People Aren’t ‘Mutts’

In “Nation of Mutts in a Muddle” (Commentary, July 3), Jonathan Turley writes, “We are a nation of immigrants; we are the world’s mutts.” Regardless of what one thinks of Turley’s position on the treatment of immigrants within the U.S. legal system, and even accepting his benign intentions and meanings, his use of “mutt” and its repetition in the headline must be decried. This is so because of the general and long-standing derogatory usage of the word, the foolishness of equating immigrants with persons of mixed heritage and the fact that more than a few who use the term fear that immigration will lead to intermarriage and the dilution of their cherished “purity.”

No matter how you slice it, to call any people “mutts,” other than within the context of close family and friends, is a mistake.

Charles A. Goldsmid

Claremont