Not Quite So Welcome Anymore

By Bruce W. Nelan

After New York's World Trade Center is rocked by a thundering explosion, police round up a string of Arab immigrants as suspects, including an Egyptian radical who was admitted to the U.S. by mistake. Off the shore of New York's Long Island, a rusty tramp steamer called the Golden Venture runs aground, disgorging nearly 300 frightened Chinese trying to enter the country illegally; 10 die. Newly elected President Bill Clinton, reneging on a campaign promise, denies entry to Haitian boat people, then is blindsided by hostile public reaction when his first two choices for Attorney General turn out to have hired illegal immigrants as household help. When Texas border patrols mount a round-the-clock blockade along 20 miles of the Rio Grande, hundreds of Mexicans, many of whom commute illegally to day jobs in El Paso, angrily block traffic on a bridge between the U.S. and Mexico, chanting, "We want to work."

The incessant drumbeat of episodes like these has Americans increasingly concerned that their country is under siege and, in the popular phraseology, "has lost control of its own borders." In a study published last June, Bard College economist Dimitri Papadimitriou concluded that new laws were needed to head off "a bitter struggle between these new immigrants and disadvantaged segments of the U.S. population for increasingly scarce low- skill, low-wage jobs."

These sentiments recall a judgment voiced in a New York Times editorial: "There is a limit to our powers of assimilation, and when it is exceeded the country suffers from something very like indigestion." That observation was not made recently, however, but in May 1880, when anti-immigrant sentiment was also on the rise. Then too there was no effective limit on the number of immigrants entering the U.S. The hard fact is that when times are good, few worry about how many newcomers arrive; when times are tough, as they are now, cries of opposition invariably rise.

Many Americans are confused about whether the continuous inflow of immigrants makes the country stronger or weaker. Economic studies abound claiming that immigration spurs new businesses and new taxpayers. With no less conviction, others contend that immigrants and their children evade taxes and overburden local welfare, health and education systems. To compound the confusion, many Americans believe -- wrongly -- that more foreigners enter the country illegally than do legally. As the doubts grow, so does the potential for backlash. Polls show that almost two-thirds of Americans favor new laws to cut back on all immigrants and asylum seekers -- legal as well as illegal. Though immigration is often regarded as a single issue, some distinctions are important:

Legal immigrants. More than 1 million people are entering the U.S. legally every year. From 1983 through 1992, 8.7 million of these newcomers arrived -- the highest number in any 10-year period since 1910. A record 1.8 million were granted permanent residence in 1991. Because present law stresses family unification, these arrivals can bring over their spouses, sons and daughters: some 3.5 million are now in line to come in. Once here, they can bring in their direct relatives. As a result, there exists no visible limit to the number of legal entries.

Illegal immigrants. This is what makes Americans almost unanimously furious. No one knows the numbers, of course, but official estimates put the illegal -- or "undocumented" -- influx at more than 300,000 a year currently and almost 5 million over the past 10 years.

Asylum seekers. Until a few years ago, applications were rare, totaling 200 in 1975. Suddenly, asylum is the plea of choice in the U.S. and around the world, often as a cover for economic migration. U.S. applications were up to 103,000 last year, and the backlog tops 300,000 cases. Under the present asylum rules, practically anyone who declares that he or she is fleeing political oppression has a good chance to enter the U.S. Chinese are almost always admitted, for example, if they claim that China's birth-control policies have limited the number of children they can have.

Right now, once aliens enter the U.S., it is almost impossible to deport them, even if they have no valid documents. Thousands of those who enter illegally request asylum only if they are caught. The review process can take 10 years or more, and applicants often simply disappear while it is under way. Asylum cases are piling up faster than they can be cleared, with the Immigration and Naturalization Service falling farther behind every year. At her confirmation hearings at the end of September, Doris Meissner, Clinton's nominee as commissioner of the INS, conceded, "The asylum system is broken, and we need to fix it."

With pressure rising to do something about immigration, Clinton felt he had to get out and lead -- if for no other reason than to head off draconian legislative proposals already in the works. The President put forward measures last July to tighten screening of potential immigrants abroad, speed deportations of phony asylum seekers and add 600 officers to the border patrol. "We will not," he declared, "surrender our borders to those who wish to exploit our history of compassion and justice."

The Administration has not, however, joined the national majority that now says it favors cutting back on legal immigration. Nevada Senator Harry Reid, a rising Democratic star in the immigration wars, has introduced a bill that would establish both an annual limit of 300,000 newcomers, including "immediate relatives," and a national identification card.

These measures, along with others from the House of Representatives, may come to life on Capitol Hill after the great debates on health care and the North American Free Trade Agreement are resolved. In fact, immigration questions already lurk beneath the surface of both these issues: should citizens carry a national medical identification card, and will the trade agreement lure more or fewer Mexicans north? Almost surely, Congress will try to reform immigration law again in 1994.

Immigration backlash is particularly strong in New York, Florida, Texas and, most of all, California, which officials say contains more than half of all the illegal immigrants in the country. As the frequent bellwether of national changes, the state has already caught a low-grade fever from this issue. Governor Pete Wilson has won majority support for a proposed constitutional amendment that would prevent children born in the U.S. of illegal immigrants from automatically becoming citizens. Californians, more than most Americans, complain about special treatment for immigrants. TIME's poll indicates that 51% of Californians favor cutting off health benefits and public education to immigrants and their children, whereas nationally only 46% back such measures.

Because there is no national consensus, political leaders and activists stake out unpredictable and sometimes contradictory positions. Many liberals believe the doors should be open to all who seek new opportunities and hope to escape persecution. Other liberals argue that while open immigration policies are intrinsically good, they must be tempered to prevent newcomers from not only taking away American jobs but also competing with poor, ill-educated minorities already here.

Market-oriented conservatives still support immigration as a source of low- wage labor. But other conservatives call for immigration restrictions to halt the cultural transmogrification of American society. One of the most ^ outspoken advocates for the latter is Daniel Stein, executive director of the Federation for American Immigration Reform, who favors a moratorium on all immigration, insisting that "nations do not have an unlimited capacity to absorb immigrants without irrevocably altering their own character" -- an echo of a view enunciated more than a century ago.

But for all the hand wringing, American resistance falls far short of the hostility evident in Western Europe. Gangs of racist thugs in Britain engage in "Paki bashing." France has officially declared a target of "zero immigration." Germany insists it is "not a country of immigration," and neo-Nazis have taken the dictum literally enough to set fire to hostels for foreign workers and asylum seekers.

More than 100 million people around the world are currently displaced from their native land. Europe's xenophobia can only mean that more of them will want to come to the U.S. That is all the more reason for Americans to spend some time debating how many of them they are willing to take in.

CHART: NOT AVAILABLE

CREDIT: From a telephone poll of 1,108 adult Americans taken for TIME/CNN on Sept. 8-9 by Yankelovich Partners Inc. Sampling error is plus or minus 3%.

CAPTION: Which position is closer to your opinion?

Where do you think the majority of recent immigrants came from?

Towards which group of recent immigrants do you feel most favorably and least favorably?

Would you favor changes in federal law to reduce the number of immigrants who enter the U.S. legally?

How important is it for the Federal Government to track down illegal aliens living in the U.S.?

Do these statements apply to immigrants who moved to the U.S. in the past 10 to 15 years?

Do you favor these proposals?

Would you favor a constitutional amendment to prevent children born here from becoming U.S. citizens unless their parents were also U.S. citizens?

How much does the presence of illegal aliens in this country concern you?

With reporting by David Aikman/Washington and David S. Jackson/San Francisco