Firing Wildly on Immigration : Grand jury’s call for moratorium is ill-conceived

The Orange County Grand Jury’s frustration with illegal immigration is understandable and shared by many in Southern California, including this newspaper. But its recommendation that the federal government declare a three-year moratorium on immigration into this country is unrealistic.

It is also unfortunate. On the local level the report, issued Wednesday, has stirred resentment among immigration advocates in Orange County’s large Latino and Asian communities. They point out that the report’s claim that illegal immigrants cost the county $200 million a year is unsubstantiated by serious research and overlooks immigrants’ contributions to the economy. Orange County is striving to avoid the ethnic tensions that plague Los Angeles, and this report won’t help.

The report is unfortunate on the national level because its loose numbers and far-fetched recommendation can be easily dismissed in Washington as more local posturing on an issue that is a federal responsibility. A more balanced report could have contributed to the renewed national debate on immigration and received the attention of Congress and the Clinton Administration, which will decide which changes to make in immigration law.

That debate is only beginning to take shape, and constructive proposals are already on the table. Also on Wednesday, a congressional hearing focused on a controversial proposal to strengthen the existing law against hiring illegal immigrants by issuing all legal U.S. workers a tamper-resistant identification card. Such proposals raise the hackles of civil libertarians. A far less intrusive method of identifying legal workers would be to replace the existing Social Security card, which all workers must have already, with a new version that is tamper-proof. But Wednesday’s testimony indicated that could be very expensive--$2.5 billion by one estimate. Clearly this issue needs further study.

In the meantime, it is reassuring to note that the National Security Council has brought its sophisticated intelligence-gathering resources and experience at coordinating government agencies to bear against the international rings trying to smuggle immigrants into this country from China. The NSC can help the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service--neither the best-equipped nor the most sophisticated of federal law enforcement agencies--to keep a closer watch on smuggling activities, which have received much public attention since a shipload of Chinese illegal immigrants landed off New York.

We in Southern California are used to incidents along the Mexican border, of course. But that does not mean we view them any more calmly than New Yorkers do--as the Orange County Grand Jury report will attest.