Immigrants No Threat to American Way of Life: New at Reason

During Cold War debates about the merits of capitalism and communism, Americans offered a simple gauge: the movement of people. “You have the Berlin Wall,” the argument went. “We have the Statue of Liberty. If communism is a blessing, why do people flee Cuba for America, not the other way around?”

Ronald Reagan, the hero of modern Republicans, knew that immigrants were not a threat to our way of life but a reinforcement of it. He welcomed them as allies, self-selected for their attraction to democratic ideals. They came here not because they wanted to change America but because they admired it as it was

Imagine what Reagan would think of Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa, who abhors foreigners like a deadly virus. On Monday, King tweeted, “We can’t restore our civilization with somebody else’s babies.” Last year, he declared, “Cultural suicide by demographic transformation must end.” This week, King insisted that immigrants are “importing a different culture, a different civilization, and that culture and civilization, the imported one, rejects the host’s culture.” Steve Chapman explains more.

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