On Congressional Illegal Immigration Legislation In The United States (1945-2012)

At present, illegal immigration reform dominates in American immigration reform. Comprehensive immigration reform for the purpose of resolving undocumented immigrants is the main event of Congress in2013. The problem of illegal immigration began after World War II and it became hot topic of American society in1970s, it has continued to exist today. For American society, illegal immigration is a controversy issue, some people get benefits from cheaper labor while others have to pay the huge cost of the illegal immigration. In order to reduce the social damage of illegal immigration, Congress of United States successively has enacted legislation to curb illegal immigrants. Among them, there are two special laws concerning illegal immigrants-Immigration Reform and Control Act of1986and Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of1996. This article studies Congress’s legislation about illegal immigrants trying to solve the two following questions:Firstly, what are the characteristics and the external influential factors of Congress’s legislation related with illegal immigration? Secondly, what is the role of Congress in illegal immigrations’legislation decision-making under the influence of the separation of powers, the federalism of political system and interest groups’politics?To answer these questions above, this article gradually discusses the characteristics of historical evolution and influential factors in Congress’s legislation decision-making about illegal immigration. In details, they are as followings:The first chapter analyses the characteristics of historical evolution in Congress’s illegal immigration legislation decision-making. At the beginning of illegal immigrants in the1940s-1960s, Congress of the United States enacted ambiguous law. With the problem of illegal immigrants becoming hot topic of American society in the1970s, Congress implemented immigration reform and enacted carrot-and-stick law. In the1990s, in the face of increasingly serious illegal immigration and resulting social issues, Congress enacted conservative and harsh law. After911, Congress combined anti-terrorism and fighting against illegal immigrants and enacted more stringent law concerning illegal immigrants. In the post911, Congress devoted to implement comprehensive immigration reform and dream act in order to resolve illegal immigrants.The second chapter discusses the domestic structure factors of Congressional legislation related with illegal immigration. It explains the influence of the constitutional foundation of Congress, Committee system, the Chairman of Committee and Congressmen from the aspect of organizational structure. Specially, Congressional legislative power and financial power is the base of legislation and finance. Committee system provides information and resource for Congressional legislation concerning illegal immigrants. The Chairmen of the committee play both positive and negative role in legislative decision-making because of the influence of interest groups and partisan factors. Constituency interests, party, race and ideology mainly influence Congressmen’s behaviors. Among them, constituency interests are the primary factor and Congressmen pursue the supremacy of constituency interests. Additionally, the influence of partisan factors towards congressmen’s voting behavior increases.The third chapter explains external institutional factors of Congressional legislation concerning illegal immigrants, including president, judiciary and state government. Among them, the mainly role of president is active promoter, facilitator and powerful administrative user in legislative decision-making. The judiciary obeys the principle, which Congress enjoys plenary powers and Congress avoids judiciary’s review. This principle is beneficial for maintaining Congressional immigration legislation power. Meantime, the judiciary also complies with equal principle, which maintains the educational rights of illegal immigrants. Judiciary is a coordinator between Congress and state governments by the use of compromise principle. In addition, immigration legislation power belongs to federal Congress according to federal system. However, some state governments also seek immigration legislation because they are not content with the fault of immigration legislation. Since1990s, more and more state governments pursue immigration legislation, which challenge Congressional legislative power about illegal immigrants.The fourth chapter discusses the role of interest groups in decision-making. Labor Union, Agricultural and industrial interest groups and minority interest groups are important interest groups, which influence Congressional legislative policy concerning illegal immigrants. They often achieve their benefits by means of attending hearing, grassroots lobbying.lobbyingx Judicial litigation and allied strategy. Interest groups generate double impact for Congressional legislative about illegal immigrants. On the one hand, they provide information and resource for decision-making; on the other hand, they often impede the process of decision-making when they have substantial difference about legislation. At this time, interest groups control Congress. Conversely, Congress owns higher efficiency of legislative decision-making and control legislative power about illegal immigrants when interest groups have smaller disagreement or a few channel to lobby Congress.The fifth Chapter answers questions above and it specially analyses the characteristics of Congressional legislation about illegal immigration and the role of Congress in decision-making. One the one hand, Congressional legislation about illegal immigration has three characteristics:pragmatism, dredging and containment are together and dredging policy is primary, monism and pluralism are blended. On the other hand, it also evaluates the role of Congress in decision-making. From the effect of legislation, Congressional legislation does not resolve illegal immigrations; from the perspective of Congressional power of the immigration’s legislation, Congress basically controls legislative power. However, Congressional legislative power is influenced by many factors. Interest groups are the greatest influential factor and the role of parties is increasing. Although American presidents play an important role in legislative process, they cannot control legislative power. State governments challenge Congressional legislative power, which are refused by courts.The conclusion further concludes the argument of this article and points out the future’s direction of studying.