America, the land of selective milk and honey

If it’s one thing that Americans are good at, it’s crushing dreams.

According to our clear understanding of immigration, maybe that’s because we’ve recently decided that what this country doesn’t need is the potential for new doctors, teachers, lawyers and soldiers. Instead, we’ve opted for the persistence of a permanent underclass – the underskilled, undereducated maids, dishwashers, and gardeners of America.

Just short of eight votes, the Senate recently rejected the DREAM Act – the Development Relief and Education for Alien Minors – a bill that offers a path to citizenship for the children of illegal immigrants if they serve two years in the military or complete two years of higher education.

By voting down the bill, the Senate also turned down the potential pool of 500,000 new soldiers, their chance at college, the possibility of greater contributions to the economy and any real progress toward immigration reform.

Under the DREAM Act, illegal immigrants who have entered the country before the age of 16 and have lived in this country for at least five years can receive conditional residency status. These children would have to complete high school, possess no criminal records and exhibit a “good moral character.” In the extension of state financial aid to undocumented students attending state universities and colleges, conditional residency status can be lifted if these individuals have spent at least two years in college or in the military. Finally after five years, these individuals can qualify for permanent legal residency, obtaining a green card in the step toward citizenship.

Bi-partisan support of the DREAM Act, including co-sponsor and author Illinois Sen. Dick Durbin, hoped that the bill would be one of several, less-ambitious measures to pass, comprising a “compassionate and pragmatic” approach that would eventually lead to more comprehensive reform. But with its rejection, the debate on the immigration issue has yet again taken a nasty turn toward a familiar state of indecision born from bigotry and fear.

Colorado senator and Republican presidential candidate Tom Tancredo urged the Immigration and Customs Enforecement Agency to raid a press conference in which Durbin featured students who would benefit from the act. Accordingly, Tancredo charged: “I don't expect Dick Durbin to be able to tell the difference between legal residents and illegal aliens.”

Funny, I don’t expect Tancredo to be able to tell the difference between his own racism and xenophobia.

In any event, objections of amnesty were grounded on the extension of benefits to illegal immigrants – the same benefits originally reserved for legal residents. And of course the other principle objection was based on the provision of incentives for more people to immigrate to the U.S. illegally.

But since the failure of the Senate’s proposed measure on comprehensive immigration reform in June, this recent failure of the DREAM Act leaves an even more daunting outlook on this already tiresome issue. After all, if we can’t start with the kids now, how are we to come to any resolution for the estimated 12 million undocumented immigrants that already live here? And what about the 750,000 people who make their way into the country every year? How are we to arrive at any resemblance of comprehensive immigration reform if we aren’t willing to take the baby steps to get there?

The Congressional Budget Office estimates that 100,000 children would have been affected by the bill, while the nonpartisan Migration Policy Institute estimates over 500,000. At any rate, these children have grown up on American soil for most of their lives. They have been educated in our schools and already speak English in addition to their language of origin. For them, assimilation has brought them even farther away from a home country that they may no longer know. Deportation, in all irrationality, remains for them. And still we say no.

After a high school education, these children are left hung out to dry. No legal citizenship status means few windows of opportunity. And so the number of people limited to a path of dead-end jobs and a life in the shadows remains large and ever-increasing.

The DREAM Act’s rejection, therefore, is simply another lost opportunity at strengthening the country. We have let go of soldiers and more educated taxpayers, of skilled graduates and the benefits they bring to American businesses. Ultimately, we have forgone potential, talent and principle out of the imminent, yet blinding fear of invaders and displacement of resources.

The DREAM Act had opened a future to those who were deprived of one, simply because of the inheritance of their parents’ undocumented status. Instead the act’s failure criminalized them for a residency status that they were not responsible for – for a stigma that they remain chained to.

And still, in a country that champions the rewards of hard work, the bootstrap model is the archetype. Since preschool (if some of us are lucky enough to have experienced it), we are taught to imagine, dream and be who we want to be. It doesn’t matter who your parents are, or what your past entails. Work hard to overcome difficulties and in time you’ll reach your goals.

But even in America, dreams are discriminatory.