Immigration is mutually beneficial. When will Americans learn this lesson?
As “the land of opportunity,” the United States has always had a tradition of welcoming immigrants. Indeed, as we all learned in high school, our country was built by such people. Mostly poor, uneducated and unskilled, more than 20 million immigrants came to America between 1880 and 1920. Despite opposition and resentment, they survived and prospered all while helping to build the greatest economy in the world.
America’s experiment in democracy deserves the credit. By bringing in new people with new ideas, it fostered competition, creating what became widely known as American exceptionalism. And it worked. Not just then, but even today, with almost half of America’s Fortune 500 companies being started by immigrants or the children of immigrants.
Now we are experiencing a new wave of immigrants flooding across our southern border with Mexico. Mostly people of color, they have mainly come from El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras, fleeing oppression and violence in their home countries. More recently some 15,000 immigrants, many from Haiti, established a tent city near a Texas border crossing. But they all came here seeking a better life, just like those others did more than 100 years ago.
