California Depends on Immigrant Labor

Re “Immigration Bites Two Presidents,” Commentary, Aug. 21: As a California Republican, I witnessed the nutty thinking of the Republican Party in this state during the last decade or so. It was not the goofy people of California who rejected the Republicans. It was the goofy Republicans who rejected the people of California.

Snarling and preaching self-righteously does not fill the pews of politics. Conservatives, by definition, dislike change. However, the world is changing more rapidly now than at any time in world history. No one can stop it.

Sure, we need new and better immigration laws that are effective. The system in place is not working. The bottom line must never be forgotten. California would most surely sink into economic and structural chaos very rapidly (probably days!) if immigrants, both legal and illegal, were not doing important work that citizens seem not willing or able to do.

Immigrants, both legal and illegal, are daily providing the “life raft” to California. Illegal immigration must be stopped with a system that provides a life raft to the residents of California and also a life raft to the immigrants who sign up for a structured system that is sustainable, but not offered to date.

Roy A. Fassel

Los Angeles

About the only stereotype missing from your portrayal of folks down here in Georgia was the potbellied, cigar-chomping, shotgun-toting sheriff (“Obscure Law Used to Jail Day Laborers in Georgia,” Aug. 21).

When did acceptance of illegal immigration and loitering become the litmus test for tolerance? It is not a crime to look for work, as one of the self-admitted illegal aliens quoted in the story complains. But it is a crime under federal law to enter the country without permission and to work here. It is a crime in virtually every jurisdiction in this country to loiter. Zoning laws, by definition, restrict what people can do and where they can do it.

“A backlash against immigrants” is nothing more than decent, hard-working citizens demanding that their government enforce laws that protect their jobs, safety and quality of life.

Jane Russell

Atlanta

I had to laugh when I read about the landscaping contractor in Forsyth County, Ga., who hires illegal aliens and says, “But they’re not crime people. They’re here to work.” Since when is entering this country illegally not a crime? As long as the illegals only flooded the Southwestern states, Congress turned a blind eye to it. Now that they’re invading the rest of the country, maybe this problem will get the attention it deserves.

Gregory Daniels

Fillmore