For the week of August 7 - 13, 2002

End the dying season

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Immigrants in the 18^th and 19^th centuries bet their lives they could get to America. Nothing has changed in the 21^st.

In Texas, Arizona and southern California, summer is called the dying season.

It’s the season when blast-furnace temperatures kill migrants from Mexico who fail to complete treacherous desert crossings on foot.

It’s the season when swift currents in a canal near El Centro, Calif., drown migrants too weak to conquer them.

It’s the season when no one in the U.S. seems shocked to learn that two migrants died recently while being transported in a truck box that became an oven in the Dallas sun. Two truckers were charged with murder.

In June alone, 67 migrants died trying to cross the border between the U.S. and Mexico, according to The New York Times. This doesn’t include 22 who died in Mexico. Only Mexico records those deaths and then only those who are Mexican citizens.

Each summer, the deaths are a mere blip on the nation’s geo-political radar. They’re reported one minute, out-of-mind the next, and register only briefly with a nation that has more pressing matters on its mind this year.

However, border deaths aren’t new. Their numbers, estimated at about 2,000 annually by the Mexican government, actually have declined a little along with the American economy.

Laying blame for migrant deaths is an exercise in futility, but there has to be a better way. Using what everyone knows would be a good place to start.

Poor migrants know they have a good chance of finding a job in the United States. Employers know they need migrant laborers to fill jobs Americans apparently don’t want.

An efficient program that matches foreign workers with jobs in the United States would go far to end illegal immigration, protect workers from exploitation, and provide the work force America apparently needs.

A well-run program—along with swift and sure action against violators—should convince both potential employers and workers that working outside it is a waste of time and money. Only a well-run program will convince migrants that it’s not worth risking life or limb to get here.

Getting a good program may require a total overhaul of the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service, an agency so seriously mismanaged that many experts say reform is impossible and replacement is necessary. A good program will also require the United States to put pressure on the Mexican government to get its economic, political and educational house in order.

It’s time to end the dying season.

 

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