2 Sides to the Immigration Brouhaha

By Bill Murchison No one gets anywhere by trying to roll Donald Trumps immigration order and its varied implications into a spitball for hurling hard and fast at the Other Side. That is not to split the difference in namby-pamby fashion between supporters of the present immigration freeze and those Americans who like Nancy Pelosi claim to see tears trickling down the Statue of Libertys cheek. The present matter may it please the court is too grave for sweeping claims of the sort the Twitter age has raised almost to Shakespearean dignity. Its a tough deal everybody should acknowledge: tough protecting the public safety tough judging when and how to inhibit the activities of those who might (not will necessarily but might) endanger the public safety. A balancing act of vast delicacy is needed to get the job done. But you have to know how to balance -- a skill seldom on display in Donald Trumps toolbox. He might have forestalled the international din over his executive order by thinking through -- youd expect this of a business tycoon -- the execution and marketing side of things. He didnt apparently. Down came the order. There was uncertainty over what to do with bearers of green cards. His own secretary of homeland security was by report less than fully briefed. There was no rapid response team on the political side. What are they paying you for anyway Kellyanne Conway? And you Stephen Bannon? It all had the look of Amateur Night at the White House. Critics of the order had uninterrupted leisure to paint the implications in direful not to say emotional terms. Truly sad stories came to light: bearers of green cards detained or diverted at airports; good and potentially valuable newcomers despairing over plans that dwindle suddenly into just ordinary hopes. Nor does Trump himself seem to have wasted much thought on the political dust storm he was about to kick up. What about the Supreme Court nominee (name unknown at this writing) he would announce this week? Had not our maximum leader considered that hearings on the nomination may now degenerate into partisan back-and-forthing about immigrant rights instead of the more vital question of how we make our justices quit making law? Oregon Democratic Sen. Jeff Merkley says hell filibuster anybody Trump puts up. Nothing like an open mind I always say. So what about the other side of things -- the executive order that made Lady Liberty weep? Several things require pointing out. Salus populi suprema lex goes the old Latin tag; the peoples welfare -- likewise translated as safety -- is the supreme law. Will Trumps immigration order render Americans safer in their beds and workplaces? I cannot make that claim. I can say only that the priority of that goal over even the wholesome expectations of non-Americans is the dispositive point. We must judge it one of several points that Trump voters wished in November to reinforce. Nor does there exist any abstract human right to move to another country without permission from the residents and their government. That we are a nation of immigrants is indisputable as is or should be the point that immigration is the sincerest form of flattery. The kind of people attracted by the kind of country we live in are the kind of people generally speaking we want to live around. But we the people -- like the people of Iran or Syria or Iraq or Sudan -- retain the right to judge to answer the knock on the door or if circumstances warrant to scram. No issue today is more complex than that of whom we want to live with and around us. I know of no formulas for resolving the matter in a world linked by airplanes and smartphones. A lot of our guesses including possibly Donald Trumps will be wrong even harmful. We have to let certain events and circumstances play out it seems to me before issuing stark declarative judgments. The Trump policy on immigration is hardly long-term: a 90-day delay for nationals from seven Muslim-majority nations and a four-month suspension of the refugee program. One could wish he hadnt done it exactly the way he did. But he did it. It may turn out -- like so many political projects -- to fall somewhere unpredictably between catastrophe and the worldly paradise.