The immigration divide

Dallas Morning News | Mark Davis:

“Before we tackle immigration laws, let's address the young scofflaws who say they were driven by their passions to skip school these last couple of days. Every last one of them should have faced detention or worse. It was truly depressing to see the condoning shrug of schools across North Texas as thousands of kids spat on truancy laws to play protest games.”

Ed Cognoski responds:

It is amusing to see Mr Davis get his dander up over those "young scofflaws" skipping school. He doesn't say, but he is probably in a state of high dudgeon over the fact that the protesters spilled over the sidewalks, jaywalking on Dallas streets. It's a good thing he didn't notice some of their signs were misspelled, or he would be lobbying for extra homework for the little miscreants, too.

Mr Davis and others are fiddling while Rome burns. The hundreds of thousands who marched in Los Angeles last weekend understand. The thousands of Dallas students who protested this week may not have a firm grasp of the issues, but they understand, too. For years, the anti-immigration forces have had free rein in the public square, decrying immigrants, their language and their culture. They no longer have the public square to themselves.

Our immigration laws are a disgrace. They have quit serving America. They fail completely to deal with reality. The problem is not that millions of people are flouting our laws. The problem is our law itself. Tightening up misguided law, building walls and criminalizing poor workers is not going to help. The most effective way to fight illegal immigration is to facilitate legal immigration. When you have millions of willing workers and willing employers, the role of the government should be to facilitate getting them together. When bad laws prevent that, you don't fix things by increasing penalties for breaking those bad laws. Laws are meant to serve the people, not the other way around. Fix the laws to do that and the problem of massive lawbreaking will take care of itself.