IMMIGRATION IN AMERICA...

Around my kitchen table on another night, those present [drinking strong coffee and eating pie with too much whipping cream] got to talking about America's immigration issue.

Far from solving anything Congress might consider noteworthy, the discussion came to an abrupt halt when someone [it could have been me] asked a question that stopped the other five people in mid swallow and bite. "In our beginning..." who laid out the borders? For that matter who was responsible for dividing up land within those 'borders' that became farms or acreages or city lots then suburbs and shopping centers?

And who sold all that divided land? Who?

What really happened: In our beginning...was it Adam? Was Eve our planet's very first land developer? Or was it Mosses as he crossed the desert? Was Mosses a squatter pitching his tents anywhere there was space anywhere he liked across Egypt's fast miles of sand?

At some point between Adam and Eve with their two boys who at one point had Eden/Earth all to themselves - and - the emergence of more humans [aka: Mesopotamian, Sumerian, Minoan]  territory to settle became important. However, not only was settled territory important - also important was the clan lineage of those ancient settlers.

As clans formed - each clan was protective of their 'territory' and clan membership. Strangers were rarely welcomed. Then within an established clan, members were generalists with everyone able to grow their own corn, grains, root vegetables and hunt for their own fowl or rabbit or fish. Eventually, though with the emergence of specialists like the farmer who made better chairs, tables and beds eventually stopped farming to make furniture for everyone. And the farmer who baked better tasting bread eventually made bread for everyone else.

Okay - so, what happened to the land that was their farm? Well, the farmer who grew better crops - grew even more crops on the carpenter's land and the baker's land, so the carpenter and the baker could still have some harvest.

Ahhh, but disputes arose [naturally] over the value of furniture versus the value of bread versus the value of land and one farmer's access to a larger piece of land to grow more crops than the other farmers...Enter a wise Elder in the clan to settle the dispute and create value. Decades slipped by and the Elder's time was taken up with resolving so many other disputes that it cut into his ability to farm so he became the official appointed leader. With him the clan had other specialists who wove fabric for his clothes, tanned leather for his sandals, made furniture for his house and bread for his meals. You get the idea.   

However - humans being human there were clan members who didn't always agree with the Elder's decisions so some clan members left and started a new clan. Still others challenged the Elder - convincing some other clan members 'they' were wiser with a better idea! Ta da! The birth of politics. With that awkward birth came making sure that everyone with land had an equal 'value' amount to cultivate and an equal 'value' for baked bread and an equal 'value' for wood and woven goods, etc...

It's at this point in our sketchy social human evolution that we can see more and more evidence of a complicated system steadily developing. Someone had to assign a value to land, bread, corn, chairs, sandals and fabric and if that person did that task full time how were they compensated? [Don't leave me yet - were getting close to unmasking, that illusive, WHO.] 

Suffice to say that over time Elders evolved into monarchs, rulers, sovereigns, governors, premiers, prime ministers and presidents etc...along with those who assigned value becoming: money changers, tax collectors, bankers and brokers. That's WHO. There wasn't 'one' single who we can point to and blame for dividing up perfectly good scenery into taxable real estate - there was a slow, but steady blossoming among certain upright humans into a growing number of people/who were born with enterprising ingenuity.

What does any of this have to do with America's immigration tangle? Everything - because all the clans now living in the 21st Century are just as territorial as their ancient ancestors. However, now in 2020 we have thousands of Elders with thousands of 'different' ideas and they have created an even more complicated system with arbitrary borders and even more arbitrary regulations to protect territory...

Question: is anyone on Planet Earth here illegally? 

When refugee/immigrant settlers first arrived in North America the Native Indians were confused then appalled that the new pioneers were paying for and then taxed for land that Mother Nature already offered for free. Our wise First Nations People possessed a highly evolved understanding that the Universe had provided water, soil, animals and plants for everyone to 'share'.  But we soon set them straight...

Which brings us right back to WHO and America's immigration tangle. From my kitchen table, we all agreed that no one is 'here' on Planet Earth illegally. Therefore, perhaps we need to re-define illegal immigrant when really what we see in the vast majority of people are - frightened, desperate humans seeking to join our Clan to live and prosper without fear.

The U.S. Mexican border is 1,954 miles long and one suggestion was we open 'more' ports of entry with smaller offices along America's [arbitrary] southern border - perhaps every 150 miles. More entry points would allow more frightened, desperate people to join our clan.

And why can't the "Dreamers" register and then be granted U.S. Citizenship? They are already finishing their education as teachers, engineers, business majors, entering medicine...They are contributing with energy and enthusiasm. And while we're at it - let's get the parents of Dreamers into the system so they can become legal too. Since those parents obviously raised some great kids - they must be a future asset too - or is my logic flawed? 

Yes, among the refugees there will be those who commit crimes, but we have criminals here already and laws to deal with crime. [Hell, we have criminals in public office! Okay I digress...]

But the vast majority of those frightened, desperate people will contribute to America by making furniture or sandals, or bread - or - perhaps developing a medical breakthrough or inventing effective cyber security or composing song lyrics or a unique form of art or find a scientific means to breakdown and reuse plastic or write a new literary classic -or- serve in our military OR just live a simple, productive life...

Since my great grandparents [and yours] came to America in centuries past how do we want immigration managed in this century and going forward? We need to email, call, write then email, call, write over and over to - everyone we elect to public office...

 AND we need to remember that we're all Americans - 'not' African-Americans or Asian-Americans or Hispanic-Americans or Norwegian-Americans...just Americans...

*Sherrie Todd-Beshore was a feature writer and columnist [for a number of magazines & newspapers Memoir From 'There To 'Here'] who shifted to fiction in 2006 with 16 novels in print. This blog attempts to highlight some of the social issues now reaching critical mass in America. The next one is: Prison Reform In America... 

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