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Immigration and Friends' Testimonies

Danielle Short, AFSC Colorado Human Rights Director

January 11, 2007

Immigration is an issue that Friends are only beginning to explore as a faith.  It is a complex topic that must be discussed in depth before we can come to unity.  However, my immigrant rights work at the American Friends Service Committee has led me to believe that the Quaker Testimonies call us to pursue just and humane policies towards immigrants.  For me, the core question of Quakerism is “how can we best honor the human dignity in all of us?”  My faith calls me to work for a society where the dignity and gifts of all are celebrated, regardless of status. I believe that we can create an immigration system that will work for all of us—I do not believe that we have to play the rights and benefits of one group off of another’s.  There are much greater threats to the well-being of all people in this country, and we have more to gain by coming together and addressing the real causes of inequality and injustice. 

Equality

The Faith and Practice draft of Intermountain Yearly Meeting speaks about the “essential equality of all humanity,” that nothing should stand in the way of living lives with dignity.  It says, “Yet not all human beings have just and equal means and opportunity to become what their gifts could enable them to be.  Friends seek to empower those who are oppressed and to find ways for more equitable distribution of the resources and wealth of the world.”1

The presence of 12 million undocumented immigrants in our country is a consequence of the inequitable distribution of wealth and resources in the world.   Our inability as a society to develop a just and humane immigration system reinforces that inequality.  The results are exploitation, vulnerability, divided families, and a humanitarian crisis on the border

Some people have said that we can only take care of our own or that we have to take care of “our own” poor first.  I do not believe that Friends testimonies apply only to those within our borders, or with a certain immigration status.  Furthermore, we should look at how our country plays a role in global economic inequality.  In his article titled “Bananas,” theologian Miguel De La Torre traces how in 1954 the U.S. Marines installed a Guatemalan dictatorship to protect the U.S. business interests of U.S. corporations, bringing poverty, strife and death.  This is a story that repeats itself throughout the hemisphere.  He traces the roots of immigration back to that exploitation and says, “Maybe the ethical question we should be asking is not “why” are they coming, but, how do we begin to make reparations for all we have stolen to create the present economic empire we call the United States?”2

We need to address the root causes of immigration and promote true sustainability so that people have the choice to stay in their home communities. Short of that, we need to create realistic and humane policies so that people who can’t make a dignified living in their home countries can go to where the jobs are in a safe and orderly way. Migration is a foreseeable consequence of free trade agreements between countries with unequal economies—the European Union knew that when they worked for 10 years to bring Spain and Portugal’s economies into alignment before opening up trade between them. We chose not to do that when we entered into NAFTA, and chose instead to fortify our Southern border. We would do better if we removed the vulnerable status of undocumented immigrants through legalization, which would raise wages and labor standards for everybody.  Bringing undocumented immigrants out of the margins would also facilitate greater civic participation, allowing immigrants and citizens to come together to address the real causes of economic injustice.

It is troubling to me that it has become acceptable to dehumanize immigrants, and those who appear to be immigrants.  In the past year we have seen an increase in expression of hatred against people of color, both immigrants and citizens.  The term “illegal alien” suggests that undocumented immigrants are non-human, and that allows us to lose sight of our common humanity, and contributes to the dehumanization of other groups.  IMYM’s draft Faith and Practice offers the advice that we should question our hidden prejudices and learn to value our differences.  Are we looking for that of God?  Loving our neighbor as ourselves?  Is it possible that unconscious prejudices are keeping us from viewing immigrants with compassion?  “Do we work individually and as a meeting to bring about a just and compassionate society that allows everyone to develop their capacities and fosters their desire to serve?”3

Peace

Border militarization is a form of warfare.  Over the past 20 years, the federal government has invested billions of dollars in a futile attempt to prevent undocumented immigration by fortifying the US-Mexico border.4  Arizona Governor Janet Napolitano has said, “Show me a 50-foot wall and I’ll show you a 51-foot ladder.”5  Migrants have voluntarily accepted the kinds of conditions African slaves were subjected to in the trans-Atlantic slave trade—cramming themselves into packing containers and ships.  How can we accept a system where this is the only option people see? 

The border build-up has cost thousands of lives.  Since border enforcement policies were implemented in the 1990s, over 3,000 migrants have died crossing the border.6

Our peace testimony calls us to “Refuse to join in actions that denigrate others or lead to their victimization.”7 Supporting enforcement strategies leads to suffering, so we must find a better way.  Borders and laws should serve human beings, rather than vice versa. Our laws are broken, and we should fix them. 

Simplicity

Faith and Practice calls us to look at issues of stewardship of resources, consumption patterns, the environment, and overpopulation.  We need to look at how our own lifestyles are subsidized by cheap immigrant labor, and work for better wages and working conditions for all workers. We need to work to end corporate welfare and challenge global economic inequality.

We can have the most impact on the environment by working for better environmental standards and sustainable communities.  Rather than buy into the scapegoating of immigrants, who are hardly the heaviest users of resources (the biggest polluters are corporations, and the single biggest polluter in this country is the military), we should work for the right sharing of world resources.  To address overpopulation, we need to work for global sustainability and the education of women worldwide. 

Faith & Practice asks in the Simplicity queries, “What are we doing to ensure adequate water, food, shelter, education, and respect for those who do not have ready access to these blessings?”8

Community

Community is not just about those closest to us, or those with whom we feel the most comfortable.  I believe that we are called to build community across difference, with all of the challenges that it entails.  This means promoting a multicultural and inclusive vision for our society. The idea that people from different cultural, racial and ethnic backgrounds can coexist peacefully is being challenged by the anti-immigrant movement. 

Nativism ebbs and flows through our nation’s history.  We have seen cycles of immigrants who are welcomed as laborers, then rejected when their labor was no longer needed.  Benjamin Franklin expressed concern about the Germans in Pennsylvania, with their German-language publications and businesses.  I believe that we are better off as a society when we value the language and culture of newcomers, rather than shame and punish them.  We must challenge ourselves to break out of our comfort zones and build relationships with immigrants and others who are different from ourselves.  As Faith and Practice says, “Although we best know a sense of spiritual unity within our families and our meetings, we look outwards and try in love to include others in our community—our neighbors near and far, the people we meet as we go out into the world, even the very living, breathing Earth that feeds us and clothes us and that we care for in our turn.”9

IMYM’s draft Faith and Practice specifically mentions immigrants in regards to community:  “We care for migrants who have left home and family to seek a new life in a strange place. We care for all we love and all we might come to love.”10

Integrity

For Friends to approach the issue of immigration with integrity, I believe we need to engage in real dialogue, explore the issue deeply, and listen to each other’s concerns.  We need to ask ourselves, “What is the whole truth?  Are we only seeing a piece of the truth?”

We should look at this issue from multiple perspectives, including the perspective of US workers.  We should consider the impact of immigration on US workers, and carefully study the data on this issue, and consider the sources of that data.  Reputable studies have shown that common assumptions about immigrants’ impact on jobs and wages come from a simplistic analysis of the economy, and that a more nuanced analysis shows that the impact is minimal, at most, once immigrants’ economic contributions are taken into account.  Even when we consider the small impact immigrants have on wages, we should not isolate immigrants in our analysis of wages in our country.  There are several other dynamics that have a much greater impact, such as continued racial discrimination against African-Americans, systematic union-busting, the corporate “race to the bottom,” and the decline in the inflation-adjusted value of the minimum wage.  Immigrants are clearly not responsible for decisions about out-sourcing or increased automation of work.  By scapegoating immigrants, we deny ourselves the opportunity to find real solutions to our nation’s economic problems, which are based in the dramatic increase in concentration of wealth and power in our society.

When I see immigrants isolated as the sole cause of economic insecurity in our country, I have to wonder if there is actually another agenda at play.  Immigrants (including most of our ancestors) have been blamed for economic woes throughout our country’s history, and I believe they have been targeted this way in large part because of deep seated fears of those who are different than us, rather than a calm analysis of the issues. I would urge Friends to find ways to seek the whole truth of this issue. 

Conclusion

My years of experience working on this issue with immigrants and citizens, and reflecting on Friends testimonies, lead me to believe that we are called to welcome immigrants to our communities and work to address the deeper social injustices in our society.  Immigration is not a cause of injustice, but a symptom.  By ignoring our broken immigration system we cause suffering.  Quakers have a long history of working for a more equitable distribution of resources and wealth, and that is the direction I believe we should be taking on immigration today.

1. Faith and Practice of Intermountain Yearly Meeting. 2006 Draft.  http://home.earthlink.net/~imym-faith-and-practice/

2. De La Torre, Miguel. “Bananas.” AFSC Colorado Footsteps, Summer 2006, p. 8.  http://www.afsc.org/central/other/documents/afsc_2006_web.pdf

3. Faith and Practice of Intermountain Yearly Meeting.

4. Immigration Policy Center. “From Denial to Acceptance: Effectively Regulating Immigration to the United States.” American Immigration Law Foundation, November 2004.

5. Associated Press. “More Fence Doesn’t Make Sense, Napolitano Says.”  December 22, 2005.

6. Coalición de Derechos Humanos, http://www.derechoshumanosaz.net/deaths.php.

7. Faith and Practice of Intermountain Yearly Meeting.

8. Ibid.

9. Ibid.

10. Ibid.

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