Deporting our Souls: Values, Morality, and Immigration Policy

In the past three decades, images of undocumented immigrants pouring across the southern border have driven the immigration debate and policies have been implemented in response to those images. The Oklahoma City bombings and the tragic events of September 11, both of questionable relevance to immigration policy have provided further impetus to implement strategies that are anti-immigration in design and effect. This book discusses the major immigration policy areas - undocumented workers, the immigration selection system, deportation of aggravated felons, national security and immigration policy, and the integration of new Americans - and the author suggests his own proposals on how to address the policy challenges from a perspective that encourages us to consider the moral consequences of our decisions. The author also reviews some of the policies that have been put forth and ignored and suggests new policies that would be good for the country economically and socially.

Bill Ong Hing is Professor of Law and Asian American Studies and the director of law clinical programs at the University of California, Davis. He has litigated before the US Supreme Court and was co-counsel in the precedent-setting case INS v. Cardoza-Fonseca (1986), which established a more generous standard for asylum seekers. He is the author of many books on immigration including Defining America through Immigration Policy and To Be an American: Cultural Pluralism and the Rhetoric of Assimilation.