I’ve wanted to post a photo of this sign for months now.  It appeared late last summer in my town.  Some consider it an eyesore.  Others call it “The Liberty Wall.”  I’m in the latter group.  Suddenly now it’s getting national attention.  That’s a good thing.  I’ll tell you why in a minute.  First read the sign.

There’s a battle taking place in my town.  I did not even know about this battle until the first skirmish had been won last summer by local xenophobes.  They managed to pass the most restrictive, invasive, fearful anti-immigrant laws in the country.  It was such a horrible law that we managed to come under the scrutiny of the United Nations.  Not the US … not my state … my COUNTY!!!

The bare bones of the law are that the police may ask for anyone’s papers that they consider to be suspicious.  So … if anyone gets stopped for any traffic violation, the police may question them about their immigration status.  It amounts to a Fourth Amendment violation of our Constitution.  But who among the immigrant population has the wherewithall to take this fight to the Supreme Court?  Or who among them knows that this is possible?

For the first several months, the nativists strutted around waving their flags considering themselves the victors.  What protectors of the castle they!  Houses began to go vacant.  Families began to disappear.  Stores locked their doors.  Teachers in our schools lost their jobs.  Mortgages were defaulted upon.

The law of unintended consequences began to make itself felt.

As more and more of our population fled the county, our economic substructure has begun to crumble. Our housing market is in the toilet and while real estate prices have fallen around the region, they have fallen so dramatically in my county to have made national news … on PBS! Or so my mother reports.  While the number of children attending ESOL classes has fallen in our county, it has gone up in neighboring counties.  So these families are not going “home” (where ever that might have once been), which is the law’s express intent.  But they are merely shuffling their place within this country.  This has become a high stakes game of NIMBY (Not In My BackYard) where we are using human beings for game pieces and the federal government as our hostage.

So, my question is … how’s that working out?

From what I can see no one is gaining from this foolish law … our local jail is overcrowded with people awaiting deportation because the federal facility has not yet been built.  Our economic structures are beginning a sad crumble because whether we like or not we depend upon these people for support and assistance, just as they depend upon us.  We all live in a system together and when you remove part of it, the ripples cause problems …

So … how’s that working out for ya?