citizenship

I’ve No Plans to Move to Canada

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Flag_of_Canada.svgThis is not a statement about Canada, which I’ve always loved visiting. I have good friends who make their home there, and they love their country as much or more than I love mine. No anti-Canada rant here. No rant at all really.

Rather, it is a response to the number of posts I’ve seen recently saying, “if ‘______’ is elected president, I’m moving to Canada!” Depending on your politics, you might be inclined to say this for a various of the candidates currently on offer.

Now I suspect that some of this is overstated hyperbole, or just a form of venting frustration with what seems a bizarre political season to many. But I also wonder if it reveals some unsettling, at least to me, suppositions about the political order.

It seems that the assumption behind statements like the one above is that if such and such is elected the nation is going to go to hell in a hand-basket. Now I will totally agree that it is not an inconsequential thing to elect a president, or any other political office holder. I grew up in a city that was more or less a one party town and often elected those beholden to organized crime. And I live in a city, that while far from perfect, has enjoyed several generations of forward looking leadership.

What troubles me in the sentiment is that I feel it puts too much stock in a single area of our public life–the political. It seems that our discourse tends to turn the politicians we like into saviors, and those we don’t into demons. It’s kind of striking to me that believers and atheists both have something in common in this discourse–they talk about politicians as supernatural, or at least as super-human figures. At very least, it seems that something is out of proportion here. A few observations:

  • Under our system, political leaders derive their power from the governed. Even with the problems of campaign finance, we are still the people who put these people in office, or not.
  • At every level, we operate in a system that balances power between executive, legislative, and judicial functions. It’s inefficient, but it does provide mechanisms to check the excesses of a person or group.
  • I also wonder if we put too much stock in these people, perhaps in part because of the way the 24/7 news cycle distorts our view of reality. So many others are pursuing the common good, whether in starting companies, serving communities, creating works of beauty, and, of vital importance, raising the next generation.
  • One of the things this points to is that what makes a country good are not simply our leaders, but an engaged citizenry that is thinking not only of our own good but the common good. This raises the all-important issue of our character as a people, as David Brooks has so helpfully done on his “Road to Character” website.

This is why I’m not planning to move to Canada, or elsewhere. There is so much I love about the city, state, and nation I live in. I will not give away my own responsibility for fostering what is best about these to the political system. Nor will I lodge my hope in any political leader, nor allow their failings to dissuade me from seeking the common good of “the land that I love.”

This post actually began in church this past Sunday. We were singing these lyrics by Chris Tomlin:

You’re the God of this city
You’re the King of these people
You’re the Lord of this nation

What is disturbing to me is that many of those I’ve heard voicing sentiments about going to Canada are people of faith, and I suspect many have sung this song at some point. What I wonder is, do they believe God will still be sovereign over our nation if the person they disdain is elected? Some may chide me for making too much of a “careless” statement. But I wonder about our “care” for our city, state, and nation if we would talk about leaving it if someone we disapprove of is elected. What are we saying about our faith in God and our love for our place?

Something to think about. . .

Review: Immigration: Tough Questions, Direct Answers

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ImmigrationImmigration: Tough Questions, Direct Answers, Dale Hanson Bourke. Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2014

Summary: Third in “The Skeptics Guide Series” and like others in the series provides a concise overview of basic facts about immigration and discusses the challenges of immigration policy in the United States.

The United States is a land of immigrants. Most of us can trace our roots back to forebears who came to the United States either to escape persecution or simply to find a better life. And yet immigration is highly contentious, between those who appeal for others pursuing a dream of a better life, and those concerned to protect our borders and restrict the numbers of people who may enter. Immigration has always both enriched our life and economy as a nation, and posed challenges for how we relate to new cultures and ethnicities.

Dale Hanson Bourke’s guide is not written to advocate but to inform. She begins with defining terms including “immigrant”, “undocumented”, “out of status”, “refugee” and more. One helpful distinction she makes is that there are no “illegal” immigrants. Under our system of law, it is not illegal to be a person and all enjoy equal protection under the law. Persons may commit illegal acts. For those who either have entered the country illegally, they are “undocumented” or “out of status” if they have overstayed their visa. She then turns in Chapter 2 to larger issues beginning with citizenship. One of the interesting facts in this section is that unlike most European countries and many others in the world, the U.S. grants “birthright citizenship” or recognizes citizenship on the basis of jus solis (“right of the soil”) as well as jus sanguinis (“right of blood”). This provides a strong incentive to have a baby on American soil. In this chapter, she also looks at larger issues of immigration around the world including refugee issues, xenophobia, the use of national identity cards and other issues.

Chapter 3 considers how we are indeed a nation of immigrants, how immigrants enter, different kinds of visas, “green cards” or Legal Permanent Residency, naturalization including our citizenship oath (quite interesting!) and even some of the vagaries of what defines a U.S. citizen–a question that has come up in presidential elections since the U.S. president must be a natural born U.S. citizen–the question being what constitutes “natural born”. Chapter 4 looks at the current issues surrounding immigration, particularly the numbers living here illegally (approximately 11.7 million in September of 2013) the problems of crime and drugs–most undocumented immigrants actually avoid crimes because this is cause for immediate deportation. I found out that U.S citizens are under no obligation to report those in the country illegally and that doing so might place one in legal jeopardy in certain circumstances. One of the challenges is how long the “line” is to enter the country legally–20 years for people in some countries.

While immigrants, including concentrations of undocumented immigrants in some states, do place added burdens on the system, they contribute immensely as well. One interesting fact in Chapter 5 was that 40 percent of the Fortune 500 companies were started by an immigrant or child of an immigrant. Google, eBay, Yahoo, Sun Microsystems, and Intel are a few examples. Equally, remittances from immigrants equal global foreign aid and so play a huge role in assisting the economies of the countries from which immigrants come. Many of those in the U.S. illegally are paying taxes and contributing to Social Security and Medicare without the opportunity to benefit from these programs.

Chapter 6 focuses on who the immigrants are and how many come into the U.S. under different categories and in what states the most immigrants are living (California, New York, Texas and Florida are the top 4 and account for over 55 percent of the immigrant population). Chapter 7 concludes the book considering the need for immigration reform. Fundamentally, our immigration system is a highly confusing system of sometimes self-contradictory laws that require an immigration attorney to sort through–something many immigrants cannot easily afford. It is a system that does not necessarily protect our borders from those who would do harm, and often fails to show mercy to separated family members. Furthermore, it makes it very hard to retain highly trained talent from other countries who would be willing to work for American companies and universities.

The value of this book is that it replaces misinformation with good information. It may not tell us the polices for which we should advocate, but it helps us cut through the misinformation we are fed in our public discourse, sometimes from those who are charged with making that policy. And it does this in a book of under 150 pages, written clearly and attractively with illustrations, charts, and images.

Whence Civility?

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Driving on one of our main thoroughfares, we were stopped behind a car with a bumper sticker that was such a vulgar slam against our President that I will not repeat it here. There was a time when we wouldn’t speak of the county dog-catcher in such terms. And yet this is increasingly commonplace.

So often we act like this is just harmless good fun. But I think this is like children who don’t realize that playing with matches can burn down the house until it does. We attack the character of our office holders until any self-respecting person is unwilling to endure such treatment.  We engage in ad hominem attacks on those who disagree with us, not realizing that we might in the process turn fellow-citizens with whom we share much in common and with whom we differ on some things into intractable enemies. We reject the time honored arts of compromise in which reasonable people find ways to arrive at the best approximation to agreement on what will serve the public good.  And in the process, we convince the more volatile among us that violence and force rather than reasoned discourse are the only way to get things done.

What is most troubling to me is that it seems that we easily forget that those with whom we differ and those they represent are also citizens and that we all share the rights, responsibilities and considerable benefits of living in this country. Why must we be attacked as a country to remember this? Why must we identify some greater enemy to stop treating each other as enemies? And why do we forget that the idea behind e pluribus unum is that our diversity coupled with our common citizenship (we are all Americans) is what makes us strong as a nation.

For those who are Christians, we believe that the diverse members of our one body are like diverse parts of a single body. Eliminating our diversity is like cutting off a part of our own body. Can we determine that while we will engage in vigorous and principled argument about what best makes for a good society, that we will refuse to attack the character of those with whom we disagree, because to do so is to attack our very selves?

If we value those with whom we disagree, we might even listen to them and try to figure out why they disagree with us and how they could think the way they do. A civil discussion engages what a person is really saying, not our caricature of what they are saying.

Above all, civility is rooted in the idea of treating others as we’d like to be treated. We don’t want our own character to be impugned. We consider our own ideas rational and well thought out.  We want others to carefully listen to us and to engage us in terms of what we are actually saying. This is the Golden Rule principle, and for good reason–the practice of this rule is precious, and sadly, all too rare.