They came here when they were too young to know what it was they were seeking. But they knew they were dreamers, wayfarers, nomads. There was something in their soul that told them so. And so they dreamt on, wandering in the wilderness, in the sure faith that one day their dream would be fulfilled.
Some would stumble along the way, be led astray, and be lost forever, but those who persisted would see their faith redeemed and their dream made reality. The dream had a name: America. Be strong and of good courage, they told one another, and so sure were they of their destiny that it became unclear whether they were seeking this new land or it was seeking them. The two possibilities merged as the impossible dream became possible. And their journey had become less a search than a find.
They were home at last. The dream was reality. What had been only a vague, instinctive urge had become their birthright.
Now all Americans are told by our president that the dream is negotiable, for he has his own ideas about immigration that he would give precedence. And he sounds prepared to replace the vision with one more item to haggle over as he does battle with those in Congress who are not about to settle for a mere agenda instead of a shining view of a city upon a hill. As it is written, where there is no vision, the people perish. And this vision isn’t about to disappear.
But our Trumpeteer-in-chief seems unfazed by the power of the dream, and confuses it with a talking point for another of his fulsome tweets. “We’re all working in an effort to develop an immigration reform plan,” he announced last week in a meeting with Republican lawmakers, “that will serve the interests of the American workers and the American families and safety.”
Later he tweeted, “Thank you to the great Republican Senators who showed up to our mtg on immigration reform. We must BUILD THE WALL, stop illegal immigration, end chain migration & cancel the visa lottery. The current system is unsafe & unfair to the great people of our country—time for change!”
For the longest time, our president seemed afflicted with the King Midas touch in reverse: Everything he touched had a way of turning into stenographic clichés. He could turn poetry into prosody with a single tweet. Why not pass a simple one-provision-fits-all bill and have done with it? Instead of complicating this issue and opening the gates to all the political wheelers and dealers whose idea of a great dream is nothing but incessant clamor as each party seeks to have its own way.
Somebody needs to tell our congressional lawmakers that smaller is better and simpler is best. Instead of stepping into the next room of the dream, these pols would hold back and peer into the alternatives as if they were funhouse mirrors designed to distance and dismay anyone who dares look at them closely.
But now, reason has raised her lovely head. The president of the United States is full of surprises, and none of them are more surprising than when he acts presidential. Which is what he has done by agreeing to a sweeping bipartisan reform of the country’s immigration laws. He wouldn’t be the first president to swing for the fences by wrapping up all the divisive questions about America’s anything but systematic system of immigration into one omnibus bill. But he would be the first to succeed in the effort.
George W. Bush tried untying this Gordian knot of American politics but failed. So did Barack Obama. Now Trump has told lawmakers, “You are not so far away from comprehensive immigration reform.”
So close, yet so far. For immigration reform has replaced privatizing Social Security as the third rail of American politics. But if anybody can make a deal, surely it’s this dealmaker of a president in both private and public life.
Paul Greenberg is the Pulitzer Prizewinning editorial writer and columnist for the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.