November 21, 2010
The Church Supports Common Sense Principles of Immigration Reform
Unfortunately, I'm still mired in a ridiculous amount of school work, so this will be a short post. I wanted to highlight the following press release from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, which demonstrates the Church's support for principles of reasonable immigration reform in the "Utah Compact." As you will notice, the Church's position is clearly divergent from the knee-jerk "deport them all" and "place landmines on the border" viewpoints of too many of our extremely conservative fellow citizens (ironically including many Latter-Day Saints). To me, the content of the Utah Compact is an adherence to the LDS principle of "moderation in all things." Extreme positions on immigration from both the far left and far right are unacceptable. One of the very few policy positions of our former president, George W. Bush, that I actually supported was his failed attempt at reforming our country's immigration system, which would have balanced the need for better enforcement while recognizing the reality on the ground, which is that millions of illegal or undocumented immigrants have truly assimilated into our society and are productive and valuable members thereof. Without further pontification on my part, here is the Church's press release and here is the official text of the Utah Compact.
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3 comments:
I like this!
When I served in Texas, I would estimate the half of our branch were illegals. The Branch President's wife told me how she got to this country and then paid off a judge so they could get married. I'm disappointed when so many Latter-day Saints support gaining members by any means necessary. The Twelfth Article of Faith states our endorsement of "obeying, honoring and sustaining the law". I hope we as a church will uphold that.
James- I know that you trust the Church's leaders as much as I do and believe that they are inspired. By supporting the Utah Compact, they are not supporting any specific policy prescription. They aren't calling for ceasing efforts to police our borders. If you read the Utah Compact and consider closely what it implies, you'll see that this is a perfect example of "moderation in all things." The authors of the compact recognize that the nation's immigration challenges are complex and require thoughtful and complex solutions.
I don't think anyone with any serious understanding of the immigration problem would advocate deporting all of the approximately 10 million illegal immigrants in this country. An approach that balances "law enforcement", "families", "economy", and "free society" is one we should vigorously pursue.
You know how I feel about President George W. Bush overall, but even Bush, a former governor of Texas, understood that this was a complex situation that required comprehensive reform. While that includes improvement on the law enforcement and border protection ends, it also includes other key elements, such as recognizing that many such immigrants have assimilated completely into our society and are valuable members thereof.
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