From one immigrant's son to another

SO THE ILLEGAL immigration problem is that all these people came into America without permission? We're in a national argument because people didn't fill out the right paperwork, stop at the right desk, come in through the right gate? Because they didn't play by the rules?

I understand the anxiety about bad guys sneaking into America to do us harm. I get that. But this fight isn't really about terrorists. And it's not about paperwork, either. Or money. None of that explains the outcry.

When you get right down to it, the distress over illegal immigration is about something else, something far harder to talk about. It is simply, quite simply, about millions of people coming across the Mexican border, refusing to immediately speak English, and taking low-wage jobs from us.

That's it.

If this were really about paperwork, America would be far more incensed about the millions of people who defy the law each April 15 by refusing to pay their fair share of taxes, forcing the rest of us to make up the difference.

If this were really about people dodging the costs of a civil society, we'd find some way to extract taxes from a giant underground economy that enriches so many businesses, both big and small, and captures so many people, both recent immigrant and not.

If this were about unwavering respect for laws, people would be handing out angry tickets on I-64 every afternoon when motorists speed or drive illegally in HOV lanes.

If this were really about terrorists, people would be demanding a fence at the Canadian border, which is far longer, more remote and more easily breached than the one with Mexico.

Nope. This is about the problem some Americans have with Central Americans coming to town and not looking like us or speaking like us. It's about U.S. businesses knowing a bargain when they see one. Otherwise, this fervor would be everywhere in America, not just in the gateway cities, or in places where different is often fought and feared.

If it sounds as if I resent American resentment of illegals, then I'm writing better than I thought. Too often - and I hear this, and read this, and see this - opposition to illegal immigration isn't really about the illegal. It's about the immigration.

Not that long ago, my family was in the queue. My mom's family came over before there was anyone here to stop them. My wife's tree includes a guy who sneaked over the Mexican border, trying to avoid military service back home.

My dad's parents emigrated early in the 20th century. My grandfather came through Ellis Island when it was crowded with Italians soon to fill up New York, a city that wasn't entirely happy about it. My grandmother may have come through Ellis Island, too, but I haven't been able to turn up her records.

My father - who was born in America - was taken to Italy not long after. He returned to New York just before World War II, an American boy unable to speak English.

Italians in America - especially in New York - needed to learn English quickly to get along, but they still spoke it among themselves. By the time he attended college, my father was just another New York boy in West Virginia, although one with parents who still spoke Italian at home.

I'm not telling you all this because it's an unusual story; it's positively ordinary. And so is the experience of many current immigrants from Central America. The difference is that Ellis Island is a museum now, and the coyotes who bring illegals across the border don't keep records.

The difference is that we have an atomized culture and media driven by animosity and suspicion. America is so often an angry place because we no longer know each other, no longer have to shake each others' hands. Many people don't believe in the melting pot, because they've never seen one.

My father tells stories of having to fight his way through his teenage years, no doubt because of the shade of his skin and the shape of his nose. His son has never had to answer for either of those things. That's how much things change in a scant generation or two. And, probably, how much things will change in the next.

Donald Luzzatto is an editorial writer for The Virginian-Pilot. E-mail him at donald.luzzatto@pilotonline.com.