We now have a two tier system of immigration. The first tier is the so-called front door, managed by the Immigration and Naturalization branch of the Justice Department. The second tier, illegal immigration, makes up all the other non-citizen residents who skipped town while waiting for their INS hearing or who simply walked in when no one was looking.

I understand their desire to be a part of this county, but immigration procedures exist for a purpose. That purpose is to allow only qualified, productive people access to the full benefits of working in this country. If we opened the front door to just anyone, and granted all immigrants the same protection, not only would we be overrun, we would drain every penny of our social programs, pushing aside citizens and working aliens.

Nevertheless, I still like to think of America as the shining beacon of freedom and opportunity to the world. This century showed us that freedom works and tyranny does not. As long as there is an America, where people are free, there will be discontent in the hearts of the subjects of oppression. I wish we could find a way to welcome all people of the world and their families into this great land.

This is already happening now. Examining how our society has incorporated the large number of illegal aliens into our culture shows us some alternatives that would allow us, once again, to be the hope of the oppressed while not loosing our own shirts in the process.

Unregistered aliens cannot work legally, so they take what they can find. They work in sweat shops, on farms, or rely on American businessmen to ignore and lie about their residency status. Because any work they do is criminal, in the eyes of the law, they are often paid off the books at ridiculously low wages to do dangerous work. And yet, very often, this still is better than what they could have achieved in their home country.

If we opened our borders wide, we would be literally overrun, but there is a scenario that would enable us to accommodate such a flood. After all, we are the leader of the free world, the home of the free, the land of opportunity, as seen by the poor of the world. We are free because it is right that we be so. Life and liberty are the birthright of every citizen of the world. This was correct in seventeen-seventy-six and is just as correct now.

Beyond idealistic platitudes, finding a way to legally accommodate all comers would help us deal with countries who still insist on oppressing their people. Germany is now reunited because in 1989 when the border to Czechoslovakia was opened, the grand exodus to the West made the failure of East Germany complete.

What if we could do the same thing for Haitians, or Mexicans, or anyone from anywhere? What if we could offer sanctuary to every man woman and child that comes to us?

Although one would hope that, as was the case in Germany, such a US policy would lead to real political reform and that we would not have to sustain such vast numbers all the time, starting along this rout would necessarily result in a new social class, resident refugees, numbered in the millions. How could we possibly sustain that population?

Obtaining a green card, work visa, and other paper work not only entitles a foreigner to seek employment, it also offers them the same protection as citizens in such areas as minimum wage, workman's compensation, overtime rules, and such.

We would have to do two things to accommodate a wave of new immigration. Give them a minimum wage of one dollar and find them a place to sleep.

Anyone entering the United States through traditional means would still be processed as they are today and would be given the same benefits and protections that resident aliens currently enjoy. This means playing by the rules, waiting for your turn in front of the judge, and proving that you can be an asset to the country.

However, for all others who either don't want to bother with the standard procedures or for some reason don't qualify, they could be granted, say, a blue work card from any post office or library. They could then be hired legally at rates that are now given only to illegals. Employers would withhold ten cents of every dollar - six for the state and four for the federal government and the employees would file no tax returns.

I can imagine massive job fair markets or even permanent offices at immigration centers to offer work opportunities around the country. Busses would pick up workers from the major immigration centers and carry them to the four corners of America, funded by companies looking for their inexpensive labor.

We would not use these people to do work too dangerous for other workers, the way the Chinese were used to build the railroads or the slaves were used in the early South. They would have the same protection as everyone else in this regard, and because their working status is legal, any employee could draw attention to an exploitive job without fear of being deported. In fact, the marketability of most immigrants would make it possible for them to simply leave any job they felt was too dangerous.

However, they may be asked to do undesirable, arduous, or unpleasant work of the type given to prison chain gangs or youth reform programs. Working all day in the hot sun digging ditches along a remote highway or stooping over to pick up trash in a city park for a net ninety cents an hour might seem horrid to the average American, but might seem like vast wealth to others. With the opportunity to work anywhere legally, common sense and the free market would mostly take care of this problem.

It seems likely that for a dollar an hour, companies would invent work that before might have gone undone altogether. A medium or low income family could afford a maid or gardener; an office could hire someone to make coffee for everyone or open doors for employees; a restaurant could pay someone to walk around town with a tee shirt to help advertise; more businesses could hire greeters to just say hello to their customers. In a society moving further and further toward service oriented industries, we might find that there are all sorts of tasks to add a finishing touch. Everything might be a little cleaner, sharper, friendlier, faster.

But it would be the lucky man or woman who gets the job as greeter for the local public library as opposed to digging ditches or clearing heavy debris from construction sites.

And even with jobs almost nobody wants, and jobs that wouldn't exist at a higher wage, there will still be people hired at the immigrant wage for a job that might have gone to a resident foreigner or American citizen at minimum wage. It's a pretty good deal for businesses and for the blue-card aliens, but unchecked, it would put unskilled Americans at risk.

Unless there was some limit imposed, most companies would attempt to maximize their profits by hiring most of their staff using the immigrant wage.

Allowing only one immigrant wage employee for every ten employees at the standard minimum wage or above would maintain the job market for Americans while giving companies a strong incentive to accommodate the flood of new workers.

To handle the domestic side, the maids and gardeners, and for small business, we can make the exception that any person or company is exempt until they employ more than five people.

It may seem unfair that two people doing the same job would be paid differently, but that's the wrong standard. Working legally for a dollar an hour while you wait for your formal immigration status is much more fair than being paid fifty cents a day, or being jailed, or sent out of the country.

Finally, these jobs should also be made available to anyone else. There might be many Americans that would like to be paid a dollar an hour to mop sidewalks or paint dumpsites for a week.

But even if it's possible to find work, or invent work for this flood of new low wage employees, where will they stay?

The answer to this seems obvious and trivial to me. In another essay, I described a place called the Fair Chance Institute. This is a place that offers bedrolls and basic food and which is operated almost entirely by the residents. Anyone can stay for free or can buy a better bed or even a room by working to help run the shelter. If businesses want to have access to low-wage staff, they would be wise to support such shelters. Cities that want to encourage new companies to move in would also have reason to supply sleeping space. Shelters based purely on altruism languish because they offer little benefit to the doners. When the residents of the shelters become an asset by providing hard work for low cost, there is suddenly good reason for keeping them warm and well fed.

So what is there to stop millions of refugees from coming here just to live for free in American shelters? The whole point is there is nothing to stop them and that's okay. Setting up hundreds, thousands, even millions of additional cots around the country is almost certainly less expensive than supporting billion dollar military solutions to these global problems. Plus, human nature will eventually stir people to spend at least a couple hours a day to help administer their group home for the reward of better food, lodging, and entertainment. If people want to come here to be warehoused, we can do that because shelters, unlike prisons, can be made to be self sufficient. When they learn that benefits and rewards come to those who contribute, they will have learned the lesson of America.

As these unqualified foreigners gain skills and become qualified, they could then return to the government office and go through the traditional processing that all immigrants and aliens go through so they can be eligible for jobs which demand at least minimum wage. Eventually, if they want, they could even become naturalized citizens. Their children, if born here, would certainly be Americans.

Yes, it means more competition for Americans. But that's how it should be. Prosperity is not a right, the freedom to fight for it is. If that means fighting with a flood of new unskilled immigrants, then let's fight for it and let the harder worker win.

But is it really fair to allow someone to work for only one dollar an hour? Isn't that exploitive regardless of the work that is done?

I say let them decide.

It's a take it or leave it offer.

Anyone can enter through the normal channels if they qualify. But just as many people would be turned down. If America is to be a beacon for the world, as it should be, then we must find a way to accommodate them without competing for minimum wage jobs and without simply letting the black market put them into slave labor in sweat shop factories or letting farmers hire them illegally to pick oranges for a pittance.

As bad as a dollar an hour sounds to American's, it would be the best thing that could happen to a lot of oppressed people of the world. Let us not forget they, like us, have families, honor, intelligence, hopes, and dreams. If our offer is better than what they've got, why not let them try?

With this type of situation, we cannot ignore the possibility of increased criminal activity. The answer for that is also easy. Anyone convicted of a felony level offense would receive the punishment of a plane ticket to his or her country of origin. It's cheaper than keeping them and feeding them in prison and the punishment is more fitting: banishment from the country that would have offered so much.

We must remember that what is best for us is not necessarily what is best for everyone else and we should judge this alternative not by how much worse it is than what we expect for ourselves, but by how much better it is for those with little or no hope but to risk their lives in search of a better chance.

In all things there are stages and transitions, opportunities and obstacles. Freedom is no different. I wish that everyone in the world could share the full benefits of this rich and generous country, but rather than give the very best to a very few, we should offer a chance, a hope, a beginning to all and let freedom follow in the footsteps of men, women, and children driven by renewed hope and powerful dreams.

:^D