A nation of [the right kind of] immigrants?

As a young girl in AustriaHungary, my grandmother was stunned when two of her sisters decided to go to America. They begged the rest of the family to come with them or join them soon, before it was too late to escape. They did not. One evening my grandmother, as was her wont, snuck out without finishing her chores, instead hiding among the tall grass near the fields to read. My great-grandmother would not be able to see her; her disappointment would be postponed until later in the evening.

She also could not be seen when the pogrom engulfed the household: she could hear the shots after they dragged out her father, brothers, and other males in the household. She could hear the shrieking as the women and girls were raped. She could hear the women beg to save the lives of the small children. She could hear the rest of the shots. She could listen to the silence before the house was consumed by the flames set by the marauders.

My grandmother walked miles to the next shtetl to find cousins, their village stunned by the atrocity that taken her family: perhaps because her father worked for the aristocracy, or perhaps because they were a well-educated family (including the women and especially my great-grandmother),it had been assumed that they would be safe. The cousins scraped together enough to send my grandmother to her sisters.

When she arrived in New York, my grandmother gained entry, not as part of some treasured huddled mass. No, she understood the people around her and realized she would be sent back if she could not find a way to avoid being one of the "too many Jews that day" seeking freedom. She spoke half a dozen languages: one was the language of a large family near her - and she became their daughter, for a little while.

Was my tiny, learned, witty grandmother an illegal alien? Is that what we call anyone who doesn't fit our racist quotas on a given day? in a given year? in a lifetime or generation or history?

So who are the right kind of immigrants? Folks who already have money? People with the right kind of job arranged in advance? People who are not brown or yellow or red - anything but white? People of the right religion? People who "know their place"?

When did the people who "discovered" this land decide others were not welcome? At least that answer is easy: right away! They came, for the most part, for freedom to practice their version of religion, not to grant others the freedom to do anything else. Good old Peter Stuyvesant tossed out anyone who was Jewish - apparently he had some free time when not harassing Africans, indigenous people, or pretty much anyone who wasn't like him.

Have we changed? Not when we were limiting the number of Asians who could come, even for menial work. Not when we were belittling Italians (my husband's family was cheerfully referred to as "black Italian"). Not when we were tossing thousands of American citizens into concentration camps and robbing them of all their possessions, their self-respect, and their freedom without any evidence they were in any way disloyal. Not when we turned away the St. Louis. Not during the generations of attempting to obliterate the cultures and identities of indigenous nations. Certainly not during the quality time we've spent denying the humanity, let alone rights, opportunities, and freedoms of Africans Americans - along with any other people of color.

Now we've turned out sights on people who happen to be from Mexico. Why? Do we really want the crappy jobs they have come to fill out of desperation? Or do we just need more fuel to fire our hatred?

I'm never going to be as eloquent as Uccellina and I didn't have the sense to quote her like sb.

Better to have blogged and been rather pathetic than never to have blogged at all? Hope so.