Federalism, Security and Immigration in the United States.

In this paper we will argue that presidential foreign policy and security considerations—in the context of the federal system— have been a determinative factor in understanding the development of immigration policies in the United States. When presidents have pursued a geostrategic course of engagement, they have tried to work with congressional factions that have favored a more liberal immigration regime. On the other hand, when they have interpreted the security environment as threatening and necessitating closure, they have tended to side with congressional nativist factions.We argue that Presidents have frequently regarded immigration policy as an effective subset of security policy complicated by electoral considerations. On one hand, for electoral reasons, presidents have often favored a liberal immigration regime. Yet, when they consider that the security threat poses too great a risk, executives have been willing to converge with Congressional nativist and restrictionist impulses. As the perception of the threat therefore changes, so does the prominent orientation of immigration policy - with significant, and sometimes draconian, implications for nascent and existent (both legal and illegal) refugees and asylum seekers. Thus, presidential support for immigration restriction has largely been a subset of an isolationist (1920-38) or a unilateralist (post-9/11) vision of foreign policy. Periods of dread of the unregulated large scale influx of immigrants who are likely to stay in the US as a result of the collapse of their own states, saboteurs infiltrating its borders or terrorists plotting to exploit the opportunities afforded to them by 'the open society' has often found its way into the rhetoric and policy prescriptions of presidents sensing that threat. The notion of 'them' or 'the other' tends to predominate in these situations. Conversely, when presidents have had a broader vision of US global leadership and a corresponding definition of security built around engagement, they have tended towards a far more limited fear of the unregulated invasion of immigrants. As a consequence, they have tended to revert to what is regarded as a default position of favoring a less restrictive approach to immigration. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]