GameBanshee Forums

The new US Intelligence Reform Bill has risen the following question:

Should illegal aliens receive driver's liscenses?

This is a tricky question as no answer will solve all problems.

Before I post my opinion on this I wanna see where some people stand.

I'm sure Martians or other aliens would like to drive when they hide away on earth.... (okay - just watched Men in Black yesteday )


Hehe - well - seriously ....
Then I am rather torn. I do see giving people a drivers licens as validating their "existance" in the country, so from the legal perspective - I'd say no. From a more humane perspective, it does seem as if driving is a huge part of american identity, and thus - I could see a reason for allowing it there. Illegal immegrants will continue to be an issue and closeing the eyes to such a fact is closing ones eyes to reality.

So - I'm rather torn here, but then again - I have started to become that on my older days on many issues. It is the "black and white" thingy all over.

That is the first issue, you don't want to give legal credence to people who are illegally in the country, but may need to drive for various reasons. Say a mother who needs to drvie in order to work(yeah, I know she's not supposed to be working either, more on that later) or to care for her dependants who are citizens.

Now I know where all the kids who tried to push square boxes through round holes work.

[QUOTE=Shai Hulud]Now I know where all the kids who tried to push square boxes through round holes work.[/QUOTE]
They immigrate illegally?

[QUOTE=Vicsun]They immigrate illegally? [/QUOTE]

I'm sorry looking back at my joke it is a bit vague. Its actually the US house of representatives.

i think illegal immigrants should not only be not allowed to drive, they need to be sent back to their country until they get in legaly and learn to speak english. I am fine with them keeping their own 'culture' and 'herritage' by speaking their language, but you need to speak english if you want to do anything important in this country. I am not sure how people who dont speak english even get in this country legaly. We need to tighten our borders, i am all for gun turrents for the border patrol. If they get into our country illegaly, what would stop them from doing other crimes? I have yet to see or hear of an illegal immigrant doing anything important. I have only seen them not teach their dozens of children english and not get jobs and not try to get off welfare. I know this first hand as my neighborhood has recently stooped to this level in a matter of mere monthes.

What makes an illegal immigrant any different to a citizen in this instance? Would granting illegals a license encourage them to get insurance? If not, then my opinion is no...but this issue does not only relate to illegal immigrants, it relates to any applicant. A tricky one to follow up.

@Copper, That's the easy answer, and believe me I have no love of people who commit crimes to get what they want or of welfare. See my other posts. The important problem here is economic. I don't know whrere you live but there are certain areas of the US that depend HEAVILY on illegal immigrants to perform certain jobs. Most of these are agricultural jobs that are very labor intensive. They usually work for about $2/hour. Now, I would love to see an actual US citizen doing those jobs for legal wages and have taxes taken out of it, but the simple fact is that the jobs cannot be done for that kind of money. The proce of food in this country would skyrocket, causing inflation. Many businesses that use illegal aliens as workers would go under, causing unemployment of their legitimate workers. I know that it is a huge hypocracy for the US, but we really do need those workers right now. It is highly illegal to hire them but the government is forced to not enforce those laws as heavily as they could. If we ended illegals today, it would have the same effect as when slavery was banned in the south. Bad news for the economy.

@Ysh, I think it does encourage insurance.. Most states revoke your liscense if your insurance cancels and a DL is one of the fwe forms of ID accepted in the US, so most illegals really need one.

Edit: Okay CE, DW, and fable, are you proud of me on this opinion at least?

[QUOTE=jopperm2]Edit: Okay CE, DW, and fable, are you proud of me on this opinion at least? [/QUOTE]

*pats Jopperm on the head and offers him a Scooby Snack*

You know, I have to admit, from a legal and logistic standpoint I find the whole concept of "illegal immigrants" being granted driving licenses paradoxical in the extreme...

Then again... I don't have issues with immigration either. Excepting the First Nations (well.. okay.. unless you go back about 20 thousand years)... we, or our ancesters, were all immigrants to this continent at one point or another. I really do not see why some groups should not have the right to freely live in a country, while others have had no trouble...

It does need to be said, however, that immigration policies, official or otherwise, have long been based on economics...

If they're paying taxes - in Texas, that means sales tax, thankfully - then they should be able to obtain drivers' licenses. Personally, I think the requirement to learn English should be an item for citizenship qualification only. A work permit should be easily obtained by an alien who passes a criminal background check. In states that border Mexico, enough of the population speaks and writes Spanish anyway - just about every public services office has at least 2 to 5 bilingual staffers. I know where I work, I can think of 5 co-workers who are fluent Spanish speakers off the top of my head (there are more), and all Spanish-only callers are routed to them. Texas is *always* looking to hire more Spanish/English bilinguals - speak both Spanish and English and want a job? Come to Texas.

I'm considering picking up Spanish myself when I register for classes this year. Once I learn it, I sure won't lose it - Ms. Martinez in the office next to mine has promised/threatened me that once I start my classes, she will only communicate with me in Spanish.

My view on immigration is that our immigration policies, in many cases, are too tight. Granted, I agree that the last thing any country needs is a wave of people coming in to leach of the social state provided by the country, but one thing I have noticed in Immigrants, is that they are often more willing to work than native born citizens of the country.

The true hypocracy, I feel, is that citizens then complain when an immigrant, legal or not, begins working, supposedly stealing a job from another citizen. As has been said, most of the citizens of a country would rather leech the system themselves, than take many of the jobs an immigrant would willingly take to live in a country with a higher standerd of living then where they came from.

Yeah, I can't stand it when people claim that jobs are stolen from Americans. You can gripe all you want if your job was given away to someone overseas because they are cheaper, but until I meet someone that was laid off from their tomato-picking job because Mexicans are cheaper, I'm not buyin it. I think there are legitimate reasons to restrict immigration, but they don't really apply to the driver's liscense issue.

Edit: What do you think about a non-citizen liscense for aliens?

I think giving licenses to illegals would only make our ecnomic circumstances even worse. It would encourge more illegals to cross the border. It says: "hey you can come into our country, gain profit from a job and get free money from the government along with all the benefits of being American without any work! and all you need to do is hop a fence!" I dont live in a place that depends on allot of migrant workers, we mainly make steel products here. But I think its horrible that we allowed this problem to grow so large. So now if anything was to make them go away(which i highly doubt will happen)we would completely boned.

Look the main problem is that there is no feasible solution anymore. There are just too many illegal immigrants, and short of rounding them all up and kicking them out, there's nothing we can do about it. So long as they're here we might as well make the best of it, and at least by giving them driver's licences we can be sure that when they drive they're qualified to do so. The main thing that's gotta be done is to figure out how to prevent them from jumping the fence in the first place; not an easy thing at all, short of building a wall the way Israel is doing (and that's sure to cause all kinds of issues with Mexico).

[QUOTE=CopperWater]I think giving licenses to illegals would only make our ecnomic circumstances even worse. It would encourge more illegals to cross the border. It says: "hey you can come into our country, gain profit from a job and get free money from the government along with all the benefits of being American without any work! and all you need to do is hop a fence!" I dont live in a place that depends on allot of migrant workers, we mainly make steel products here. But I think its horrible that we allowed this problem to grow so large. So now if anything was to make them go away(which i highly doubt will happen)we would completely boned.[/QUOTE]

Have you actually read any of the posts in this thread?

In most cases, illegal immigrants work for wages that the average citizen would not even contemplate. And the system makes it easy for this happen. Since these people are not in the country legally, they have no protection whatsoever from unscrupulous, exploitative employers. You have heard of sweatshops, right? And yes, they *do* exist in the US and Canada.

If the migrants were legal, they would be entitled to the same rights and wages as everyone else. IMO, the best way to deal with the situation is to legitimise their residency. This means employers would not have the same options of paying these people dirt wages.

And I ask again? Why should some people be able to seek a better life while the same is denied to others? Not that 'legitimate' immigration has the most humanitarian of histories..but that is another subject...

To be brutally frank about it, I think that many of the attitudes expressed towards illegal, and particularly Mexican, migrants has everything to do with good old-fashioned racism.

[QUOTE=dragon wench]

To be brutally frank about it, I think that many of the attitudes expressed towards illegal, and particularly Mexican, migrants has everything to do with good old-fashioned racism.[/QUOTE]


Sis, You know I am not a racist
As I said first off, I believe all borders should be open.. this planet belongs to us all, and it is not anyone's fault where they are born. Open boarders play into the free market ideal.. the country that is run the best, attracts the largest number of people, take away welfare, and the free loaders have no incentive to stay.. but that is another topic

I am wondering if those who have such a strong visceral reaction to non-English speaking / non- Caucasian illegal immigrants have the same strong reaction to English speaking Anglo-immigrants without papers.

[QUOTE=Scayde]
Sis, You know I am not a racist

I am wondering if those who have such a strong visceral reaction to non-English speaking / non- Caucasian illegal immigrants have the same strong reaction to English speaking Anglo-immigrants without papers. [/QUOTE]

I know you are no racist *hug*

Indeed... I have wondered the same thing... Looking at it historically, one thing interesting to note is that Irish immigrants were especially reviled... in much the same way as are Mexicans. The Irish were obviously caucasion, but they were called... "The White N_____s of America." (note: I have not written the one word the way I have to avoid any filter.. I just won't write it out..)