This Land is Your Land

Control of our borders has become a very controversial issue. I am not sure Liberals, Conservatives and everyone in between will ever agree on how the United States should respond to the control of our borders. Therefore, I thought it would be appropriate to remind or educate those who have forgotten or were never aware of our history.

The United States has been controlling Immigration for over 100 years. Ellis Island opened in 1892 as a federal immigration station. Millions of newly arrived immigrants passed through the station during that time. It has been estimated that close to 40 percent of all current U.S. citizens can trace at least one of their ancestors to Ellis Island

When Ellis Island opened, a great change was taking place in immigration to the United States.

As arrivals from northern and western Europe, Germany, Ireland, Britain and the Scandinavian countries. Among this new generation were Jews escaping from political and economic oppression in czarist Russia and eastern Europe (some 484,000 arrived in 1910 alone) and Italians escaping poverty in their country. There were also Poles, Hungarians, Czechs, Serbs, Slovaks and Greeks, along with non-Europeans from Syria, Turkey and Armenia.

The reasons they left their homes in the Old World included war, drought, famine and religious persecution, and all had hopes for greater opportunity in the New World. Border Patrol operations have been conducted in the Thousand Islands/Watertown area of New York since the U.S. Border Patrol's inception in 1924 with an initial station in Clayton, NY. Prior to world War II, additional back-up stations were located at Cape Vincent, Lowville, Adams, and Alexandria Bay.

The main enforcement emphasis at the time was on liquor smuggling from Canada. In 1944, the Watertown Border Patrol Station was established to bolster the Clayton, NY Station and to better control transportation routes.

Enforcement priorities changed to the prevention of illegal entry by prisoners of war and subversive aliens from Canada. The Watertown Station closed in 1949 with the establishment of the New York City Sector and reorganization of sectors in the Northeast Region. During the 1950's, Canada received thousands of displaced persons and refugees from Europe, many of who were excluded from the United States. This resulted in an increase of illegal entrants across the St. Lawrence River and a change of enforcement strategies.

Today we are faced with enemies who would take pleasure in killing Americans and even more pleasure if they are Christians. Most Americans enjoy living in safe communities. Unfortunately, there are some exceptions. There are specific things that are outside our control, but our borders? We should certainly be able to control our borders.

It is true that the United States has always been a land of opportunity. A land that people have immigrated to since Columbus first discovered America. I am certainly not against people immigrating to our country. In fact, my grandparents immigrated here via Ellis Island. However, to my knowledge, back then people weren’t coming to America to kill Americans. Sure there was corruption and there will always be corruption and live will be lost in the crossfire.

The reasons and motives have changed. I don’t know of any way that we can look at an immigrant and determine whether they have good intentions or the intent to kill. For that reason and more than ever before, we MUST protect our borders and control who enters our country. This is especially true if we want to continue having safe communities to live in.

My wife and I visited Ellis Island last year. We spent hours there reading and learning about the history of Ellis Island. It was interesting to learn there are a set of questions (i.e., over 100 questions) that an immigrant must be able to answer about America in order to become a citizen. Like many other things that requires hard work, study, etc., during the process of becoming a legal U.S. citizen a person gains an appreciation for this country and learns to appreciate and respect their accomplishments.

The process of becoming an American is still being followed. We should give every illegal American who has lived in America for X number of years the opportunity to apply for citizenship. This process should be enforced once again for every immigrant and every illegal American to comply with. Following the correct process to become a legalized American citizen is a very reasonable request for anyone who truly wishes to become an American citizen. Those who don't want to follow the correct process, probably doesn't deserve to become an American and certainly does not have the right to live in this country.

God Bless America!