Immigrants’ Quest Is No ‘Freedom Ride’

“Hundreds Rally on Behalf of Immigrants” (Sept. 21) stated that hundreds of “immigrants and their supporters” rallied for their rights. Those “rights” included amnesty and legalization for the nation’s estimated 10 million illegals. A parade of politicians, religious leaders and labor organizers all spoke, drawing a parallel between the struggle of black American citizens and that of the illegals now in the country. Gov. Gray Davis and Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante pander to Hispanic populations by supporting a law that opens our state to an extreme security risk.

What’s next? Illegals demanding we just abandon our borders and give up all attempts to control our future via legal, limited immigration? Since when do people who broke laws to get here demand to influence governmental action? What would happen if huge numbers of Americans sneaked into Canada and began to demand their “rights”? How many amnesty programs will it take to satisfy an increasingly arrogant swarm of illegals? Meanwhile, overpopulation continues to ruin our roads, damage our forests, pollute our air and overcrowd our schools and hospitals. When does it end?

Pam Wright

Pasadena

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Re “Migrant Rights on the Move,” Commentary, Sept. 21: Frank del Olmo’s commentary on the “freedom ride” of illegal immigrants is typical of his continual support for the illegal immigration that has been ruining Southern California for years. The ridiculous statement comparing this event to the freedom rides staged on behalf of disenfranchised African Americans in the 1960s makes absolutely no sense, as the freedom rides of that time were conducted to show the world that American citizens were being denied their rights by rogue Southern state governments. The “freedom ride” of 2003 is on behalf of violators of federal immigration laws and their supporters.

David W. Brant

San Clemente

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I wonder what would happen if all the illegal aliens went back to their countries permanently. What would it do to our national and state tax revenue systems? What effect would it have in the agriculture, construction and the many service industries in which many are employed? What would it do to the hundreds of businesses that sell their services and products to these people? I wonder how many anti-illegal-alien people really know the answer to these questions.

Joe Martinez

El Segundo