Illegal Aliens

I was struck by the relationship between two Jan. 16 articles. The first article, prominently displayed on the front page, lamented the plight of illegal alien workers who fear or have suffered the consequences of attempting to unionize: being turned over to the INS and deported. On the front page of the Metro section was another article discussing the epidemic of identity theft and how the victims suffer and how difficult such crimes are to solve. The connection between these two articles is the simple fact that every illegal alien who is working in the United States had to show proof of legal residency and provide a Social Security number for payroll purposes.

Archbishop Roger Mahoney's protest (Letters, May 18) of Supervisor Mike Antonvich's campaign ad calling attention to Southern California's illegal immigration problem is just the latest installment in a long-running series of actions and public statements casting him as the most openly pro-Hispanic Catholic bishop in modern U.S. history. There certainly is nothing inappropriate in the archbishop giving attention to the largest ethnic group in his territory, but over the years, in Fresno and Stockton as well as in Los Angeles, he has allowed his obsession with Hispanic relations to blind him to the existence of very serious problems that uncontrolled illegal immigration is creating.

Why not impose penalties on illegal immigrants as deterrent to cross the border illegally? ask Barry R. Chiswick and Carmel U. Chiswick in their article (Editorial Pages, Oct. 9). It is obvious how naive these two people are regarding the people who come across the border. How many detention facilities, and how big, would it take to temporarily detain 1 million undocumented workers a year? This "solution" is not going "to stop the revolving door." As an illegal worker myself, I can speak from personal experience.

Once again, The Times' editors have chosen to be selective with the facts concerning my proposals to reform our immigration policies. The problem is not immigrants--the problem is illegal immigrants, a crucial point that your editorial writer chose to ignore almost altogether. I support generous legal immigration, believing that newcomers to our society can make a tremendous contribution. But I also believe that the United States has a right to determine how many immigrants we can accept every year, and clearly we have lost control over our borders.

Illegal immigration costs U.S. taxpayers billions of dollars yearly and is the most critical domestic problem the United States--and Orange County--faces. Local communities are experiencing a wave of serious crimes, many gun-related. A high percentage of these crimes are being committed by Mexican illegals. It's obvious that these people cross the border to do other things besides pick strawberries. Nevertheless, a recent (April 7) editorial in the Los Angeles Times criticized the ordinance passed by the Orange City Council to control the activities of Mexican illegals within the city limits.

Stephen Moore attempts to prove that illegal immigration is beneficial to the economy (Editorial Pages, April 15). He offers as proof the answers he received from 28 economists he recently polled. Most agreed with him. Presumably, the answering economists used as a criterion for their conclusions the classical economic principle that labor is to be classified the same as materials in any cost consideration. This, of course, is simply an extension of the supply-side theory, and gives no thought to the humanistic, social and other overall facets of a complex problem.

City Directors Tuesday approved a contract with the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service to provide up to 10 beds weekly in the city jail for illegal aliens who have completed prison terms and are awaiting deportation. The INS will pay $75 per person, per day. Before approving the contract, officials surveyed Latino leaders in the city, who they said endorsed the idea.