Over at National Review, libertarian Daniel Griswold makes the case for liberalized immigration policies, by reminding Republicans that current GOP Candidates Betray the Spirit of Reagan on Immigration.
Commenters at the site will have none of it, and are highly critical of Griswold’s views. Their criticism matters no more than if flat-earthers railed against the idea that the world was a sphere. It is and will remain a globe no matter how much others insist against the fact.
There is no better large-scale arrangement on immigration than a free market in labor. All else is inferior, being less efficient and less fair. For resources on immigration, see the Cato Institute’s thorough collection of studies.
Griswold makes the good and reasonable case for reformed, not restrictive, immigration policies:
Conservatives should be friendly to immigration, and the first to seek expanded opportunities for legal immigration. Immigration has been integral to America’s free and open economy. Immigrants embody the American spirit. They are self-starters seeking opportunity to support themselves and their families in the private sector.
Current immigration is driven largely by demand and supply. Immigrants come when there are jobs available that not enough Americans are able and willing to fill. That’s why immigration rates, legal and illegal, tend to fall when the economy is struggling, and to pick up as the economy grows. Immigrants stimulate job creation for natives by promoting investment, creating new products and services, and increasing demand for housing and other goods. Immigration keeps America demographically healthy while other, less open Western nations struggle with declining workforces.
Griswold correctly notes that immigrants not only boost our economy, but that they are less dangerous, and less likely to commit crimes, than native-born Americans.
Some GOP candidates today reject these truths, but Reagan understood and advocated for markets throughout his career. (Disgracefully, former GOP contender and all-around embarrassment Herman Cain even called for a lethally-electrified border fence between American and Mexico.)
There are, sadly, worse things than calling for an electrified fence. The harshest proposals call for a dramatic expansion of state power to detain and deport. (See, Wisconsin Assembly Bill 173.)
The most extreme proposals call for all these things in the name of the rule of law, as though any law were a good law. In this way, these harsher proposals serve as contemporary versions of Jim Crow – they are laws wrongful and shameful, no matter how they are enforced. (See, The War on Immigrants.)
Toward these unjust proposals, there can and should be no compromise. (See, Eight Steps for Responding to Political Wrongs.)
It’s a long and tough year ahead, on immigration and a dozen other topics. No matter: either one year or several should be met with the same diligent and zealous perseverance.