Coming to America, a hilarious 1988 Eddie Murphy comedy film, with absolutely nothing to do with this article.
“… Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore,
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,”
These words are inscribed on the Statue of Liberty and were written by Emma Lazarus in her poem “The New Colossus” in 1883. They sum up the beacon of hope that America once represented to the outside world. People of all creeds, classes and countries came here to find freedom, a better life and opportunity for their children. For the first 150 years of our country, this was our immigration policy: come one, come all and come together. Unfortunately, it seems that now, we have a new immigration policy: send us your rich, your privileged and those who can afford a tourist visa.
In the last decade the debate over immigration in the United States has focused wholly on Mexico. The question seems to be, not who to let in, but how high to build the wall. While we have argued over how best to keep out these immigrants, which I think we can correctly describe as tired, poor and yearning to breathe free, it seems we have been letting the world’s upper classes have a free pass into citizenship through something called “birth tourism.”
Birth tourism, highlighted in this weekend’s English version of the Hurriyet Daily News and Economic Review, is the process through which citizens of other countries travel to the United States and sometimes Canada to give birth, thus granting their child citizenship to that country. It should be no surprise to Americans that foreigners want to obtain citizenship for their children. What is surprising, though, is that this is not a black market activity, but a burgeoning cottage industry across the globe. According to this weekend’s article, 12,000 Turks have been born in the United States through birth tourism since 2003. The number is certainly higher in many East Asian countries where this is more common, such as South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Singapore. The companies quoted in this weekends Hurriyet provide packages complete with airfare, hotel accommodations, standard tourist activities and of course, medical costs. Depending on the city in which you want to give birth, the minimum cost is between $25,000 and $40,000. And this high cost is the main obstacle to purchasing a birth tourism package, and so it would seem, to American citizenship. As Kim Jeong Yeon, the expectant Korean mother in the 2002 LA Times piece said, “If they could afford it, all my friends would go to the United States to have their babies.”
The law that allows people to become citizens through birth on our soil is written into our Constitution, in the 14th Amendment. Passed in 1868, it was intended to end abuses against former slaves following the Civil War and in no way could have predicted the ease of international travel 140 years into the future. So, while this practice may be controversial and possibly morally questionable, it is also perfectly legal.
Despite the proliferation of this practice around the world, it is something Americans seem largely unaware of. A search of some of our nations most trusted news sources brings up only a few pieces. One from the LA Times in 2002 entitled “Korean moms want ‘Born in USA’ babies,” and another in Slate Magazine from June 2009 called “Why I Left Pakistan to Give Birth in US.”
The reasons people turn to birth tourism are no different than the reasons an expecting Mexican mother might cross the border. One of the main reasons is a better education. For a poor migrant worker, it may be that their child gets any education at all, while for a wealthy Korean or Turk, it is the ease to which university studies in the US can be obtained. Another reason is job opportunities. Again, for the Mexican mother, it may be an opportunity for her child to get any work at all, for the South East Asian, an easier time being hired by large American companies after a professional education. One reason though, may be different. The Korean mother, Kim Jeong Yeon, wanted to give her son the gift of avoiding the compulsory military service required of all South Korean men.
If the reasons for giving birth in America are similar, what then separates a potential illegal alien being turned away by border patrol and a tourist coming from abroad, both wanting to give birth? Well, it seems, only the ability to purchase a tourist visa and a plane ticket. This seems an extremely poor test of citizenship for the country that once declared “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to be free.”
