Who is this "we"?

Reader comment on: Magnet's Immigration Dichotomy
in response to reader comment: Disagree

Submitted by Harry Binswanger (United States), Jul 19, 2014 13:24

Good article, Mr. Stoll. Yes, curtail welfare, not immigration.

Chris, in his comment, asks why "we don't use it [data] to profile who might be the best additions to our country." Who is this "we" who owns the country and everyone in it? That this is rank collectivism is shown by substituting the first person pronouns, which is all that he is entitled to use:

> Why don't I use data to profile who might be the best additions to my country?

Just as no individual has the right to stand at the border and decide who can enter (onto someone's private property) and who he will exclude at gunpoint, so the voting majority has no such right.

Neither the majority nor the government *owns* America. America comprises a set of privately owned pieces of real estate. The government has *jurisdiction* over the whole area but not *ownership*. That's a crucial distinction. Only the owner of property has the right to decide who will be allowed on it.

More widely, the government has no right to initiate physical force against anyone, citizen AND non-citizen. But the initiation of physical force is what excluding any peaceful entrant means.

(None of this means we have to, or should, extend voting rights to immigrants.)

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Other reader comments on this item

Title	By	Date
Two weak arguments [111 words]	David in Cal	Jul 20, 2014 13:42
↔ The solution to "illegals" [254 words]	Harry Binswanger	Jul 21, 2014 11:40
The piece you're missing [44 words]	Bill	Jul 18, 2014 19:12
Disagree [281 words]	Chris	Jul 18, 2014 11:38
↔ ⇒ Who is this "we"? [211 words]	Harry Binswanger	Jul 19, 2014 13:24
↔ No shame on the editor [123 words]	John Gillis	Jul 19, 2014 22:34

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