The initiative announced Monday by President Bush is consistent with his long-standing approach to dealing with illegal immigration across the nation's southern border. While there might be five points, the president's primary focus is on two: border security and a guest worker/citizenship program that deals with the estimated 12 million illegal immigrants already in the United States.
The president, whose understanding of immigration from Mexico matured during his service as governor of Texas, has it about right. He intends to beef up border security. At the same time he wants a pragmatic, humane policy to deal with illegal immigrants already here, most of whom are working, raising families and paying taxes.
The president's program can work, but only if politicians on the right and left put aside their biases in favor of the greater good for the nation. That's a tall order in an election year. It calls for enlightened leadership in Congress. Don't hold your breath. Immigration is one of those hot-button issues that brings out demagogues, panderers and nativists. The U.S. House of Representatives has its share of them.
The president, however, has a larger responsibility. His proposal to secure the U.S.-Mexican border by using National Guard troops in non-law enforcement roles is a sensible temporary measure that will give the federal government time to train several thousand border patrol officers. The president does not want to militarize the border with a friendly nation. Rather, he wants to deploy the Guard while law enforcement adds more personnel. It's a good idea that needs, and has, the support of the governor of Texas, a Republican, and the governor of Arizona, a Democrat.
The president's realistic treatment of illegal aliens already in the United States is a practical expression of the compassionate conservatism that was the foundation of his political philosophy. Despite characterizations by some conservatives that the president's plan would be an amnesty, an honest assessment shows it anything but. Immigrants would be put on a path to citizenship (if that was their goal) that would require everything from fines to criminal background checks to going to the end of the citizenship line. The president put it very well: "There is a rational middle ground between granting an automatic path to citizenship ... and a program of mass deportation," he said in his nationally televised address from the Oval Office.
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Common sense is difficult to find in the immigration debate. Extremists on both ends of the political spectrum tend to dominate the national shouting match. President Bush staked out the middle ground - the right place for a nation of immigrants to develop policy that secures the southern border and ensures that America remains a welcoming nation.
Forum editorials represent the opinion of Forum management and the newspaper's Editorial Board.
