Victor Reppert is the author of C.S. Lewis’s Dangerous Idea, a philosophy book I read a few years ago that develops the Argument from Reason, a refutation of materialism, in C.S. Lewis’s Miracles and elsewhere in his writings. I just discovered Victor Reppert’s blog Dangerous Idea, and this post on immigration:

Do I support open borders?

Bill Vallicella asked me.

No. But I strongly suspect that barriers to legal immigration are probably excessive. We do have to keep out people with criminal records.

I think it’s probably a false dilemma, or a straw man, to claim that anyone who wants to reform the immigration system simply wants open borders. It also doesn’t follow that all “path to citizenship” programs are simply amnesty. Those that I have heard proposed involved paying a penalty, and earning citizenship. (I realize there are a wide range of fairness issues involved in all of this, but the idea that such plans involve our just forgetting that people are here illegally doesn’t seem right to me at all).

This is an Ed Montini column which discusses the effort of Tyson Nash, the hockey player (not related to the Suns Steve Nash, apparently), who, in spite of being a model citizen, came close to being deported. It seems to me that I could ask whether we could make immigration easier without advocating open borders.

http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/local/articles/2010/05/21/20100521Montini0521.html

I am also convinced that we’ve have to combine a partial immigration reform with an increase in border security. I’d rather stop them before they come in than send them back after they’ve settled in and started contributing to our community.

As for the [undocumented] immigrants that are already here, there are questions in my mind about what the economic impact of their removal from our community would be. The departures from Prince William County in Virginia, which was the basis for the movie 9500 Liberty, showed that it resulted in a lot of economic harm, and an increase in the rate of foreclosures. In short, [undocumented] immigrants are a mixed curse, since they become part of our community and do contribute to its economy, pay taxes, etc. I’m not even sure it’s physically possible to deport all of them, anyway. That flaming liberal Michael Medved said that in order to send all of the back you’d need buses that, laid end to end, would stretch from Tijuana to Seattle. On the other hand, the people that actually do transport these desperate people over the border are, so far as I can tell, the worst sorts of criminals, and surely we can hit them as hard as possible.

I seriously doubt that 1070 is going to result in very many deportations. The cost in ill will between the Hispanic community and the rest of us, to my mind, far outweighs the improvement in will provide in law enforcement, which I suspect will be minimal.

So, without actually having done a full cost-benefit analysis on all of this, I would say start with security at the border, make the process of immigration more rational but don’t just throw it wide open, and then provide some path to citizenship that involves a serious penalty and isn’t just simple amnesty.

A fence? Yes, if it would work, no, if it wouldn’t.

These are fairly conventional views, but what strikes me is that the disclaimer that supporting immigration reform doesn’t amount to supporting open borders should be necessary. It is semi-necessary because moderate restrictionists who want to let those who are here stay, but keep out any new undocumented immigrants, get lambasted as supporters of “open borders” by the nativist right– Victor Davis Hanson, say. But the distinction between open borders and a moderate restrictionist who wants to build fences and is OK with large numbers of deportations should be too obvious to need explaining. That’s what I mean by “the poverty of language/concepts in the migration debate.”

Objections to Reppert. First, it wouldn’t actually be a good thing for the country to “secure the border,” even if it were possible. It would separate a lot of families, prevent California growers and other employers from getting the workers they need, and block a lot of foreigners from opportunities to better their lives. Second, calling possible payments involved with a path to citizenship a “penalty” isn’t quite appropriate since illegal immigration isn’t morally wrong. But OK, that’s hair-splitting. Third, if you do establish a path to citizenship/amnesty, then you’ll strengthen the incentives for other foreigners to come. That’s fine with me! But it’s a problem for proposals to secure the border while letting the people already here gain status. Reppert isn’t an open borders supporter, and my main point is that the use of “open borders” as a straw-man attack on moderate restrictionists from the nativist right is unfair. One useful role that Open Borders: The Case might play is that moderate restrictionists could link to us and say, “I don’t support open borders! Those guys support open borders.” However, Reppert’s seemingly commonsensical moderate position is not actually a feasible, sustainable compromise. One amnesty would create the expectation of another amnesty, which would draw in more immigrants hoping to benefit from the next amnesty, until, hopefully, people start to see that the only way to reconcile a decent respect for human rights with incentivitizing law-abiding behavior is to open the borders. Currently, of course, we’re getting neither– neither decent respect for human rights (over 1.4 million deportations during Obama’s first term)– nor rule of law.

First, this post is not anti-Irish. I’m not Irish, at all, but I attended Notre Dame (the “Fighting Irish”), and I lived in Scotland for a while when I was 16 and love Scottish music, and maybe even more, Irish music. There was an Irish band called Colcannon my family and I used to listen to when I was a kid. I like to sing Irish songs like “The Fields of Athenry,” “Raglan Road,” “The Patriot Game,” “The Sally Gardens,” and “There’s Whiskey in the Jar.” In 2008, I went to a St. Patrick’s Day parade in Lousiville, Kentucky, and rode one of the floats singing and playing guitar in the rain, to cheering crowds. More generally, Americans nowadays have a soft spot for the Irish. St. Patrick’s Day, Ireland’s national holiday, is now more or less recognized as an American holiday too. I think John Kerry tried to pretend at one point to be Irish, and Joe Biden joked that his running mate was “O’Bama”– the point is not to mock politicians, but that there was a perception that Irishness is an electoral asset. Two of the most popular presidents in US history, John F. Kennedy and Ronald Reagan, were of Irish ancestry. Everyone now more or less sees Irish immigration as a success story that America can rejoice and take pride in.

But it wasn’t always thus, and part of the folklore I grew up with is that back in the bad old days, there used to be prejudice against the Irish, with employment advertisements sometimes saying “No Irish need apply.” There’s a song about it. You can listen to it here, it’s fun. Lyrics:

No Irish Need Apply

I’m a decent boy just landed
From the town of Ballyfad
I want a situation,
And want it very bad
I have seen employment advertised
It’s just the thing” says I
But the dirty spalpeen ended with
No Irish Need Apply’ “

“Whoa,” says I, “that’s an insult
But to get the job I’ll try”
So I went to see the blackguard
With his “No Irish Need Apply”

Some do count it a misfortune

 To be christened Pat or Dan

But to me it is an honor

To be born an Irishman

I started out to find the place,

I got it mighty soon

There I found the old chap seated

He was reading the Tribune

I told him what I came for

When he in a rage did fly

“No!” he says, “You are a Paddy

And no Irish need apply”

Then I gets my dander rising

And I’d like to black his eye,

But I cooled it down and asked him why

No Irish Need Apply

Some do think it a misfortune

To be christened Pat or Dan

But to me it is an honor

To be born an Irishman.

And says I to hime your ancesters

 came over here like me,

To try and make a living

in this land of liberty

They were greeted here with dignity

And thought to reep and sow,

By the Indians who owned this land

They didn’t tell you no,

But I’ll get a job in spite of you

For I’m willing heart in hand,

Thank God there’s better men than you

All over this great land.

Some do think it a misfortune

To be christened Pat or Dan

But to me it is an honor

To be born an Irishman.

And they say that in America

It always is the plan

That an Irishman is just as good

As any other man,

A home and hospitality

They never will deny

To strangers here forever say

No Irish need apply,

But there’s some bad apples everywhere

A dirty lot says I,

And a decent man may never write

No Irish need apply.

Some do think it a misfortune

To be christened Pat or Dan

But to me it is an honor

To be born an Irishman.

The whole song is a splendid libertarian parable. The immigrant comes seeking work. He faces discrimination: “No Irish need apply.” No one doubts his right to come. No one doubts the employer’s legal right to discriminate, but the narrator thinks it’s morally offensive to discriminate. He goes to meet the employer, and while he doesn’t get the job, he gives him his moral comeuppance by expressing his contempt, appealing by the way to the Pilgrims as a precedent, as I did in my last post. In spite of his disappointment and the temporary setback, he’s confident that he’ll get a job, since he’s confident that only some employers discriminate against the Irish. One of the lessons of the economics of discrimination is that it shouldn’t matter much if a few people discriminate, as long as many others don’t. Continue reading “No Irish need apply” →