No Human Being Is Illegal By Ngai, Mae M. Like abortion and guns, immigration has emerged as a hot-button issue in American politics. Because immigration involves concerns in different registers, economic and cultural, it is strangely and perhaps uniquely misaligned in traditional partisan terms (Wong 2006; Zolberg 2006). President Bush cannot manage the split in his own party, between those Republicans who want to exploit immigrants and those who want to expel them. Among Democratic voters, some support cultural diversity and inclusion while others worry that cheaper immigrant labor depresses domestic wages. Political consultants, sensing a no-win situation, are advising Democrats with presidential aspirations to stay clear of the issue altogether. The lack of partisan coherence, however, does not explain why immigration evokes such heated debate. There is a dimension to the debate that seems irrational, impervious to arguments involving empirical data, historical experience, or legal precedent. This was brought home to me after I wrote an op-ed in a major newspaper about how, during the first half of the twentieth century, the U.S. government legalized tens of thousands of illegal European immigrants (Ngai 2006). I received postcards with invectives like, "stupid professor!" I faced similar hostility during a live call-in show on public radio. Confronted with ranting about how immigrants are bad for the United States, I wanted to counter that immigrants are good for the United States. At one level, negative generalizations about immigrants can be refuted point by point: they do not hurt the economy, they expand it; they are more law abiding than the native-born population; they want to learn English and their children all do (Smith and Edmonston 1997; Alba and Nee 2002). But this approach is risky. Generalizations reproduce stereotypes and efface the complexity and diversity of immigrant experience. As Bonnie Honig (2001) has argued, xenophilia is the flip side of xenophobia. In both cases citizens use "immigrants" as a screen onto which they project their own aspirations or frustrations about American democracy. Casting immigrants as bearers of the work ethic, family values, and consensual citizenship renews the tired citizen's faith-liberal capitalism. But when the immigrants disappoint or when conditions change, they become easy scapegoats. As Honig suggests, this kind of immigration discourse is an exercise in nationalism. In an important sense, "Are immigrants good or bad for us?" is the wrong question. It takes as its premise that immigrants are not part of "us." The idea falsely posits that non-citizens are not part of American society and leaves them out of the discussion. The mass demonstrations of Mexicans and other immigrants last spring were significant because they showed that immigrants are no longer content to be the object of discussion but have emerged as subjects with voice and agency. It was particularly noteworthy but p ...

1. No Human Being Is Illegal
By Ngai, Mae M.
Like abortion and guns, immigration has emerged as a hot-
button issue in American politics. Because immigration involves
concerns in different registers, economic and cultural, it is
strangely and perhaps uniquely misaligned in traditional
partisan terms (Wong 2006; Zolberg 2006). President Bush
cannot manage the split in his own party, between those
Republicans who want to exploit immigrants and those who
want to expel them. Among Democratic voters, some support
cultural diversity and inclusion while others worry that cheaper
immigrant labor depresses domestic wages. Political
consultants, sensing a no-win situation, are advising Democrats
with presidential aspirations to stay clear of the issue
altogether.
The lack of partisan coherence, however, does not explain why
immigration evokes such heated debate. There is a dimension to
the debate that seems irrational, impervious to arguments
involving empirical data, historical experience, or legal
precedent. This was brought home to me after I wrote an op-ed
in a major newspaper about how, during the first half of the
twentieth century, the U.S. government legalized tens of
thousands of illegal European immigrants (Ngai 2006). I
received postcards with invectives like, "stupid professor!" I
faced similar hostility during a live call-in show on public
radio. Confronted with ranting about how immigrants are bad
for the United States, I wanted to counter that immigrants are
good for the United States. At one level, negative
generalizations about immigrants can be refuted point by point:
they do not hurt the economy, they expand it; they are more law
abiding than the native-born population; they want to learn
English and their children all do (Smith and Edmonston 1997;
Alba and Nee 2002).
But this approach is risky. Generalizations reproduce

2. stereotypes and efface the complexity and diversity of
immigrant experience. As Bonnie Honig (2001) has argued,
xenophilia is the flip side of xenophobia. In both cases citizens
use "immigrants" as a screen onto which they project their own
aspirations or frustrations about American democracy. Casting
immigrants as bearers of the work ethic, family values, and
consensual citizenship renews the tired citizen's faith-liberal
capitalism. But when the immigrants disappoint or when
conditions change, they become easy scapegoats.
As Honig suggests, this kind of immigration discourse is an
exercise in nationalism. In an important sense, "Are immigrants
good or bad for us?" is the wrong question. It takes as its
premise that immigrants are not part of "us." The idea falsely
posits that non-citizens are not part of American society and
leaves them out of the discussion. The mass demonstrations of
Mexicans and other immigrants last spring were significant
because they showed that immigrants are no longer content to
be the object of discussion but have emerged as subjects with
voice and agency. It was particularly noteworthy but perhaps
not surprising that so many of the participants were female,
from older hotel workers to high school students, giving lie to
the stereotypes that the "illegal alien" is a solo male laborer or
that immigrants are meek. Undocumented immigration involves
men, women, and families, and they are all standing up.
Further, the question assumes that "we" (the United States,
defined by its citizens) have a singular interest above and
against the interests of "them" (all non-citizens and the foreign
countries from whence they came). To be sure, while human
migration is as old as human history, immigration and
naturalization are modern phenomena, part of the international
system based on nation-states that was consolidated in the
period between the late nineteenth century and World War I. In
this system sovereign nations assert their absolute right to
determine, in the first instance, who shall be admitted to
territory and membership and who shall not.
In the United States, immigration was not regulated by the

3. federal government until after the civil war and it was not until
the late 1880s and 1890s that the U.S. Supreme Court invoked
the sovereign principle as the basis for immigration policy.
Before that, it considered immigration part of the commerce
clause of the Constitution; as laborers, immigrants were easily
imagined as “articles of commerce” (Bilder 1996).
But Chinese exclusion, first legislated in 1882, required the
Court to justify why some laborers were desired and others were
not. Was the claim that Chinese were racially unassimilable an
acceptable reason? The Court said yes; in fact, it said, Congress
did not have to justify itself in terms of the Constitution. In the
Chinese Exclusion Case (130 U.S. 518 [1889]) the Court
recognized Congress’s plenary, or absolute power to regulate
immigration as part of its authority over foreign relations, in the
same realm as declaring war and making treaties. “Aliens enter
and remain in the United States only with the license,
permission, and sufferance of Congress,” it opined (Fong Yue
Ting v. U.S., 149 U.S. 698 [1893]). To this day plenary power
doctrine over immigration stands.
American political culture has thoroughly normalized the
primacy of national sovereignty in immigration affairs, and with
important consequences. Nationalism generates the view that
immigration is a zero-sum game among competitive nation-
states. Americans like to believe that immigration to the U.S.
proves the superiority of liberal capitalism, that America is the
object of global envy; we resist examining the role that
American world power has played in global structures of
migration. We like to think our immigration policy is generous-
-indeed, too generous, as we also resent the demands made upon
us by others and we think we owe outsiders nothing (Ngai
2004).
The emphasis on national sovereignty is the basis for the alarm
that we’ve “lost control” of the border and for the draconian
proposals against unauthorized immigration: more fencing,
criminalization of the undocumented and those who hire or
assist them, mass deportations. But many liberals who are

4. sympathetic to Mexican immigrants also want “something done”
to stop illegal immigration, although few would actually support
turning the entire country into a police state, which is what
would be necessary to truly seal the border from unauthorized
entry. The cost of viewing sovereignty as the exclusive grounds
for immigration policy is that we push to the margins other
considerations, such as human rights and global distributive
justice. The current debate over immigration policy reform
reminds us that sovereignty is not just a claim to national right;
it is a theory of power (Carens 1998).
Just two months before September 11, 2001, it will be recalled,
President Bush announced his intention to legalize
undocumented Mexican immigrants and institute a guest-worker
program that would offer a path to permanent residency and
citizenship. In its details it was not particularly generous and it
faced a complex process of legislative negotiation, as have all
efforts to reform the immigration laws. But it did not provoke
the kind of emotional controversy that we hear today.
However, after 9/11 the immigration issue disappeared from the
Washington scene. It resurfaced a couple of years ago, with
Bush’s proposal receiving support from then-president of
Mexico Vicente Fox. But only in the last year has it become an
explosive issue in national politics, with vociferous rhetoric
like “stop the invasion” and “no amnesty for lawbreakers.” It
seems no accident that immigration restriction has moved to the
fore as public disaffection with the war in Iraq grows.
According to Republican strategist Don Allen, it’s an issue that
“gets us talking about security and law and order” (Hulse 2006).
House majority leader Dennis Hastert deploys flexible rhetoric
of popular sovereignty most succinctly: “We’re at war. Our
borders are a sieve” (Swarns 2006). Whether mongering
terrorism and illegal immigration will result in greater mass
support for U.S. wars against both will succeed remains to be
seen. But the very connections made between them suggest
broad ground for oppositional action.

5. Rhetorically Analyzing an Argument
Take a moment and write an answer to this question: In what
ways have your ideas on the issue been changed, if at all? If
they have, or you have learned some valuable information, then
the essay was successful to some degree.
Write two to three paragraphs in support of your answer to the
evaluative question at the end of the list below. In other words,
applying the rhetorical concepts below to evaluate the
persuasiveness of an argument constitutes a rhetorical analysis
because they provide "lenses" through which to "view" or
understand ideas.
Try applying and responding to several of the following
questions that appear in the chart on page (852) [850] to help
show why your ideas have changed, or why not, and will help
support your evaluation of the article's effectiveness. (Your
instructor can guide you further if you have questions about
your responses.)
Questions for Rhetorical Analysis:
The kairotic moment and writer’s motivating occasion-
What motivated the writer to produce this piece?
What social, political, legal, or economic conversations does
this argument join?
Rhetorical context: Writer’s purpose and audience-
What is the writer’s purpose?
Who is the intended audience?
What assumptions, values, and beliefs would readers have to
hold to find this argument persuasive?
Rhetorical context: Writer’s identity and angle of vision-
How does the writer’s personal history, education, gender,
ethnicity, age, class, sexual orientation, and political leaning
influence the angle of vision?
How much does the writer’s angle of vision dominate the text?

6. Rhetorical context: Genre-
What is the original medium of publication?
How does this influence content, structure, and style?
Logos of the argument-
How effective is the writer’s use of evidence?
How is the argument supported and developed?
Ethos of the argument-
How does the writer try to seem credible and trustworthy to the
intended audience?
Does the writer deal fairly with alternative views?
Pathos of the argument-
How does the writer use concrete language, word choice,
narrative, examples, and analogies to tap readers’ emotions,
values, and imagination?
Writer’s style-
How well does the writer’s tone (attitude toward the subject)
suit the argument?
Overall persuasiveness of the argument-
What features of this argument contribute most to making it
persuasive or not persuasive for its target audience and for you?