The United States is now solidly part of the western world, having been colonized from the sixteenth century to the twentieth, when the Apache's, not willing to extend immigrant amnesty to the western invaders, were finally released from their prisoner of war camp and allowed to return to their ancestral homes, as close as they could get to it. Conquest, not some divine law, put the land of the United States, North America, into the hands of those who now claim it as their own. Manifest destiny drove the European invaders from one end of the continent to the other, immigrants all, none applying for amnesty to the natives who wanted them out, not when killing the natives was the easier path. To the New World they came, as if the Divinity had created this continent only on their arrival, bestowing right of claim on them for the civility of their ways. But if law is to be universal, then Americans can't escape the fact that this land was taken without the cover of law, that they and their progeny are essentially illegal immigrants and, some natives would say, should be asking for immigrant amnesty themselves. Fortunately for these invaders, amnesty is no longer necessary: those who were rightful, de facto owners of the land are mostly dead or were herded into concentration camps we euphemistically call reservations.
Today, as it was in the colonizing days of the Americas, a new set of immigrants have invaded the land, coming, not with sabers, horses, rifles and cannons, but with bodies hardened for back-breaking work, not so much looking for Eldorado's land of gold, but for the chance to live the life of a modern, civilized man. These immigrants came in full view, in full knowledge of the U.S. government -immigrant amnesty by silent consent - to fill jobs that U.S. citizens, fully equipped with high school diplomas and corporate office, warehouse, factory and plant experience, no longer wanted. Many of these immigrants came under the laws of immigration to this country, and never was there one available immigration position left unfilled for these blue collar legals, yet the demand for such workers not only remained, but grew to such a proportion, that a nod and a wink replaced the tedious immigration procedure, especially when the crops were in danger of destruction and U.S. agriculture stood to lose great profits throughout the world.
There was no call for exportation of these immigrants then, no counter call for amnesty, for jobs were aplenty for all, no, not until the U.S. leadership let the prominence of America fall in international economics, when jobs became scare, that calls resounded throughout to deport these illegal immigrants, to deny immigrant amnesty, thereby making those once unattractive jobs available for the children of those illegal immigrants who came on wooden ships centuries before with no invitation in hand.
Let us be fair. Perhaps we should allow the Native American Indians, what's left of them, to determine who should and who should not receive immigrant amnesty. It was theirs first.
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