With all due respect to my colleague Roger Pilon, I can’t say I share his views on immigration. This is an old, old argument among libertarians, so it should come as no surprise that someone takes the opposing view here. Roger writes,

We no longer control our southern border, and Congress seems unable or unwilling to do anything about it. It hardly needs saying that a welfare state, in the age of terrorism, cannot have open borders.

It’s never really been the case, though, that we did control that southern border. Passage has always been relatively easy, at least aside from the natural dangers. This may be a good thing or a bad thing, but it’s a matter of historical fact. We can certainly change that, but it will only be by doing something relatively new.

As to the welfare state, don’t expect me to shed any tears. Our welfare state is already well on the path to bankruptcy, with or without illegal immigrants. Compared to the damage being done by native-born U.S. citizens and their cursedly long lifespans, the immigrants’ overall effects are quite small. It would be unkind of us to set up such an ill-considered system and then pin its inevitable demise on others.

And as to terrorism, there are measures we could take that would both combat it and increase individual liberty — like legalizing recreational drugs. Without the black market in drugs, we’d have a lot less to fear from terrorists, particularly on our southern border. I can’t say I favor a liberty-restricting policy to quash terrorism when a liberty-increasing policy seems to do even better.