In this essay I will argue that the United States' distribution of immigration status is unjust according to my ethical principles of justice. From my ethical perspective, which meshes with that articulated by John Rawls, we are all people in the "original position" behind a "veil of ignorance" who would seek to create a society in which the rights of all are of equal significance and in which discrimination based on such factors as race, ethnicity, gender, age and/or national origin is not permitted. In the case of immigration, which is a highly controversial issue in the United States today as the article by the American Friends Service Committee (2006) so clearly demonstrates, the law of the country appears to be oriented towards significantly reducing the flow of certain groups of immigrants into the country and punitively sanctioning those "illegals" who are discovered and then forcibly returned to their homelands.
The American Friends Service Committee (2006), also known as the Quakers, calls for recognizing the very real economic and other contributions made to the United States by undocumented aliens who, for the most part, are in the country seeking economic opportunity for themselves and their families. As workers, they pay taxes and spend money that assists in maintaining the local and national economy. They are, as human beings, endowed with inalienable natural and civil rights; they are worthy of being treated with dignity and respect, and they are deserving of the same type of humane treatment in the workplace and in society that is given to naturalized immigrants and American citizens (Americans Friends Service Committee, 2006). This organization argues, as do I, that justice demands that efforts be undertaken to make it possible for the workers to receive the legal documentation required for successful work in America, to provide them with the protections given to others, and to ensure that their desire to ...