Speak Out for Change in Immigration Policy

Children are the most precious gift; to the parents, to the future of a nation and the future of humankind. Without children there is no future. Yes, parents are responsible for their children and in bringing them up for the future of the nation and humankind. But a civilized society does not use children as a means to admonish, correct or punish the parents for acts which the parents may have knowingly or unknowingly committed.

There are supposedly cases where people are crossing the border with children who are not their own and may not even be remotely connected. There are cases where people are crossing the border with children justly seeking asylum. Then there are a group of parents seeking a better life for themselves and their children, the reason most of us immigrants came here. Before removing the children at the border or thereafter , there are steps which could be taken.

First if the parents are seeking asylum, then as Secretary Nielsen has said, the children should and need not be removed while the immigrants are taken to the appropriate processing center.

As to the other two groups, simply on arrest warn them that their children will be removed according to law while they are being processed. The parents then have a choice to go back or face the consequences of their children being separated indefinitely. One can then have some grounds for placing responsibility on the parents which does not justify the change in policy; namely to make children the pawns in enforcing a failing immigration policy.

I very much doubt that the U.S. Government has widely disseminated the consequences of the new policy on the routes these immigrants take to reach the border. I have not heard of signs being posted along the routes to the border. I have not heard of the border guards telling or being advised to tell parents crossing or attempting to cross or having crossed of the potential consequences of the parents actions. At the same time, as attempts to justify the process as applying the law, let us not forget that under our laws one is not a criminal until one pleads guilty to or is found guilty of a crime and under the fundamental principle of Common Law, one is innocent until found guilty in spite of what Secretary Nielsen might state in propagating the new policy.

There is no justification for snatching children from their parents. There is no justification in keeping them in cages whatever any previous Administration may have done. And there is no justification in using the separation of children from their parents to further or enforce the policies of any civilized government. We can blame the adults for bringing children across the border illegally and for the ensuing treatment of those children but that in no way justifies the action of an Administration changing its policy to use children to enforce its intentions.

There are better and more humane ways especially while the Administration is supported by control of both houses of Congress responsible for passing legislation to secure the border. Blaming the Administration or the Democrats or the parents does not solve the problem of how these children are being used to further a political agenda. And those of us of more Conservative beliefs need to speak out. Even if we cannot reverse the current policy, we can see that it is handled in more humane ways as I have tried to show.