Scuttle the National ID (Letter to the Editor)

The article "Immigrant rights advocates pressure Obama" (Politics, March 12) detailed this month’s White House immigration meeting but curiously omitted talks about a national biometric identification card.

The compromise Senate version of immigration reform spearheaded by South Carolina Republican Lindsey Graham and New York Democrat Charles E. Schumer includes a national biometric ID card that every American would have to present in order to work. Under consideration in this plan are retinal scans, vein geometry, fingerprints and facial mapping for every American.

But immigration reform doesn’t require a national biometric ID card. We just need to change the law so mass immigration is once again legal and a wall is built around the welfare state. That would eliminate the black market and ensure border security without restraining American freedom.

Taking your children to the Department of Motor Vehicles on their 16th birthday is an annoying American tradition. If a national biometric ID is made the law of the land, that process would be replaced with an intrusive procedure that would destroy much of our personal privacy. The path to immigration reform does not have to include a detour to destroying our personal liberties.