A Wall (or Fence) on America's Southern Border Would Be Worthless

Illegal immigration has been a hot topic in political circles the past year and a half or so, though attention has shifted lately following the demise of the reform bill championed by Sen. John McCain (R-AZ). But while America's eyes have temporarily looked away from the issue, it remains on the periphery, as imposing and frustrating as ever.

The McCain-Kennedy bill died an ugly death on the Senate floor, as Republican and Democratic senators alike ripped it to shreds (and with it, McCain's presidential aspirations). This outcome was inevitable. In a political era in which partisanship rules, the bill was simply too non-partisan to have any chance. Republicans denounced the opportunity for citizenship it provided as "amnesty," a very negative, though technically accurate, characterization. The "a-word" alone was enough to kill the bill.

However, the question remains: How should the U.S. address illegal immigration? One proposal that keeps getting trumpeted by conservatives is: build a wall. A huge, solid, thousand-mile long, twenty-foot high, six-foot deep wall of uncompromising, illegal alien head-crushing stone and mortar.

Such an awesome wall, constructed across the nation's southern border, will stop the flow of illegal immigrants from Central America, as well as stop attempts by terrorists to sneak into the U.S. undetected by way of Mexico. No more illegals stealing American jobs! No more aliens dragging down wages! And if all goes well enough, no more damn Spanish-language billboards!

The wall idea would be the perfect solution, save for one minor detail: It won't work. Walls NEVER work. The Berlin Wall, erected and patrolled vigilantly by the most vicious military of the 20^th century, didn't stop Soviet citizens from escaping to West Berlin from the East. The Great Wall of China, so massive that it is visible from space, couldn't repel a few thousand Mongols on horseback. The little miniature wall around my old house's front yard couldn't stop a jackrabbit in its tracks.

A wall's power is derived from the idea it represents, not the function it performs. The Berlin Wall said to the world, "Communism begins here." The Great Wall of China screamed, "We will never lose our cultural identity!" My house's mini-wall desperately pleaded, "Please, mister jackrabbit, don't poop next to the rose bush!"

A wall (or fence) between the U.S. and Mexico will do nothing to stop or slow illegal immigration. Even now, in the few places where physical barriers between the two countries do exist, undocumented workers are using sophisticated networks of underground tunnels to get from one side of the border to the other. How, exactly, will a wall stop this kind of basement-level traffic? Will the wall penetrate ten, fifteen, twenty feet under the surface? If so, the workers will simply dig tunnels that go thirty feet down.

Even if you despise the reality of illegal immigration, and believe (like I do) that hopping the border illegally is a criminal offense, you have to at least admire the immigrants' fortitude. Felons or not, they are willing to cross miles of desert and general wasteland for the chance to pick strawberries for a few bucks an hour, fourteen hours a day. Against this kind of determination-no, this kind of desperation-a wall is little better than a stop sign.

The real question in the issue of illegal immigration is not "How do we stop them from coming?"; rather, it is "WHY do they want to come?" Why are so many millions of people risking (and often losing) their lives, as well as leaving behind their whole families, so they can live in handmade shanty towns and pull weeds all day in a country that doesn't want them there in the first place? Until America begins to ask herself this question-the REAL question-there is not a wall, law, prison sentence, or border patrol agent on Earth powerful enough to truly put the issue to rest.

Any schmuck with a middle school diploma should be able to realize that building a big wall to stop illegal immigration is a colossal (literally) waste of time and money. It is a simplistic, reactionary solution to a problem for which debate has been, to date, dominated by neoconservative nationalists who try to pass off their politically self-serving jingoism as honest patriotism.

As stated before, a wall's power is derived from its message. And were one to be erected on the U.S.-Mexico border, the message would most clearly be, "We don't know what the hell we're doing."