This country was founded on liberty. This country was founded on free immigration. For much of our history, the government had nothing to say about immigration. Anybody who wanted to come here could. There were no visas, no quotas and no laws regarding this issue.
Indeed our country is one of the few in the world that was actually founded on a principle. We came together with a common idea, with a common view of liberty and government’s proper role. We were able to shape the befuddling idea of the history of our own future.
Are we willing to sacrifice the ideas our country was founded on at the expense of an artificially high wage? On the idea that “I got mine”? Does that make any sense? Are we willing to sacrifice the “soul” of liberty?
I think Ronald Reagan can say this much more eloquently than I can, so I offer the following from Reagan’s famous “city on a hill” farewell address:
“I've been reflecting on what the past eight years have meant and mean. And the image that comes to mind like a refrain is a nautical one--a small story about a big ship, and a refugee and a sailor. It was back in the early '80s, at the height of the boat people. And the sailor was hard at work on the carrier Midway, which was patrolling the South China Sea. The sailor, like most American servicemen, was young, smart, and fiercely observant. The crew spied on the horizon a leaky little boat. And crammed inside were refugees from Indochina hoping to get to America. The Midway sent a small launch to bring them to the ship and safety. As the refugees made their way through the choppy seas, one spied the sailor on deck and stood up and called out to him. He yelled, "Hello, American sailor. Hello, freedom man…
“The past few days when I've been at that window upstairs, I've thought a bit of the "shining city upon a hill." The phrase comes from John Winthrop, who wrote it to describe the America he imagined. What he imagined was important because he was an early Pilgrim, an early freedom man. He journeyed here on what today we'd call a little wooden boat; and like the other Pilgrims, he was looking for a home that would be free.
“I've spoken of the shining city all my political life, but I don't know if I ever quite communicated what I saw when I said it. But in my mind it was a tall proud city built on rocks stronger than oceans, wind-swept, God-blessed, and teeming with people of all kinds living in harmony and peace, a city with free ports that hummed with commerce and creativity, and if there had to be city walls, the walls had doors and the doors were open to anyone with the will and the heart to get here. That's how I saw it and see it still.”
Let me further illustrate this idea. Come with me back in time to 1775, to Patrick Henry’s famous line, “Give me liberty or give me death!” What was he really saying here? Patrick Henry’s willingness to sacrifice his life for liberty, as profound as that is, is only the surface.
What, after all, is liberty? What is a free country? What is this idea that Patrick Henry is obviously so passionate about? Freedom means liberty for all. Liberty is not subject to temporal bounds. Liberty is not something that can be given and taken away. Liberty, in its eternity, is not subject to the whims of a finite government. Liberty is something that lives within us, which drives us. People are not satisfied until they have achieved liberty. Lives have been sacrificed for it, wars fought over it.
Patrick Henry was making a statement to the world (and I believe he knew it at the time): Liberty lives here! Here, we value liberty above all things, even our lives! If you try to take away our liberty, you will have to kill us! Anybody who loves liberty can come here knowing they will find refuge, just as we found refuge here! Fight with us! We will fight with you!
Is that idea already dead? After a mere 200 years? Is that the lifespan of liberty? Once, we were willing to die for liberty for all. Now we won’t even reduce our wage. Once, we would fight to the death to defend the idea of liberty. Now we just fight those most seeking it. Once, we found refuge in liberty. Now that refuge has turned to comfort and complacency.
Let’s pause here a moment and reflect on the founding values of our country. They are literally written in stone at the base of the Statue of Liberty, in a poem by Emma Lazarus titled The New Colossus:
Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
"Keep ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she
With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"
This poem is incredible and I think it’s worth breaking it down a little bit.
With all the power and fury of lighting, she is the “Mother of Exiles.”
She stands vigilant with a beacon of “world-wide welcome.”
“Keep ancient lands, your storied pomp!” Keep your ceremony, give me liberty.
“Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.” Though you cast them aside, they are welcome here, and welcome with open arms.
“Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door.” The homeless. We are all homeless until we find the land of liberty. The tempest-tossed. We are all battered by storms until we find shelter in liberty. I lift my lamp beside golden door. Follow me to the place of liberty. I light the way and I stand guard to ensure you safe passage. You are welcome here.
Yes Patrick Henry and Ronald Reagan both shared Winthrop’s vision of a shining city upon a hill; a shining beacon calling out to all who love liberty. Because Patrick Henry was willing to die for liberty, he lit a fire that started this nation. Ronald Reagan realized that this country was founded on eternal values, and to stay consistent with liberty, he must not restrict freedom of movement. Emma Lazarus recognized the inherent compassion in this country. Liberty is consistent with compassion. Compassion is consistent with free immigration. To change course now would be to betray the cause that Patrick Henry and so many others were willing to die for. In a very real sense, to restrict immigration is to kill the soul of liberty.
Free immigration has very important implications. On the economic side, free immigration is essential to the division of labor and economic output and growth. It is well documented that an autarkic society is not sustainable. While restricting immigration does not equal autarky, it is a step in that direction. In an age of globalization, free information and (increasingly) free enterprise, it seems almost barbaric to restrict the liberty of an individual to move where his output could be greater. Restricted immigration has the same negative economic effects as do labor unions, tariffs and minimum wages.
On the human side, the consequences of restricted immigration can be dire indeed. Free immigration often times means the difference between life and death. It is absolutely inconsistent with liberty if your actions cause harm to another individual. Restricting immigration is an action (in the natural world, movement would be absolutely free, so restricted movement must be artificial; anything artificial is the cause of an action) that can and does cause harm to innocent individuals every day.
And finally on the intangible side, on the “soul” side, some of the greatest thinkers of our time, indeed some of the fiercest advocates of liberty contend that immigration must be free. Our ancestors came here because they loved liberty. Liberty is not subject to temporal bounds, so how now can we seek to restrain it by restricting immigration?
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