Observance

Excerpts from an article by Robert F. Babcock a civil engineer/construction lawyer:

For decades our society welcomed workers. We welcomed them because we needed them. We needed them to pick crops, install roofs and drywall, do framing, and excavation work, work in processing plants, fast food industry, hospitality and healthcare industries and many other industries that lacked workers.

They work in jobs many of the native-born workers find too underpaid, too hot, too labor intensive, too dirty, etc. 

As a society, we should have made a viable pathway for them to come legally to work here. No such legal pathway existed for the 11 million to 15 million that have come and are working here (an estimated two-thirds of whom have been here for more than 10 years). Congress has failed for decades to fix the broken system, despite many pleas. Both political parties had opportunities.

The economic realities for needed workers have taken priority; we as a society looked the other way as we put them to work year after year. Why did we look the other way? Because we wanted and needed the fruits of their labor. 

So now more than 40 years have passed and our borders are over runned by those seeking a better life. Is anyone surprised that the problem has gotten substantially worse? 

Everyone supports the effort to arrest and prosecute violent criminals regardless of the status of their documentation. That is already part of the existing criminal justice system. For the small percentage of convicted criminals that are undocumented, they should be deported if their country of origin will even take them back.

Nationwide the percentage of non-citizens in the US prison population has decreased over the years, from 19% in 2018 to 15% in 2022. These are considered the violent ones along with others.

That is a small percentage of inmates and an extremely small percent of the immigrant population. Statistically, the crime rate amongst the immigrant community is lower than the crime rate in the native-born population. Stanford University economist Ran Abramitzky, for instance, shows that across recent decades, immigrants are 60% less likely to spend time in prison than U.S.-born people.

You would not know that listening to much of today’s rhetoric.

Is ICE targeting only the violent criminals? No. Within days of the new administration, up to 75% of the field workers in Bakersfield California were not showing up for work to pick the current crop of oranges, according to a local citrus industry spokesperson. Why are they not showing up? Because ICE has been threatening to detain them.

Farmers around the country are sounding the alarm about what is going to happen to their crops. The chilling effect of higher prices is rapidly spreading among the workforce across the country. 

May I now ask who is going to build those new homes at an accelerated pace if the federal administration deports a substantial number of undocumented workers? 

Are those economic adverse effects even being discussed?

No solutions to these concerns are being proposed. But the realities cannot be ignored. 

It’s time to create a balanced approach to adopt a process to vet the current undocumented workers and their families already here and working hard. That would be a small fraction of the cost and not negatively impact our economy.   (end of excerpts)

Insight

I would like for you to take a moment to place this image in your mind – in a two-bedroom apartment with one bathroom and a small kitchen and living room is a family of six. The father is a laborer. He mixes mortar for brick laying and carries and places the bricks on scaffolding high above his head each day, six days a week, sometimes seven, and does this at least eight hours each day. If his supervisor offers extra work time, at regular pay, he eagerly takes it. Sometimes he works sixty hours a week. His wife is a dishwasher at a local restaurant 30 hours a week. The four children are now old enough to ride a bus to school where they struggle understanding English because Spanish is spoken in the home. 

If we have enough of these workers; then, close the borders. If those immigrants here have proven worthy of our trust and hire; let’s bring them into our fold. With them understanding their precarious position in our society if some break our laws placing our trust in question; let’s punish, then deport at their moment of release.

One of the greatest messages the Savior taught and exemplified was love. Not only is He lover of our souls — and He loves us enough to die for us — but He taught we should love one another. What power there is in that admonishment.

Love begets in us an honest acceptance of ourselves and our fellow human beings. We begin to see beyond our faults and frailties to the potential perfection that is in each of us.

“There is no fear in love”; said the Apostle John, “but perfect love casteth out fear.” (I John, 4:18)

We need to trust the gentle pulling power of love that draws us upward toward the Lord. We need to love our neighbor and ourselves and God . . . For only as we love all three can we become what we can be.

Southern Standard contributor Cordell Crawford can be contacted at crawfordcordell@yahoo.com.