Illegal Immigration and the Authority of the Law

May 2, 2008
by Evans Munyemesha

"When law and morality contradict each other, the citizen has the cruel alternative of either losing his moral sense or losing his respect for the law."

Much is made of the law as it relates to the inevitable distribution of populations by impersonal forces on the earth, a fact so obvious that it is unquestionable. But political systems, as is almost always the case, have devised a means to interfere with this natural process, sowing misery and poverty among people who, if left alone, would move freely and peacefully, as they seek to meet their needs through efforts of their own. These efforts at free movement and association of different people of all races by their own means are thwarted by a vast network of legal obstacles erected by political systems with the aid of the foggy science of the law

It is now almost a truism that the end of the law is always virtuous and therefore must be attained at all costs by all nations. To this effect, there are various organizations formed primarily to promote it. Any hostile and critical remarks against this 'sacred' law are treated as heresy or 'out of touch with reality.'

This attitude, intended to preserve the apparent integrity of the law against the critical examinations of its farsighted critics, I believe, has its roots in the general attraction of wanting to tremble before vaguely defined antiquated legal customs, and in that ubiquitous fear of questioning that which the majority hold in reverence in spite of the fact that much of what constitutes the law is founded on the principle of expediency. Yet a candid review of this ancient doctrine reveals vicious errors that are repugnant to all those who hold every other human life in high esteem and bow before the altar of common liberty, pledging their allegiance to none but only to the freedom of all.

If that which is called the law is pregnant with vicious errors, as I certainly know it does, its principles then, like those of a political prostitute, would be traitorous against the life-affirming principles of liberty. But as to attack, without grounds, an almost universally accepted doctrine would be the mark of a savage, it is incumbent upon me to support my allegations as truthfully as my faculties would permit me.

As a society of human beings have equal claims to the habitation of the earth and the enjoyment of its resources, it follows naturally that a person born in one country has rights equal to another born in another country. This is to say that the right of a person born in Mexico to subsist anywhere on this earth by his own efforts is no less than the right of another person born in America to do the same anywhere. That someone was born in one country and another in a different country are a mere accident of nature over which neither the former nor the latter has any control.

If the foregoing is admissible and true, then the question before us is: Can a people claim the collective ownership and use of a portion of the earth in such a way as to prevent others from its use and call them illegal immigrants? [On this I concur with an Englishman who pointed out somewhere that when all own something collectively, none owns anything individually; and with Murray Newton Rothbard who said something to the effect that whoever is currently in control of a public institution is its owner.]

If we pretend for the sake of argument that the assumption of collective ownership is sound (as it is admitted by all nations everywhere) and must be protected then the designation 'illegal immigration' is not only well-founded but the act of 'immigrating illegally' is as well a breach of the right to property, and therefore, recourse must be sought to remedy this social disease. In our day, that remedy rests with our legal system which is fed an endless diet of laws by our omniscient Congress.

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Let us bear in mind that there was a time when law (which is the basis of our legal system) said to be derived from the Crown was a political custom held in high esteem and dutifully obeyed. With time, this savage custom passed away, making room for law that has its origin in the popular consent communicated through Congress.

The change of the source of law from the Crown to Congress--- and the fact that it was illegal for Black people in the American colonies to read, write, and be free; that it was illegal for Black people and women to vote; that it was illegal for the races to intermarry; that it was at one time illegal to manufacture, sell, and transport alcoholic beverages, etc.--- implies that the law is fallible and transitory, drawing its life from the prejudices of the Congressmen with the passive support of public consent. The law as such is not essential but incidental to the matter of immigration.

Before it is taken for granted that the case against the issue of 'illegal immigration' is unanswerable, it is significant that a brief examination of the legal system which is claimed to be the foundation of the argument against individuals to move from other geographical locations without government-approved papers to this one because of various causes commonly in search of economic security. This brief review has nothing to do with considerations of 'conventional privilege' or 'legislative convenience' but with pure equity.

The best meant legislation, as is well known, will not fail to inflict misery on the whole of society, including on the very classes of people it is usually intended to benefit, for no Congress of men could ever know the true interests of the people they have never met personally and literally represent them. It is evident, therefore, that every law will prove to be mischievous as those who made it wish to do that which could not be done without eventually causing harm: That is to say, law making is pretence at mastering Nature, attempting to control it by human ingenuity and cunning.

To master Nature is of course a feat outside the competence and collective wisdom of a Congress of men. To try and master Nature as a means to eventually controlling it by imperfect and inadequate congressmen is itself proof of the small-mindedness, ignorance, and arrogance of the lawmakers.

In the exercise of this power of intermeddling with the private pursuits and individual occupations of other human beings, congressmen arrogate themselves power with which they in vain attempt to subvert the glorious laws of creation. By so doing, they assume a function that will compel them to become the universal dispensers of good and evil.

As a general rule, the prosperity of a rational man depends on himself. His talents and his virtues shape his fortunes. He is therefore the best judge of his own affairs, and should not be permitted by any other but himself to seek his own happiness in his own way, unshackled by the heedless interference of Congressmen and their imperfect laws, so long as he does not violate the principle of equal liberty, nor transgress the general laws of Nature that secure his person and property.

Having admitted earlier, for arguments' sake, that collective ownership is sound, we are intractably compelled to hold the view that the law is a product of congress, emerging by violating or tending to the violation of security of rights of person and property. This view, absurd as it is, takes the false assumption on collective ownership for its basis and the preposterous presumption that, that through congress and its unproductive employment of legislation, our rights could be made more superior than the rights of others(such as the rights of the Mexicans!), crumbles the whole premise upon which the idea of the law (and illegal immigration) are founded on account that a people could not be bound to the law which comes into being by allying itself with political force and encouraging the ruin of the same principles upon which it is said to be founded. As the law could not operate without direct or implied political force; and as force is contrary to justice, morality, liberty, and security of rights, the argument against illegal immigration melts before our eyes as a highly profitable chimera.

Moreover, were the law otherwise satisfactory, it would be still useless in this matter: If the purpose of the law is to enlarge freedom and secure justice, then the law must first be shown to be equally just before it could be enforced.

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