The Nation - Still no give on immigration issue - Bill offering citizenship for the young can't muster enough votes.

WASHINGTON — The Senate on Wednesday rejected a bill offering the children of illegal immigrants a path to citizenship if they serve in the military or complete two years of higher education. The defeat of the measure, which had attracted bipartisan support, underscored the difficulty of enacting even a narrowly tailored proposal in the polarizing atmosphere surrounding immigration reform.

The vote on the proposal was 52 to 44, short of the 60-vote margin needed to prevent a filibuster and begin debate. It was one small piece of a comprehensive immigration bill that collapsed in the Senate earlier this year, and it sparked a brief but heated debate.

Opponents called the bill a form of amnesty and argued that it would create incentives for illegal immigrants to cross the border with their children. But Sen. Richard J. Durbin (D-Ill.), who supported the measure, said that "to turn on these children and treat them as criminals is an indication of the level of emotion and, in some cases, bigotry and hatred that is involved in this debate."

His remarks were directed at Rep. Tom Tancredo (R-Colo.), who on Tuesday suggested that immigrants who had attended a meeting in Durbin's office were illegal and should have been arrested.

Tancredo, a presidential candidate who has staked his campaign on tough immigration enforcement, dismissed Durbin's understanding of the issue: "I don't expect Dick Durbin to be able to tell the difference between legal residents and illegal aliens."

The debate on Capitol Hill suggested that the public outrage kicked up last summer when the Senate considered comprehensive immigration reform was still driving the political agenda.

Proponents of the Dream Act -- the Development, Relief and Education for Alien Minors Act -- had hoped it would be one of several less-ambitious changes to the nation's immigration law to pass this year.

But Wednesday's defeat signaled that any further attempts to help illegal immigrants might have to be balanced with action to increase border security or enforcement.

"All of America's awake on this one," said Sen. James M. Inhofe (R-Okla.), suggesting amnesty was the end game of the measure that failed Wednesday. "They know exactly what we're doing."

The environment has become so poisonous that Durbin, in a news conference after the vote, thanked not only the Republicans who joined his effort but also the Democrats who he said "stood by me on this."