Fascinating to see how much our legislative process relies on secret rules and rituals promulgated by mysterious and shadowy lawyers whose names we will never know from some basement (or cave?). Who the hell is driving this thing?

In the same vein:
http://www.nationalreview.com/article/354487/iowa-divided-robert-costa

There's a fantastically knowledgeable chap in the UK called Stephen Davies, with a think tank called the IEA, who argues in erudite tones that there's going to be a political realignment where people on 'both sides of the political spectrum' are more consistently libertarian or more consistently authoritarian, and so there will be some unusual allies as this process takes place: http://youtu.be/rAped3w0O4Y?t=43m12s (43 minutes in)

What's interesting now is that many of the libertarian arguments (pro-civil liberties, anti-corporate welfare) have become the populist ones - people (rightly) see things like the NSA, stop and frisk, or the bank bailouts as an alliance of elites operating against the interest of the larger population.

I'm not optimistic that this will have much of an impact on larger political culture, but maybe it will (akin to the reaction against the Red Scare or Watergate). The reason I'm not optimistic is because America is so much more partisan now. Look at the semi-cult of personality emerging around Obama, just as it had around Bush. Watergate wouldn't happen the same way now -- people would circle the wagons and fight it, and it would become just another political football.

^ Exactly right

I think the GOP's ticket to survival would be reforming itself as a right-wing libertarian party. Start pushing hard for marijuana legalization. Start pushing hard for serious spending cuts, military included. Openly apologize for previous foreign interventions and establish staunch opposition to future/proposed wars. Eliminate the party's current stances on gay rights. Just ignore that issue altogether (using the rationale that bedroom activities are none of the government's business, to avoid completely alienating social conservatives). Double down on immigration (using the populist rationale that the people behind amnesty are really pro-big business and that amnesty would cost a lot of American jobs). Leave abortion for each individual politician to establish his or her own stance.

If the GOP does all of that, they will not only survive but thrive. A shocking number of Americans (I think maybe 70% off the top of my head; don't quote me on that) identify as "fiscally conservative and socially liberal", a stance which conveniently aligns with current American libertarian views. They need to paint the Democratic Party as the party of statists. Americans don't want a powerful federal government and it will show at the polls.

"fiscally conservative and socially liberal" basically translates to "I don't care if poor folk and POC can't afford food, and I do like smoking weed."

who cares about the republicans ?
Isn't Ms Hilary Clinton lining up for the Democratic parties nomination as their
Presidential Candidate ?
all those gays, blacks, micks, spicks, wetbacks et al will vote her into the Presidency
so all those bible bashing God bothering rednecks are just going to love that ---
8 years with Obama, followed by 8 years with the Lesbian Chicky as President--
it's all God's punishment for not nukin those North Korean commo's

Gunfighter, there are two reasons that can't work, I think. First is that too many important Republicans are Rick Santorum-esque believers that gay marriage or legal marijuana or abortion availability will bring this country down into hell. It's tough to win the Republican nomination without those types. Second, almost everyone wants to get rid of big government, but for somebody else - they want to cut welfare but God forbid the government touch their Medicare, or they claim to favor a free market but support heavy zoning laws to keep downtown looking the way they like. America's claimed preferences are socially liberal and fiscally conservative; the revealed preferences are socially moderate and fiscally liberal.

mendax, I will make a deal. Let's just try being libertarianish - have the government stop blowing up or arresting brown people, favoring big business, and keeping the criminal elite in power while the rest of us go to jail for smoking harmless marijuana or buying the wrong kind of milk. Just for, say, ten years try it. At the end of that time, we'll see whether the government's (in my view limited and counterproductive) help to the poor and marginalized truly outweighs the (in my view far larger and more significant) various ways that it helps the rich and keeps the poor down.

@GunF ... as one of those that would call themselves fiscally *moderate* and socially liberal (not the same as that 70% mark, however true that number actually is, as I actually do want everyone to eat and have a home and eliminate class warfare), I would like to see a government styled that way. However, there's a point, specifically in this country, that the federal government needs to step in. On smaller (doesn't mean unimportant) issues like marijuana and abortion and gay rights (etc), the government can do a lot to stay out of the way, but when it comes to economics, *especially* when you have a $16-17 trillion debt to clean up, the government has little choice but to be proactive in attacking it. They can't just leave it and hope it clears itself up, as appealing as it may sound.

@ckroberts ... growing up in Indiana is one thing, growing up in Indiana under a moderate liberal mother and moderate conservative father is another. What it's taught me is that you need the crazies. Rick Santorum is so important, just as is Michelle Bachmann and Rick "Dumbfuck" Perry. It makes the rational people come off as rational, and as a result, you have a class of moderates that fight the extreme groups and typically overrule them.

I don't know, bo. I feel like Republican policies are more popular, generally speaking, that Democratic policies, except for their social policy and even more than that their social attitude/demeanor/approach. Maybe within the Party that helps moderates, but it hurts the brand overall. Romney did a lot to tank his 2012 campaign, don't get me wrong, but, the whole "legitimate rape," "God intended that to happen," and so on -- that sort of stuff really caused serious damage to the GOP's electoral chances. I don't know that it cost Romney the election by itself, but that sort of image certainly contributed.

Romney was/is part of the same party, there's no reason it wouldn't attach to him. If he were to become the President and the face of the party, he would be the one forced to confront those lines every time they came out anyway.

And Romney didn't do shit to dispel that image, anyway. When that 47% quote came out, the writing was on the wall. He'd done the same thing as Mourdock and Akin did.

Ironically, each of those three lines pertains to the GOP's outdated social policy, and that's how the Democrats won (and will likely keep winning as the old generation turns over to a clearly left-leaning age unless the GOP fixes it).

"Ironically, each of those three lines pertains to the GOP's outdated social policy,"

Um, no it doesn't. The 47% line was about tax and fiscal policy.

Wasn't the original purpose of the Tea Party to be the new libertarian wing of the GOP? It seems like all they're doing nowadays is opposing gay marriage, rolling back women's rights, and waving Confederate flags while talking about "heritage" through one side of their mouths and claiming to not be racist through the other side.

I had high hopes for the Tea Party early on when I thought they were libertarians. They have turned out to be everything I ever thought the Republican Party should jettison.

I think GF is absolutely right. Though as we've discussed before I think doubling down on immigration is still a mistake - perhaps it would help them politically as a party if they did everything else you suggest.

Well said, and that would indeed vastly increase their appeal.

@Semck ... the implied sentiment was that 47% of Americans can't sustain themselves on their own. Yeah, it was about taxes and welfare, but the idea behind what Romney said was directly in line with his views on society altogether and in line with much of the social policy of the party.

@YJ ... do you think they should get into immigration at all? They obviously aren't going to get the borders closed up; the other side isn't going to go with that.

I dunno, Bosox, I don't really have strong feelings about immigration one way or the other. I'm just saying it clearly is hurting the republicans lately.

I don't see a splinter of social conservatives and libertarian-conservatives as a realistic scenario. Social conservatives still hate those hell-bound Democrats more than libertarians, because Democrats openly support/encourage "deviant" behavior, whereas libertarians merely have a passive tolerance for it. Social conservatives are a dying species, and there are enough libertarians (or libertarian-sympathetic voters) to replace the loss of any hard-line social conservatives who decide to split from the party.

There are enough Americans that hold a right-wing stance on immigration that a position favoring strict enforcement of current laws would be a politically tenable position, but it's all about delivery of the message. Paint the pro-illegal-immigration people as hypocrites who are unwittingly working with/for big business interests to kill American jobs and squeeze the illegals for all they're worth. It's all about amnesty/guest workers, which by its nature favors big business. After all, I don't see anyone with national prominence out there pulling a Cesar Chavez and campaigning for better working conditions for illegals.

There's also the national security angle. You could argue that securing the border is a better idea than foreign intervention. Let's be honest with ourselves: It wouldn't be very difficult for terrorists to smuggle a nasty device into America via Mexico. Let's pull our military out of the Southwest Asian sandbox redeploy to the Southwest American sandbox.

America is sick and tired of government spending, government interference and foreign involvement. The first party to propose a more Constitution-based, "Old Right" approach will be the dominant 21st century party. The GOP needs to get as far away from Bush-era policies as possible and embrace non-intervention abroad and libertarianism at home. Turn the tables on the Democrats by forcing them to run as out-of-the-closet statists. At this point, the GOP doesn't have much to lose. If the Democrats can win national elections as open statists, we're all fucked anyway. The GOP has to reform because it's our last chance for real freedom.

@GF: the GOP can't get rid of their social conservative base, so they're not going socially libertarian. We haven't had a "non-interventionist" President since I have no idea when, and the answer is the other part of the GOP, which is their big money constituency. They have overseas holdings, and they need American soldiers dying to protect them.

The social conservatives don't make up the "GOP's base". That's why Santorum and Bachman weren't nominated last time around. The GOP doesn't really have a dominant faction at the moment, which means that the GOP can change its message easily and with negligible negative consequences.

If the GOP doesn't adopt libertarianism (or at least some of the more popular elements of the libertarian platform) then we're all fucked because the unified statists will win.

Social conservatives aren't big enough to carry a nomination, but they're probably influential enough to sink one. We saw what they did (as AWB mentions above) to the Tea Party: turning a potentially bipartisan movement about big government spending and corporate bailouts into a sort of generic grassroots Republican organization.

Also, the anti-immigration stand would hurt the GOP's image even more than it already does, if it became the dominant Republican view. They already have an image problem when it comes to race; insisting even more loudly that we kick a bunch of brown people out, and keep more from coming in, won't help that. Besides, the economic downturn means that new incoming immigrants aren't a big deal; I think that America has actually lost more undocumented immigrants* leaving of their own accord than entering in the last few years. The best solution for Republicans is probably to not make it a big deal or to include in a generic "law and order" approach (which might itself no longer be effective or might even be counter-productive given the recent debates about police militarization etc).

Besides, the danger for the Republicans isn't that the social conservatives will vote Democrat; it's that they won't show up. In states like Pennsylvania or Florida, that margin could cost an election.

*"undocumented" being the correct term since most of them did not break a criminal law to enter the country, but rather are staying on expired papers, a civil (not criminal and hence not "illegal") offense.

Reports of Republican doom are overblown. In 2016, for one, black turnout will plummet on its own accord without Obama on the ballot. It's really them, especially older blacks who actually remember segregation, who won it for him in 2012. There's little reason to believe they'll turn out like that for Hillary.

Provided that

A. House Republicans don't shut down the government over funding Obamacare, and
B. the primary is not overly divisive,

then the GOP should have as good a chance as ever to win. And all the Republicans really need to recover fully is to have their candidate win and then preside over a period of economic growth, demographics be damned. Winning is inevitable since eventually the political wheel will turn, and so is recovery, especially with the sorts of economic policies Republicans champion.

the GOP / Republican bible bashing red necks are stuffed
It gets worse than just having to put up with a cheeky black President for 8 years
to be followed by 8 years of Lesbian chicky Hillary Clinton as President
look out, Michelle Obama might have a go at President after Hillary's turn

so you got Obama for 8 years, ( a black chap )
then Hillary for 8 years ( Lesbian white woman )
then Michelle Obama ( Black & a woman )

God's punishment on Bible bashing red neck'd Republicans for all their sinning
------ they must have been wicked sinners

@ckr,

Good post, but I'd have one small gripe. You say,

"not criminal and hence not 'illegal'"

But illegal doesn't mean criminal, just against the law. For example, it is illegal to break a contract, but it is not criminal.

So "illegal alien" is not an incorrect term -- they are here in contravention of immigration law.

Semck, is "illegal" the accurate term for the breaking of a contract? I am not an attorney, so I may be mistaken. Looking into it briefly it appears that "illegal immigrant" is technically inaccurate, but it's not clear to me about "illegal alien." But more than that, it's also inaccurate in the sense that a person's status cannot be "illegal," only their actions. I also find the phrase "illegal immigrant" particular unsuited for, say, a person who was brought to the USA as an infant without knowing it.

"I also find the phrase "illegal immigrant" particular unsuited for, say, a person who was brought to the USA as an infant without knowing it. "

Certainly I agree there.

"But more than that, it's also inaccurate in the sense that a person's status cannot be "illegal," only their actions. "

Well, that's up for debate, but in any case, I think it's more a weird linguistic twist anyway (though it's often interpreted as calling a person illegal). Suppose I drill illegally. Then I'm engaging in illegal drilling. That makes me an illegal driller. That's not saying my status is illegal -- it's saying my status *as a performer of that action* is illegal.

Therefore, I would disagree that "illegal immigrant" is an inaccurate term. It is one that a lot of people misinterpret and/or find offensive, so I'd be open to alternatives, although "undocumented immigrant" doesn't really serve the purpose, I don't think.

"Semck, is "illegal" the accurate term for the breaking of a contract? I am not an attorney, so I may be mistaken. "

It's not a term that would be used very often, but it would not be inaccurate, since it is in fact violating a law. The point is just that "illegal" simply means "in contravention of the law." It is not required that the law in question be a criminal law.

For example, it is illegal for me to copy a commercial CD and give it to you; but it is not criminal unless the value of the material copied within three months was over $1000 or I profitted (including by receiving copyrighted material back), etc.

But it's illegal whether or not it's criminal, and I can get sued for it and lose.

* (Six months, rather, or 180 days -- not three months).

I think "undocumented" is used because it covers the most or rather the widest range of people. You can be in the country legally without documents, for example, if there's a problem with paperwork. And it best captures the sense that, again, most immigrants did not break a criminal law.

Do we have any attorneys here? I'm now as interested in the proper use of the word legal.

No, they use undocumented as a euphemism. It's a way to group Mexicans who blatantly sneak in in violation of US law with the people (including many Mexicans) who do everything right but get caught up in the bureaucratic maze like you talk about. It's a rhetorical strategy to advance amnesty, not an attempt to be more factually precise.

" I think "undocumented" is used because it covers the most or rather the widest range of people. You can be in the country legally without documents, for example, if there's a problem with paperwork. "

This, I think, is exactly an argument for why "undocumented" should *not* be used -- these people are virtually never who one is talking about when discussing "illegal immigrants." I think Invictus is correct about the use of the term.

The problem with the term is that it simply doesn't capture what people mean when they discuss illegal immigration. Very few people's concern is whether an immigrant's documents are in order, because that doesn't speak to whether they could easily get them in order and remain. The concern, rather, is the presence of people who are in the country in contravention of immigration law and should not, by law, be here at all; and what this means about the US's ability to control its immigration by law at all. Documentation has nothing to do with it.

A technical term sometimes used in immigration law is "removable alien." I don't know if this would be preferable to "illegal immigrant" or not. It does at least describe the right group of people. But again, the concern with "illegal immigrant" is not that it is incorrect (it's not), but that many people find it offensive (rightly or wrongly), and prefer other terms for that and political reasons.

"Do we have any attorneys here? I'm now as interested in the proper use of the word legal. "

I'm an attorney. I believe there are others here as well.

I think one disagreement might be that I see the opposite motivations. People who are anti-immigrant or even anti-Mexican/racist/xenophobic (not saying that anyone here is, but a lot of people in America are) use the phrase "illegal immigrant" to tar all of them with that brush. It assumes that the main problem with the immigration system is how easy it is to get into the country without going through the proper channels, when the real problem is how difficult it is to go through those proper channels.

I like the phrase "removable alien," for these purposes.

"It assumes that the main problem with the immigration system is how easy it is to get into the country without going through the proper channels, when the real problem is how difficult it is to go through those proper channels."

Those two things mean exactly the same thing, dude. Besides, why *should* we make the legal channels (or allow the illegal channels to be) easy?

That is not the same -- it is relatively easy to get in without going through the paperwork, practically impossible to get in going through it.

It should be easy to immigrate because 1. there is a fundamental human right to movement; 2. you don't have the right to tell me with whom I can do business, make contracts, live, marry, etc, and this includes making distinctions based on national origin; 3. practically speaking, immigration control has led to all sorts of terrible big government and anti-civil liberty law, and I don't want to see that anymore.

@ckroberts,

"It assumes that the main problem with the immigration system is how easy it is to get into the country without going through the proper channels, when the real problem is how difficult it is to go through those proper channels."

You're conflating the status of some people's actions with your preferred solution to it. If the latter is significantly impacting the nomenclature you prefer for the former, then you are probably doing what Invictus says, using a euphemism in order to promote a policy objective.

In other words, it may well be that we allow outrageously few immigrants into the country legally, and that our laws are completely unreasonable. That does not change the fact that those who are here in violation of our current laws are illegal immigrants.

@ckr,

I was responding to your first post, above. This is to your second. At the outset, I'll just note that I actually agree with you that immigration should be much easier. That said, I consider these terrible arguments:

"1. there is a fundamental human right to movement;"

There is, but that's really more an issue with one's home country. North Korea violates the fundamental right to movement by not allowing its citizens to leave, even to countries that would permit them.

On the other hand, there is not a fundamental human right to move wherever you please. You have no right to move through my apartment, nor even through my yard if I don't want you to. Similarly, an entire community/nation has every right to exclude those from its confines that it wishes to. A claim to the contrary would be highly novel and require a good deal more than assertion.

There is nothing wrong with reasonable immigration law -- in fact, it's a must for any country that plans to survive.

"2. you don't have the right to tell me with whom I can do business, make contracts, live, marry, etc, and this includes making distinctions based on national origin;"

You're confused here, though. The "national origin" distinction in law refers to the origin of people who are legally present; not the immigration status of people who are not supposed to be here at all. Congress has ever right to prescribe the latter, including to discriminate based on national origin when it does so (quotas by country, etc.)

It's true that you can do business with anybody, but that doesn't mean you can be anywhere to do it; it's true that you can marry anybody, and almost universally our immigration law accomodates that reality; it's certainly *not* true that you can live anywhere (either in principle or reality).

@ ckr

"there is a fundamental human right to movement"

No there isn't. America, just as any other sovereign nation, can enforce our borders however we goddamned want and remove non-citizens from our territory.

"this includes making distinctions based on national origin"

I'm not proposing making distinctions based on national origin. I'm proposing making decisions based on legal status. If you are not a citizen of the United States or you don't have the explicit permission of the United States government to be in the United States, then the United States can (and should) remove you from the United States. At least in an abstract sense (and arguably in a practical sense), the arguments supporting deportation are more logical than the arguments opposing deportation.

"practically speaking, immigration control has led to all sorts of terrible big government and anti-civil liberty law"

If you are not here legally, then you should not have any civil liberties. Here's a simple proposal: If X person is neither a citizen of the United States nor a legal US resident, then person X will be returned to their country of origin as expeditiously as possible.

For starters, anyone who is arrested or otherwise accused of a crime and cannot prove their US citizenry or legal residence (within a reasonable amount of time and provided with procedures in place to allow them to retrieve the proper documents if they possess them) Second, all American citizens have the common law right to make a citizen's arrest. If a citizen knows someone to be in the country illegally, there should be mechanisms in place for that person to easily and quickly arrest the illegal alien and turn the alien over to the proper authorities. Any false accusations/baseless arrests would be treated normally (citizens are more liable than police officers; in other words citizens have to be damned sure that a crime has been committed in order to make an arrest), with the falsely accused being able to take legal action against the would-be arresting citizen.

^All of that could be done easily with no more government

Interesting fun fact about immigration violations: they are considered "administrative," not "criminal" violations.

That doesn't mean they're less serious. You can still get scooped up by ICE and thrown in jail for overstaying.

What "non-criminal" DOES mean is that these people don't have a right to counsel when they get picked up.

We already had a discussion about the non-criminal nature above, AWB. : )

oh my bad

Semck, I will defer to your legal expertise as to the proper use of the word "illegal." But I will say that tons of people have made the argument otherwise, though. Example from the first Google response: "But describing an immigrant as illegal is legally inaccurate. Being in the U.S. without proper documents is a civil offense, not a criminal one. (Underscoring this reality, Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote for the majority opinion on SB 1070, Arizona’s controversial immigration law: “As a general rule, it is not a crime for a movable alien to remain in the United States.”) In a country that believes in due process of the law, calling an immigrant illegal is akin to calling a defendant awaiting trial a criminal." http://ideas.time.com/2012/09/21/immigration-debate-the-problem-with-the-word-illegal/

As to the fundamental right of movement, that's when two competing rights collide; in the case of someone peacefully and in a non-emergency situation wants to move, your property rights take precedent. But the government entirely limiting the free movement of persons is a different story. I dispute the validity of the analogy of a government to a family or home -- the government is not my mom, who could rightly tell me to stop hanging out with those kids when I was in middle school. I think we can get to a key difference in perception with this quote:

" Congress has ever right to prescribe the latter, including to discriminate based on national origin when it does so (quotas by country, etc.)"

Congress has the _power_ to do that; I deny Congress has the _right_ to do so, outside of very minor limitations primarily related to the safety of American citizens (checking for wanted criminals, infectious disease, or during times of declared war, that sort of thing). A government does not have rights; people do. For most of this country's history, the United States government did not in any meaningful sense limit the large majority of immigration, and we were better for it (nation of immigrants and all that). Admittedly this is an opinion far outside most mainstream thinking, so I don't expect everyone to agree with it unreservedly.

@Gunfighter: Sovereignty is a fake idea a bunch of kings came up with so they could kill the wrong kinds of religious minorities without having to worry that a different ruler would intervene. Like currency, it's a useful concept in that things are probably better with it than without it, but let's don't pretend there is some meaningful underlying principle beyond convenience for accepting it.

"If you are not here legally, then you should not have any civil liberties."

Civil liberties do not come from the government. They come from God, or, if you're not theologically inclined, from our shared human nature (or whatever). Further, that's an unconstitutional perspective: the Constitution does not protect the rights only of citizens; it protects the rights of people (or, more accurately, limits the power of the government to infringe on the liberties of the people).

"anyone who is arrested or otherwise accused of a crime and cannot prove their US citizenry or legal residence"

This demand for your papers, please, is, again, a hallmark of totalitarianism. We used to be proud that in America, unlike our dictatorial and imperial rivals, you could freely travel the country without fear that some government agent would challenge you that you weren't where you were supposed to be. Why does the government get to decide who lives in the country, and not, say, the owner of the home in which they live and the business at which they work? This is the road to authoritarianism.

@ ckroberts

"Sovereignty is a fake idea a bunch of kings came up with so they could kill the wrong kinds of religious minorities without having to worry that a different ruler would intervene."

I won't argue that sovereignty as a concept has a very ugly history, but it is far from being a "fake" idea. When all of the rhetoric is filtered, the bottom line is that you basically have three choices in terms of governance: 1) Authoritarian global government. Ostensibly open borders but the UN runs your life. 2) Anarchy. Anyone can go wherever they want but there is no law or order. 3) Some happy medium where distinct sovereign nations (hopefully) cooperate (or at least ignore one another) for the mutual benefit of all involved citizens from each respective nationality. Each nation installs its own form of self-governance that best fits its culture, history, and national identity.

"Civil liberties do not come from the government. They come from God, or, if you're not theologically inclined, from our shared human nature (or whatever). Further, that's an unconstitutional perspective: the Constitution does not protect the rights only of citizens; it protects the rights of people (or, more accurately, limits the power of the government to infringe on the liberties of the people)."

My choice of words was poor. What I meant to say is that everyone has God-given (or human nature or whatever you want to call it) rights, but freedom of movement is not among them. I cannot sneak into Mexico just as I cannot trespass on my neighbor's property. People without the permission of the United States government cannot sneak into America, just as they would not be allowed to sneak into a military base.

"This demand for your papers, please, is, again, a hallmark of totalitarianism."

I really am a libertarian at heart, but when it comes to illegal immigration, the negative effects of allowing illegal immigrants to remain is far greater than the negative effects of a "papers please" society. Freedom is sacred, but so is the rule of law. Both must be considered and balanced in a civilized and just society.

Having a "papers please" society is FAR better than a society in which all sorts of (potentially highly dangerous) humans of completely unknown background are allowed to do whatever they please without interference. I would gladly show my ID whenever challenged if it meant that the illegal immigrant cancer would be eradicated.

@ckr,

Thank you for the link. Yes, there are a lot of people on the internet (even writing for Time) with flawed legal beliefs. The writer you quote clearly conflates "illegal" with "criminal."

" in the case of someone peacefully and in a non-emergency situation wants to move, your property rights take precedent. But the government entirely limiting the free movement of persons is a different story. I dispute the validity of the analogy of a government to a family or home -- the government is not my mom, who could rightly tell me to stop hanging out with those kids when I was in middle school."

I think the weakness of this argument is highlighted by the fact that it rests on, "The government is not my mom."

Yes, the government is not your mom. The federal government has few and delineated powers. Controlling immigration is one of them, and an important one.

You've really lost the argument as soon as you admit that property rights are sufficient to curb the right to movement. If property rights are sufficient to curb the right to movement, then a community collectively can also say who is allowed on its property.

If you wish to flesh out your argument better, it would be helpful to know precisely what conception of rights you are referring to. It is easy to assert, "There is a right to movement, and it trumps the right of a government to control its borders." Since this is not a conclusion commonly reached, it would be helpful to know the analysis in some detail.

"Congress has the _power_ to do that; I deny Congress has the _right_ to do so, outside of very minor limitations primarily related to the safety of American citizens"

Congress has the right to exercise any of its delegated powers (though it is not a natural right). But sure, we can say power. Congress has the power, delegated to it by the free persons who ratified the Constitution, to do that.

You must therefore think that they did not have that power to delegate. I would love to know how that could be.

"For most of this country's history, the United States government did not in any meaningful sense limit the large majority of immigration, and we were better for it (nation of immigrants and all that). Admittedly this is an opinion far outside most mainstream thinking, so I don't expect everyone to agree with it unreservedly."

For all of its history, the reality of immigration has been completely other than you seem to think. Yes, we let enormous numbers of people in during those times; but there was never the least question that it was by permission, and that we (by which I mean, the federal government) had every right to withdraw or modify that permission, something that it did on several occasions even before the new systems were put in in the 1920s.

In other words, your historical argument is nothing to the point of whether the government violates rights when it controls immigration.

I have been too busy to continue this good discussion and I don't know if anyone cares anymore, but briefly:

Gunfighter, I don't think those are the only three options. I don't know why global government (which I oppose) would necessarily be authoritarian. But the nation-state is a relatively recent invention. It will go away someday. I don't know what will replace it (although I am not optimistic). Also, you can have a government which keeps dangerous people out without either seriously limiting immigration or having anarchy. I would much prefer, as in almost all things, to have too little government rather than too much.

Semck, the government has all sorts of powers to do things it has no right to -- infringe on free speech, round up racial minorities, etc etc. And I should clarify about my reference to the history of immigration. I am saying mass immigration is a good thing, not a legal requirement. I feel like we may be in an "agree to disagree" position, although I do want to point out this part:

"You've really lost the argument as soon as you admit that property rights are sufficient to curb the right to movement. If property rights are sufficient to curb the right to movement, then a community collectively can also say who is allowed on its property."

I am not saying that property rights universally are sufficient to curb movement, especially with regards to public/government property. Otherwise that would mean a political community can collectively decide to allow everyone besides, say, Muslims to use it. The government introduced all sorts of limitation designed to reduce the number of immigrants from certain alleged racial groups, a pattern I reject for then and for now. I guess to sum up my disagreement with this argument: property owners have certain limitations in how they use their land; the government has certain limitations in how it uses its property; that means the government has strict limitations on the extent to which it can limit the rights of individuals with regards to that property.

@ ckroberts

"I don't know what will replace it (although I am not optimistic)"

I think the nation-state is here to stay for a while. Presently (and in the foreseeable future) the current system of nation-states is in nearly everyone's best interests.

"I would much prefer, as in almost all things, to have too little government rather than too much."

I agree with that statement, and I'm not advocating that Big Brother take over everything and "solve" the problem. I'm just saying that we need to put a stop to illegal immigration. To a very limited and admittedly arbitrary point, I'm willing to pull my ID a little more than usual. Playing around with rights and government interference thereof is definitely playing with fire, but the situation calls for it. Just like the draft, more vigorous enforcement of immigration law is a necessary evil at this point.