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Jewish World Review
March 6, 2008
/ 29 Adar I 5768
Immigrants in prison? Not likely
By
Jeff Jacoby
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http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
Warming to one of his favorite themes the other night, CNN's Lou Dobbs
repeatedly invoked the phrase "criminal illegal aliens" as he did his best to
feed the stereotype that illegal immigrants drive up crime. Dobbs's relentless
spleen on this subject has, of course, won him a following. Seal-the-borders
nativism won't get anyone elected president — just ask ex-GOP candidates Tom
Tancredo, Mitt Romney, and Rudy Giuliani — but there is no denying it's good
for TV ratings.
Fortunately, politicians and television personalities aren't the only people
interested in immigration and crime. Consider a new study from the Public
Policy Institute of California, which offers significantly more substance on
the topic than anything you're likely to encounter on cable TV or in the
presidential campaign.
The paper, by economists Kristin F. Butcher and Anne Morrison Piehl, assesses
the impact of immigration on crime by analyzing data from California, which has
by far the nation's largest population of prison inmates: One-eighth of all
state prisoners in the United States are incarcerated in California, as are 30
percent of all inmates who are not American citizens. What Butcher and Piehl
demonstrate is that immigrants, far from being more likely to end up behind
bars, are dramatically *less* likely to do so.
The numbers are striking: While immigrants (legal and illegal) account for 35
percent of California adults, they represent just 17 percent of the state's
prisoners. Men born in the United States are incarcerated in California prisons
at more than 2-1/2 times the rate of foreign-born men. Within the age group
most often involved in crime (ages 18 to 40), US natives — astonishingly - are
10 times more likely to be in prison or jail than immigrants (4.2 percent of
the former are in correctional institutions, and just 0.42 percent of the
latter). Even when the focus is narrowed to inmates who were born in Mexico and
are not citizens — the demographic group most likely to include illegal aliens
— the rate of incarceration is only one-eighth that of men born in the United
States.
Butcher and Piehl also compared crime rates among California cities. They found
that the cities with greater numbers of recently arrived immigrants have lower
crime rates, while cities with fewer immigrants experience higher levels of
crime.
"Altogether, this evidence suggests that immigrants have very low rates of
criminal activity in California," the researchers write — a finding
"consistent with national studies on immigration and crime, which also find low
rates of criminal activity for the foreign-born." Butcher and Piehl address the
seemingly irreconcilable statistic that nearly one-fifth of federal prison
inmates are illegal immigrants. In truth, they explain, there is no
contradiction: Since persons arrested for immigration violations are
automatically transferred to federal facilities, noncitizens are
disproportionately represented among federal inmates. In any case, the federal
prison population comprises only 8 percent of the total number of prisoners
nationwide.
But you don't have to pore through think-tank studies to recognize that
immigration, illegal or otherwise, doesn't drive the US crime rate.
Over the last dozen or so years, the number of illegal immigrants in the United
States has doubled to an estimated 12 million. Those same years saw a dramatic
nationwide fall in violent crime and property crime. Similarly, the surge in
illegal immigration didn't prevent welfare caseloads from falling or millions
of new jobs from being created.
Americans may not have the statistics at their fingertips, but most of them
understand that immigrants, even those who enter the country without
permission, are here not to make trouble but to make a better life for
themselves and their families. Yes, Dobbs has his loyalists; in a nation of 300
million people, you can find an audience to whoop it up for just about any
cause. But far more Americans recognize that demonizing illegal immigrants is
as bootless as it is mean. In opinion polls, only a minority of respondents say
illegals should be forced to leave; the consistent majority preference is that
illegal immigrants be given a way to earn American citizenship.
The most distressing spectacle of the 2008 presidential race so far was the
attempt by Tancredo, Romney, and Giuliani to win their party's nomination
through a Dobbsian attack on illegal immigrants. And the most encouraging
development? The Republican Party's rejection of that appeal and its elevation
of Senator John McCain, who had steadfastly refused to take part in the
immigrant-bashing.
So chalk one up for American common sense. The anti-immigration rabble-rousers
haven't disappeared — but none of them will be the next president of the
United States.
Every weekday JewishWorldReview.com publishes what many in in the media and Washington consider "must-reading". Sign up for the daily JWR update. It's free. Just click here.
Jeff Jacoby is a Boston Globe columnist. Comment by clicking here.
Jeff Jacoby Archives
© 2006, Boston Globe
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