Tag Archive for: xenophobia

Cyrus Mehta

Brexit and Xenophobia vs. Immigration and Innovation

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In the backlash against globalization, as seen in the vote in favor of Brexit, there is an even more insidious backlash against immigration. The world has prospered because of the expansion of trade and technology, and also due to the free movement of capital and people. Millions of the world’s poor people have been lifted from poverty as a result of globalization. In turn, people in richer countries have been able to buy products and services at lower cost. Businesses have also been able to sell goods and services outside beyond national boundaries, thereby becoming more profitable and hiring more people.

Politicians like Donald Trump do not see it this way, who wish to tear up trade deals such as the North American Free Trade Agreement. So does Bernie Sanders, who while speaking with a softer voice, appears to be in harmony with Trump in his critic of globalization and trade deals. While Hillary Clinton is probably in favor of trade deals, she back tracked on the Trans-Pacific Partnership, after being attacked by Sanders during the primaries. It is true that globalization does not always have winners. Those who get displaced need to land on a safety net so that they can re-train and develop new skills. The safety nets, unfortunately, are not keeping up with the enormous changes in technology that increase productivity through innovative technologies, which include rapid strides in robotics and artificial intelligence. During this transition that promises a better future for all in the long run,  politicians exploit this shortcoming to lash out against immigrants in their countries and foreign-based workers outside who are paid less, when the true disrupter is technology and innovation.

As Fareed Zakaria so succinctly puts it:

“Manufacturing as a share of all U.S. jobs has been declining for 70 years, as part of a transition experienced by every advanced industrial economy. All other developed countries from Australia to Britain to Germany — which is often seen as a manufacturing powerhouse — have seen similar declines over the past several decades. Even South Korea, which has tried many kinds of protectionism, has experienced a drop in manufacturing as it has become a more advanced economy. This shift is partly a result of free trade, but serious studies show that the much larger cause is technology. One steelworker today makes five times as much steel per hour as he or she did in 1980.”

Immigration lawyers know first- hand how free trade and immigration has been beneficial for America. It is due to NAFTA that Canadians and Mexicans can enter the United States on TN visas to work for US employers who seek them out even while the H-1B visa, the main workhorse nonimmigrant visa, has hit the annual numerical cap. Singaporeans and Chileans can enter the United States on H-1B1 visas that ensue from trade deals and so can Australians on an E-3 visa. Nationals of many countries that have treaties with the United States can come here on E-1 and E-2 visas as investors and traders. While the L-1 visa does not ensue from a treaty, it too is premised on the needs of multinational corporations, big and small, in a globalized world. Intra-company transferee managers, executives and specialized workers can work for a US branch, subsidiary, parent or affiliate of a foreign company on L-1 visas. Despite there not being H-1B visas, the fact that other visas are still available, allow US companies to remain globally competitive by tapping into skilled and professional foreign workers. If it were not for these visas, the entry of skilled workers into America would be at a standstill.

We need to embrace immigrants, and view them as an asset, rather than as people who steal jobs and work cheaply. Immigration not only provides a complimentary workforce, but also generates innovation that will create the next generation of jobs that require new skills. If we have a robust and welcoming immigration system that would not shackle the worker to one employer, but would allow mobility and a quick pathway to permanent residency, then there would be no suppression of wages. Everyone would be on a level playing field, and market forces would ensure that wages remain competitive. Indeed, by encouraging more movement of people to America and other richer countries, it would have the effect of wages increasing worldwide and potentially a convergence in wages for highly skilled people. With the advent of technology that has increased productivity manifold times, manufacturing would be based in places not where the wages are lower, but where there is an abundant supply of skilled workers, technology and innovation.  If the free movement of people is restricted, employers will be forced to move operations to other countries, thus perpetuating wage disparity.

This brings us to the H-1B visa program that has a mere 65,000 visas, plus an additional 20,000 for those who have graduated with advance degrees. Due to the well publicized layoffs of US workers at companies like Disney by H-1B workers, there appears to be no appetite by Congress to increase H-1B visa numbers even though there is a dire need to do so. By continuing to limit and stifle the H-1B program, US employers will remain less competitive and will not be able to pass on the benefits to consumers. We need more H-1B visa numbers rather than less. We also need to respect H-1B workers rather than deride them, even if they work at IT consulting company, as they too wish to abide by the law and to pursue their dreams in America.  The best way to reform the H-1B program is to provide more mobility to H-1B visa workers. By providing more mobility, which includes being able to obtain a green card quickly,  H-1B workers will not be stuck with the employer who brought them on the H-1B visa, and this can also result in rising wages within the occupation as a whole. Mobile foreign workers will also be incentivized to start their own innovative companies in America, which in turn will result in more jobs. This is the best way to reform the H-1B visa program, rather than to further shackle it with stifling laws and regulations, labor attestations and quotas. Market forces can better control the H-1B program from abuses and distortions than labor attestations!

As we meditate over yet another July 4th weekend celebrating America’s independence, we should note that the world faces a stark choice today. Should countries be more open or less open? The ideological line between left and right is blurring as another more distinct line is being drawn between open and closed nations. America was founded on principles of openness and its ability to embrace people from all over the word, but that may change if the proponents for a closed and isolated world have their way.  If America becomes closed, just like Britain will likely be after Brexit, there will be fewer opportunities for businesses to sell outside national borders, and they will be further stymied and unable to grow if they cannot gain access to the best talent. Moreover, innovation will get stifled if the best people from around the world cannot cluster together to develop new products and change paradigms. Immigration is what fuels these advances, which in turn promises more growth and prosperity. Do we want to revive the industries of the past to bring back those illusory jobs, such as steel manufacturing or coal mining,  after technology has already marched on, or do we want to imagine about autonomous vehicles (notwithstanding the recent Tesla car setback), nanotechnology that will automatically repair our cells and space travel through a wormhole?  Brexit and xenophobia go hand in hand. Will America buck this trend in favor of immigration and innovation when it goes to the polls in November 2016?

Cyrus Mehta

The H-1B and L-1 Punitive Super Fee Rears its Ugly Head Again

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By Cyrus D. Mehta and Michelle S. Velasco

Last December, Congress passed the Consolidated Appropriations Act (Public Law 114-113) (“Omnibus Bill”) that set up the government’s budget until October 2016.  It is one of Congress’s basic tasks to create the budget for the government – something it has failed to do without rancorous debate, shutdowns, threats of shutdowns, and political rigmaroles in the past five years.  The passage of the recent bill was not immune to controversy as it only passed after close-to-deadline negotiations with new House Speaker Paul Ryan.  And as is par for the course in large spending bills, lurking within the nearly 1000 page bill were pork barrel projects and controversial amendments.  The full text of the bill is available here, but what concerns us lies at Section 411, entitled “9-11 Response and Biometric Entry-Exit Fee,” and which includes the following language:

  • TEMPORARY L-1 VISA FEE INCREASE.—Notwithstanding section 281 of the Immigration and Nationality Act (8 U.S.C. 1351) or any other provision of law, during the period beginning on the date of the enactment of this section and ending on September 30, 2025, the combined filing fee and fraud prevention and detection fee required to be submitted with an application for admission as a nonimmigrant under section 101(a)(15)(L) of the Immigration and Nationality Act (8 U.S.C. 1101(a)(15)(L)), including an application for an extension of such status, shall be increased by $4,500 for applicants that employ 50 or more employees in the United States if more than 50 percent of the applicant’s employees are nonimmigrants admitted pursuant to subparagraph (H)(i)(b) or (L) of section 101(a)(15) of such Act.
  • TEMPORARY H-1B VISA FEE INCREASE.—Notwithstanding section 281 of the Immigration and Nationality Act (8 U.S.C. 1351) or any other provision of law, during the period beginning on the date of the enactment of this section and ending on September 30, 2025, the combined filing fee and fraud prevention and detection fee required to be submitted with an application for admission as a nonimmigrant under section 101(a)(15)(H)(i)(b) of the Immigration and Nationality Act (8 U.S.C. 1101(a)(15)(H)(i)(b)), including an application for an extension of such status, shall be increased by $4,000 for applicants that employ 50 or more employees in the United States if more than 50 percent of the applicant’s employees are such nonimmigrants or nonimmigrants described in section 101(a)(15)(L) of such Act.

In essentials, this confusingly worded section boils down to an increase in the H-1B and L-1 petition fees for certain employers who have 50 or more employees, more than 50% of whom are in H-1B or L-1 status.  The provision not only reintroduces the super fee from Public Law 111-230 that sunset on September 30, 2015, but it doubled that super fee!  However, unlike Public Law 111-230, These extra fees will be used to fund healthcare for 9/11 first responders and a new system to track entries and exits using travelers’ biometric data.  What left many immigration attorneys and businesses scratching their heads was the bill’s language that left many things unclear: Should employers should pay the super fee right away because the statute says “beginning on the date of the enactment of this section…”?  Would the super fee apply to extensions of status because the statute says “including an application for an extension of such status”?  Are fraud fees now also required in extension of status petitions?

It took nearly a month, but on January 12, 2016 USCIS finally issued its interpretation of the statute in a website announcement that as of January 12, 2016 USCIS began accepting the super fee for eligible H-1B and L-1 petitions.  The announcement included some helpful clarifications:

  • The fee is applicable only for initial or transfer filings, not to extensions of status.
  • The super fee was not required for petitions filed prior to January 12, 2016.
  • The fraud fee is not required in extensions.

However, as of writing this blog, USCIS has yet to revise the Form I-129 and Form I-129S.  Outside of this announcement there are no other instructions on the USCIS website, and its page on H and L filing fees has not been updated.  Nevertheless, USCIS provides only a 30-day grace period post the January 12 announcement where USCIS will merely RFE for missing fees.  After February 11, 2016, USCIS will reject petitions with missing fees.

We accordingly provide the following practice pointers for employers affected by the new super fee to minimize the likelihood of RFEs and rejections or other processing delays:

  • Employers should carefully complete the Form I-129, in particular Section 1, Numbers 1.d. and 1.d.1 of the H-1B and H-1B1 Data Collection and Filing Fee Exemption Supplement (page 19 of the 36-page I-129 form) and Numbers 4.a and 4.b of the L-1 supplement (page 22 of the 36-page I-129 form).
  • Employers ought to make a careful count of their employees and their nonimmigrant statuses.
  • When possible, employers should send filing fees in separate checks. In the event USCIS has received extra fees, it will simply return those extra checks to the employer without delaying the process.  This way, employers can avoid RFEs or rejections of their petitions.

Given the severe increase in fees, employers affected by the change will have to reevaluate the business costs of filing these petitions.  Once totaled, the filing fees can be exorbitant.  An initial or transfer H-1B filing for affected employers will total $6325 in filing fees alone: ($325 basic filing fee; $500 fraud fee; $1500 ACWIA fee; $4000 super fee).  Tack on the premium processing fee and the filing fees alone will total $7550!  For initial L-1 filings, the total filing fee would be $5325 in regular processing ($325 basic filing fee; $500 fraud fee; $4500 super fee).  Meanwhile, other employers would pay anywhere from $825 to $2325 for initial H-1Bs and only $825 for initial L-1 petitions.  The difference in costs is striking.  Indeed, by enacting this super fee targeted at larger companies with nonimmigrant workforces, the U.S. has cemented its anti-immigrant and anti-business stance particularly with respect to India-based technology companies who are disproportionately affected by the punitive fees.  Though it is a nation built on the backs of immigrants and their entrepreneurial spirit, the U.S. can’t seem to reconcile its claim as the greatest country in the world with the spread of hypocritical and unjustifiable fear of foreign worker takeovers.

It is clear that this severe increase in fees has been aimed against India-based companies to punish them, without giving any thought to the fact that most of corporate America relies on them to run business efficiently, which in turn benefits the American consumer.  It is this very business model that has provided reliability to companies in the United States and throughout the industrialized world to obtain top-drawer talent quickly with flexibility and at affordable prices that benefit end consumers and promote diversity of product development. This is what the oft-criticized “job shop” or “body shop” readily provides.  By making possible a source of expertise that can be modified and redirected in response to changing demand, uncertain budgets, shifting corporate priorities and unpredictable fluctuations in the business cycle itself, the pejorative reference to them as “job shop” is, in reality, the engine of technological ingenuity on which progress in the global information age largely depends.  Such a business model is also consistent with free trade, which the U.S. promotes vehemently to other countries (including the protection of intellectual property rights of its pharmaceutical companies that keep lifesaving drugs high), but seems to restrict when it applies to service industries located in countries such as India that desire to do business in the United States through their skilled personnel.

It is not necessarily the case that H-1B employees who work in the United States through these IT firms are taking jobs out of the United States.  That has been the prevailing rhetoric, but the benefits that IT consulting firms and their H-1B workers provide by way of productivity gains, resulting in an increase in jobs elsewhere and a lowering of costs to the consumer, is often overlooked.  As a recent Times of India editorial put it bluntly:

These workers are not feeding off the American economy, they are contributing to its innovation and productivity.  Jobs are no nation’s monopoly; if Indians work hard and well they are not breaching any globally mandated caste system.  Indian companies pay taxes and create jobs in the US too.  These controversies are not new.  But an effective counter to America’s Indophobia remains to be found.

The current rhetoric ultimately results in disparaging H-1B workers from India who are also here to work hard and pursue the American dream.  It also affects H-1B adjudications, resulting in extra scrutiny, and denials of H-1B extension visa requests that hitherto were easily granted.  While many recognize and justifiably condemn the absurd anti-immigrant rhetoric of Donald Trump, punitive efforts against India-based companies, resulting in stricter H-1B visa adjudications of individual workers who are waiting for years in the crushing India employment-based second and third preference backlogs, must also be recognized as xenophobic.  It is only then that anti-immigrant rhetoric, in the guise of protecting U.S. workers, will be acknowledged and the media, politicians and others who currently freely engage in this will get less of a free pass.

(This blog is for informational purposes only, and should not be relied upon as a substitute for legal advice)

Cyrus Mehta

BOOMERANG: THE MOSQUE CONTROVERSY AND OTHER IMMIGRATION EXCESSES

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By Gary Endelman and Cyrus D. Mehta

There is growing Islamophobia engulfing the country combined with a rise in xenophobia, http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,2011798,00.html. The Islamophobia has been unleashed as a result of the unfortunate controversy over the Islamic center and mosque that will be built within two blocks of Ground Zero. Much has been written about this controversy, but there has been scant commentary about its impact on immigration and immigrants. It is time to step into this lacuna, which we do so in this blog post to link this Islamophobia to the xenophobia against immigrants. We are especially motivated to write after an immigrant Bangladeshi cabbie in New York last week was almost stabbed to death after the passenger, his assailant, realized he was a Muslim. More recently, arson has been suspected at a proposed construction site for a mosque and Islamic cultural center in Murfreesboro, Tennessee. Strangely, anti-Islamic sentiment, which was largely absent after September 11, has suddenly flared in New York City after the controversy surrounding the proposed Islamic center, even though two strip clubs, liquor stores and criminal defense attorneys who represent suspected terrorists thrive within two blocks of the WTC site, http://blogs.wsj.com/metropolis/2010/08/26/anti-muslim-bias-absent-after-911-surfaces-in-new-york/ . Ironically, two mosques have always existed in the vicinity for years and not a word was said about them.

An anti-Islamic sentiment seeped into immigration enforcement policy immediately after the September 11, 2001 attacks. Non-citizens from Muslim countries were rounded up, and when they could not charge them with links to terrorism, they were detained and deported in secret for immigration violations unrelated to terrorism. In late 2002 and early 2003, the immigration agency, under Attorney General Ashcroft, and his lieutenant Kris Kobach (who has also helped draft Arizona’s SB 1070), invented Special Registration to target only males from countries with mainly Muslim populations. They were required to report within a short time frame or face both immigration and criminal consequences. Those who faithfully reported, thinking they were helping law enforcement, but were found to have immigration violations, were quickly put in removal proceedings. Although more than 80, 000 males reported for Special Registration, no one was caught for terrorism. But over 13,000 men were put in removal while their wives, sisters and daughters were not. The program was a spectacular flop, a waste of resources for the immigration agency and tax payer, and most problematic of all, it antagonized immigrant communities who trusted that the government was neutral even after the September 11 attacks. Even though overt immigration polices against Muslims were disbanded, one still could not help notice the occasional visa applicant from a Muslim country not being approved for a visa or being denied naturalization for a flimsy reason.

But all this pales in proportion to the recent hate and invective we have see against Muslims after political leaders such as former Alaska Governor and Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, have made political capital of the mosque near Ground Zero controversy in the Summer of 2010. Gingrich has even equated Islam to Nazism, forgetting that those who caused the September 11 attacks hijacked Islam in the same way as the pastor of a Christian church in Florida has just hijacked Christianity by organizing a Koran burning day on September 11, 2010. Also note the nauseating description of Islam by Franklin Graham on national television calling it a devilish faith and his discussion of the “Muslim seed” of Obama.

Islamophobia is not growing in a vacuum and cannot be understood or appreciated without a reference to the pervasive economic anxiety gripping this nation and others in the developed world. It is the dramatic difference in economic conditions that accounts for the upsurge in Islamophobia now and its relative absence at the time of 9/11.This is not strange at all. Remember when Hitler came to power? The link between xenophobia and economic anxiety is a global rather than merely an American phenomenon, http://www.businessworld.in/bw/2010_07_31_Xenophobia_At_Work.html. A dark
tribalism has also engulfed Europe, with Switzerland constitutionally banning minarets and France outlawing the burqa, http://www.newsweek.com/2010/02/18/europe-s-big-choice.html. Migration itself is a global phenomenon and no country can frame immigration policies purely in a domestic context without reference to this wider movement of peoples across national boundaries. This is particularly the case throughout the developed economies of Europe, Japan and the United States where the population is aging, birth rates are dropping and only immigration can supply sufficient workers young enough to support complex and costly social systems. However, the very dependence on such migration in a time of economic anxiety also fuels a latent but increasingly emergent social dislocation, a sense that cultural realities are changing in a way that seems both menacing and hard to understand. This is what you see in the many tea party rallies when people bring signs saying they want to take their country back. Once again, this is an international problem. Even countries like the Netherlands that have long and proud traditions of humane immigration policies are changing in response.

The link between immigrants and radicalism goes back to the earliest days of the Republic. Federalists roundly condemned French immigrants as dangerous Jacobins and pressed President John Adams to sign the Alien and Sedition Acts in 1798 as a way to turn back the rising tide of Jeffersonian democracy. The nativist appeal of the Know Nothing movement in the 1840’s and 1850’s was fueled, in large measure, by the economic anxiety that swept through the industrialized North, especially among working class voters most fearful about competition for low-wage jobs that the enormous wave of recently arrived Irish immigrants presented. Throughout our history, the tenor of our immigration laws reveals a great deal about the national mood. The adoption of the first immigration restrictions in 1924 arose out of the disillusionment with foreign entanglements in reaction to the First World War. After the Pearl Harbor attack on December 7, 1941, 120,000 people of Japanese American ancestry were kept in internment camps from 1942 to 1946 (and approved by Cal. AG Earl Warren of all people!), which illustrates how the scapegoating of immigrants can come back to eviscerate the rights of citizens as well, http://www.immigrationpolicy.org/special-reports/have-we-learned-lessons-history-world-war-ii-japanese-internment-todays-secret-deten. The numerous ideological exclusionary grounds in the 1952 McCarran-Walter Act, unsuccessfully vetoed by President Truman, spoke of a frightened nation in the grip of Cold War hysteria. The abolition of the national origins quota in 1965 should properly be considered one of the hallmark civil rights measures of the Great Society. Passed the same year as the Voting Rights Act and only a year after the 1964 Civil Rights Act, the 1965 immigration law was the product of a confident and prosperous nation ready to embrace the world. The American Competitiveness in the 21st Century Act, passed at the peak of the dot.com boom in 2000, displayed an economic vitality whose expansion seemed to know no limit. The Schumer assault on H/L fees against companies that hire more than half their work force on H-1B and L visas, mainly Indian IT companies, most recently speaks of a frightened people who feel that they can no longer compete and worry that their time has past.

In light of this disturbing trend, noted columnist Tom Friedman in a recent New York Times Op-Ed best explains why it is important from a US immigration policy perspective to support the building of the Islamic Center, which will essentially be a 13 story building taken up by an auditorium, pool, gymnasium, offices and an exhibition space:

That resistance to diversity, though, is not something we want to emulate, which is why I’m glad the mosque was approved on Tuesday. Countries that choke themselves off from exposure to different cultures, faiths and ideas will never invent the next Google or a cancer cure, let alone export a musical or body of literature that would bring enjoyment to children everywhere.

When we tell the world, “Yes, we are a country that will even tolerate a mosque near the site of 9/11,” we send such a powerful message of inclusion and openness. It is shocking to other nations. But you never know who out there is hearing that message and saying: “What a remarkable country! I want to live in that melting pot, even if I have to build a boat from milk cartons to get there.” As long as that happens, Silicon Valley will be Silicon Valley, Hollywood will be Hollywood, Broadway will be Broadway, and America, if we ever get our politics and schools fixed, will be O.K. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/04/opinion/04friedman.html

We also admire Mayor Bloomberg for standing firm to his convictions and not retreating like other politicians have. How far will such a “no-mosque” zone stretch from the WTC site? Mosques that are being proposed in Staten Island, NY, and even as far in Murfreesboro, Tennessee, have met with virulent resistance. Even though President Obama admirably defended the right of Muslims to build the center, the next day he somewhat retreated by indicating that he was not commenting about the wisdom of building the mosque near Ground Zero. The following extract from Bloomberg’s no-compromise address at Gracie Mansion on August 24 is worth noting, http://blogs.wsj.com/metropolis/2010/08/24/bloomberg-on-mosque-a-test-of-our-commitment-to-american-values/:

Nonetheless, it was not so long ago that Jews and Catholics had to overcome stereotypes and build bridges to those who viewed them with suspicion and less than fully American. In 1960, many Americans feared that John F. Kennedy would impose papal law on America. But through his example, he taught us that piety to a minority religion is no obstacle to patriotism. It is a lesson that needs updating today, and it is our responsibility to accept the challenge.

The ill-conceived sacrifice of religious toleration will neither ensure our safety nor promote our security. As Benjamin Franklin reminded the Pennsylvania Assembly in February 1775, those “who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” Memoirs of the life and writings of Benjamin Franklin (1818). Think of this when former House Speaker Newt Gingrich pollutes the national discourse by comparing those who advocate the Muslim cultural center with Nazis. Remember well when Senator Schumer slanders major Indian IT giants like Infosys or Wipro and compares them to criminals who steal cars and chop them up for parts, http://cyrusmehta.blogspot.com/2010/08/world-according-to-senator-schumer-if.html. Indeed, the very use of the term “job shop” suggests illegitimacy and even the concept of an “H-1B dependent” employer, not to mention the refusal of Congress to expand manifestly inadequate immigrant visa quotas, derives in no small measure from an unspoken but powerful bias against the “threat” of Indian migration. Popular frustration over federal inaction metastasizes into state-sanctioned bigotry like that directed against illegal immigrants through SB 1070 in Arizona. http://cyrusmehta.blogspot.com/2010/07/no-room-at-inn-sb-1070-and.html.

Nativist excess has a price tag. Here is a great example.http://www.azcentral.com/community/chandler/articles/2010/06/24/20100624chandler-arizona-immigration-california.html. An Arizona construction company lost out on a major construction contract to expand LA international airport precisely because the LA City Council boycotted Arizona in the wake of their state immigration law. Moreover, the Immigration Policy Center reports that over 35,000 businesses in Arizona are Latino-owned and had sales and receipts of $44 billion in 2004, which employed over 39,363 people in 2002, the last year in which such data was available, http://www.americanimmigrationcouncil.org/newsroom/release/how-much-will-arizonas-immigration-bill-sb1070-cost. “Gov. Brewer should keep in mind that, if significant numbers of immigrants and Latinos are actually persuaded to leave the state because of this new law, they will take their tax dollars, businesses, and purchasing power with them.”

The demonstrable willingness of our political leadership to demagogue against immigration contributes to a willingness in the body politic at large to equate all immigrants with a malignant terrorism against which our heralded commitment to diversity must and will give way. It is not that far a walk from portraying immigrants as the source of our economic malaise to depicting all Muslims as silent accomplices in 9/11. Nor is this the first time in our history when such a sad state of affairs has come to pass. As Abraham Lincoln wrote to his great good friend Joshua Speed on August 24, 1855:

Our progress in degeneracy appears to me to be pretty rapid. As a nation, we began by declaring that “all men are created equal.” We now practically read it, “all men are created equal except negroes.” When the Know-nothings get control, it will read, “all men are created equal except negroes and foreigners and Catholics.” When it comes to this, I shall prefer emigrating to some country where they make no pretense of loving liberty–to Russia, for instance, where despotism can be taken pure, and without the base alloy of hypocrisy.

Yet, all is not lost for we have emerged from other times of torment and returned to what Lincoln’s First Inaugural so rightly and famously called “the better angels of our nature.”. In time, the fever will break and America will regain its moral balance. The crusade against Islamophobia and all forms of nativist excess can only be won if America once again believes in itself. F. Scott Fitzgerald had it right:

France was a land, England was a people, but America, having about it still that quality of the idea, was harder to utter…. It was a willingness of the heart. The Crack-Up (1936).