Speech #990274965

The country most like ours. Canada. reported that its enactment of employer sanctions laws has had virtually no effect. And. despite an overall decline in the number of visitors to Canada. the number of illegal aliens working there has increased slightly since 1981. In our own country. the Federal Farm Labor Contractor Registration Act of 1963 gives evidence that employer sanctions have been ineffective in the United States at the national level. In addition. employer sanctions have been proven ineffective at the State level in the many States with such laws on the books. The most these laws have produced was one $250 fine. As Wayne Cornelius of the Center for United StatesMexican Studies at the University of California at San Diego said: "There is not a single documented case of successfully using employersanctions laws to reduce the population of illegal immigrants anywhere in the world." My second principal concern is that the legislation does not deal with the root problem of illegal immigration. Instead of sending hundreds of millions of dollars to Central America to overturn governments. that money would surely be more wisely spent in being a better neighbor to Mexico and other sending countries. Helping the sending countries in their development is part of the real answer to curbing illegal immigration. Working hand in hand with these countries will have more effect than this unilateral move before us today. Indeed. Mexican officials have said that a successful solution to perceived problems of migration between our two countries necessarily involves a bilateral search for answers. And. here at home. providing the necessary resources to our agencies to enforce our immigration laws and our laws on fair labor standards and practices would be part of the solution as well. For the reasons Ive outlined. and others. I cannot support this legislation.