Introduction
“We are all of us Americans, and nothing else; we all have equal rights and equal obligations; we form part of one people, in the face of all other nations, paying allegiance only to one flag; and a wrong to any one of us is a wrong to all the rest of us.” (Roosevelt, p-3)
So according to Theodore Roosevelt that Americans must persist that if the immigrant reaches America in fine reliance turns out to be an American and incorporates himself to America and the citizens of America, one will be taken care on accurate impartiality with everybody else, for it is indignation to distinguish against any such man for the reason of faith or place of birth. Theodore Roosevelt also forced the point that it is predicated upon the individual’s becoming in very fact an American and not anything but an American so there can be no separated adherence in America.
American middle class
America is unique from other countries because it has a middle class. American middle class is one of the things that keep the American dream going. Immigrants are diminishing the gap between the rich and the poor. The average immigrant has only a ninth-grade education. Supporters argue, “Who else is going to take hard labor jobs for low pay?” This is a problem today. 40% of wage loss to low-skilled Americans is because of competing immigrants. Unemployed Americans would proudly work for minimum wage in order to feed their families. The wages of American citizens are dropping due to immigrants’ willingness to work for lower wages.
This is a huge problem in the American construction industry. The business owners are charging the same rate for work, but are getting by paying less and less to its employees because of help that will work cheaper. An answer to this problem is to check the employers for illegal immigrants. Charge the violators more money in fines. This will make it less appealing to them to hire immigrants.
People say that America is a “nation of immigrants.” This is true. The great wave at the turn of the last century brought many new immigrants to America. They came from Europe in search of the American Dream. The immigrants today are coming from other areas of the world in flocks. Immigrants in 1909 were three times more likely than Native Americans to be on welfare. That was then, imagine today. Today immigrants can cross the border, have their babies in American hospitals for free, then can stay and move the rest of their immediate family here. Furthermore, elderly immigrants who have worked in America for just a year or two can receive social security benefits. This is ridiculous. Americans cannot even support elderly people with quality health insurance. Americans should take care of their own people first.
One difference between immigrants now and then, the writer would like to note, is that immigrants then wanted to learn the English language and American customs. My great-grandfather immigrated here from Wales and would not allow his family to speak Welsh in his home. He said that he left the old country and now is an American. Today many immigrants do not want to learn the English language. Why should they? Americans are conforming to them. If an immigrant wants to be an American they should conform to us. Bourne supports the point of view of the writer in such words:
“Only America, by reason of the unique liberty of opportunity and traditional isolation for which she seems to stand, can lead in this cosmopolitan enterprise. Only the American–and in this category I include the migratory alien who has lived with us and caught the pioneer “spirit and a sense of new social vistas–has the chance to become that citizen of the world. America is coming to be, not a nationality but a transnationality, weaving back and forth, with the other lands, of many threads of all sizes and colors. Any movement which attempts to thwart this weaving, or to dye the fabric any one color, or disentangle the threads of the strands, is false to this cosmopolitan vision.” (Bourne, pp 86-97)
Conclusion
In the past immigrants were damaging to the American economy. Something socially came along to stop immigration overkill. Today unless America tightens the borders, increases enforcement on illegal aliens, Americans won’t have any way to regulate the number of immigrants or regulate who comes in. Until America can take of the people who are already here, Americans have no room for immigrants. So Bourne and Roosevelt have been accepted in today’s climate of immigration reform as they both were of the opinion that only immigrants who will come to America and become Americans in the true sense that will learn the American language and customs and live their lives accordingly. Unfortunately, today immigrants are not able to become Americans so the policies should be further controlled to organize the immigrants.
References
Bourne Randolph, “Trans-National America”, Atlantic Monthly, 118 (1916), 86-97.
Roosevelt Theodore, “Americanism” Som, Sonya Olds, and Eileen Momblanco. “The Immigration Reform Debate.” Social Education 70.5 (2006): 286+.