, they also bring problems. And when those problems fester they contribute to xenophobia, nativism and other anti-immigrant sentiments. Among the solutions this newspaper has endorsed in the past to help this country better deal with immigration, and which we urge the Clinton Administration to consider:

--More federal financial aid to local jurisdictions heavily impacted by immigration. Immigration is a federal government responsibility, but immigrants tend to congregate in a handful of states and cities, where they add to the cost of public services such as schools, safety and public health. California, and especially cities like Los Angeles and Santa Ana, needs federal help to pay for those services. President Clinton announced last week that he will consider Gov. Pete Wilson’s request for help; Clinton’s words are encouraging. But the $4 billion allocated for local assistance when IRCA was enacted has never been fully paid out--and more money than that is needed.

--The Border Patrol should be separated from the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service and be consolidated with the Customs Service and other federal agencies into a new, more efficient border management agency. That new agency should then put all its resources at the border and ports of entry to stop illegal immigration there. Once relieved of its border patrolling duties, the INS should focus its resources on assisting immigrants, particularly encouraging them to become citizens.

--To improve the enforcement of IRCA, and to make sure it is applied in a non-discriminatory fashion, all workers in this country should be required to have counterfeit-proof Social Security cards. And the responsibility for administering IRCA should be transferred from the INS to the Department of Labor, which should combine its enforcement with other workplace laws such as wage and hour standards and worker-safety rules. The Labor Department should be given a sufficient budget to carry out these added responsibilities.

--To deal with the most fundamental cause of immigration, poverty in “sending” countries such as Mexico and Haiti, the United States should encourage development projects abroad and free trade, so that poor countries can prosper and put their people to work at home. The impending North American Free Trade Agreement with Mexico and Canada must be put into effect as only the first step in this direction. But it will be an important first step because 60% or more of the illegal immigrants to this country come from Mexico. And, as a logical follow-up to NAFTA, the United States and Mexico should negotiate a guest-worker program to allow those migrants who will inevitably keep crossing the border to look for work to at least do so legally.

The Biggest Myth of All. That’s just a short list--but with some big, complicated proposals. But then the international migration of human beings is, in itself, a very big and very complex phenomenon--one that responds more to the immutable laws of economics, and the unpredictable vagaries of human behavior, than to laws passed by legislatures. As one Border Patrol veteran once told us, “It can’t ever be stopped, just regulated.” Like him, we long ago concluded that the biggest immigration myth of all is that this “problem” is somehow amenable to easy, or glib, “solutions.”