Throughout United States history, we have had many immigration policies. Some of them banned a certain group of people. In other parts of history, we did not care who came in and out of our country. Right now, we have a president who has a strict immigration policy. But in the past, presidents were very lenient on who came in and out of our country. Even with our “strict” immigration policy, there are still people getting into our country. Even if we build a wall at the Mexico border, there are still ways to get into a country illegally. Even though there are ways to become a legal citizen of the United States, people still want to come into our country illegally.
There has been so many different policies throughout our history. Starting in 1790, we had an act known as the Naturalizations Act. This was the first rule for naturalization in the United States. “Free white persons” are allowed naturalization if they have been in the country for two or more years. This law also says that children of naturalized citizens, under 21, will also become citizens. (“Major U.S. Immigration Laws, 1790 – Present.” Migrationpolicy.org, 12 Aug. 2015, www.migrationpolicy.org/research/timeline-1790.) I think this immigration policy is fair, because if a naturalized citizen has a child, then they should automatically become a citizen too. Children did not ask to come into this world, so why should they have to go through a naturalization process?
Later on in our history, we had a Chinese Exclusion Act in 1892. Basically, this stopped immigration from the Chinese into our country. This law also says that any chinese person unlawfully abiding in the United States will be put in prison along with a year of hard labor. (“Major U.S. Immigration Laws, 1790 – Present.” Migrationpolicy.org, 12 Aug. 2015, www.migrationpolicy.org/research/timeline-1790.) I think that a certain group of people should not be punished for bringing their drugs into the country. This did not stop the opium addiction so what good did it do? It did not do any good because people were still addicted to their opium and we know this because of some movies we used to watch as children. In the Wizard of Oz, one of the scenes in the movie was talking about opium. And in Alice In Wonderland, the writer of that movie was probably high on opium. This did not help the opium addiction, but we still punished a certain group of people. Why should we punish a group of people when it is not going to do any good?
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In 2005, we had this act called the REAL ID Act. This expanded terrorist background checks and you can be deported if something comes up on the background check. This also says that they have to have a background check or be verified before issued a driver’s license or identification card.(“Major U.S. Immigration Laws, 1790 – Present.” Migrationpolicy.org, 12 Aug. 2015, www.migrationpolicy.org/research/timeline-1790.) This is fair, no matter where someone comes from. If someone is coming from Germany or Ireland, this is fair. We should not have to be scared of someone coming into our country. When Al-Qaeda attacked our country, we were scared of people from that area.
We still are scared of people from that area. We stereotype them as “coming here to ruin our country and blow up all of our stuff”. We do not want them in our country because of what a group did seventeen years ago. Just because a certain group of people did something bad, it does not mean that everyone from that group of certain individuals are bad. The vast majority of these people from the middle east really are not that bad. They are just stereotyped everyday for something that happened seventeen years ago. Even now with a more recent group that has been terrible called ISIS. Isis made headlines all over the world, so people from the middle east are now being more stereotyped because of what we see on television. Just because a group of people are bad, does not mean everyone from the general area is bad.
Now on to my opinion, I think our immigration policy should be open, but people should have to go through background and mental health checks. Even if there are background checks, there are ways to get around them. Mental health is one thing that is overlooked in this country, this is one thing that should not be overlooked. Mental health is so important and we do not even care about it. Most of the people who shoot up schools are very mentally ill. Even if people are cleared for mental health, half of the people who have a mental health problem do not even go to the doctor, it is undiagnosed. Anyway, onto immigration policies, we should have immigration rules, but I do not think there should be a test to become a citizen. I think that if you pass your background check and extensive mental health check, then people should be granted access to become a citizen.
Building a wall is not going to help our country in any way, shape, or form. People are still going to find illegal ways to get into our country. Mexicans are not the problem, people going undiagnosed with mental health problems is the problem. It is not even the mexicans shooting up our schools, it is mostly white boys with mommy issues and other problems that are going unnoticed. When we talk about “building a wall” this is not going to stop our already problematic country. People from different countries are going to come in and possibly do the same thing, not just Mexicans. We cannot just build a wall around our country to keep it safe. Anyone who wants to get into our country will find a way weather there is a wall or not. Our problem in this country is mental health problems going unnoticed, not illegals. More mental health problems go undiagnosed than the ones that are diagnosed.
In conclusion, I think we should have an open door policy, but there should be strict rules. Mental health checks and background checks are key to this policy. Everyday, more people are going undiagnosed with a mental health issue. Because people look at depression as people want to die and they are just weird. But it is more than that, these people really do not want to die, they just want the pain to stop. When we say background checks, this means we need to check in more than just the United States. We need to check specifically in the country the immigrants are coming from and the surrounding areas. An open door policy is ideal, but we need to have strict background and mental health checks.
