Bright Ideas

“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-tossed, to me:

I lift my lamp beside the golden door.”

— Emma Lazarus

These words were written in 1883 by 34-year-old Emma Lazarus. She only lived until 1887, 38 years, but she managed to write volumes of poetry and attract the attention of Ralph Waldo Emerson.

Her words appear on the base of the Statue of Liberty, the destination immigrants from Europe, including Ireland, England and the Netherlands, disembarked when arriving in America. Poor travelers were forced to travel below decks where infants were born and died, and sick people perished. As far as poor people coming to America, welcomed by Lazarus; what would Trump know about being poor?

These travelers might look like “wretched refuse,” but they were welcomed. These people don’t seem like Trump’s favored refugees, unless they were German or Scottish — his ancestors. What would he have thought about brown or black people?

Do we need a similar marker on our southern border, because those Central American refugees certainly are yearning to breathe free. People protecting their children from gang violence deserve entry into our country. We ARE a country of immigrants!

What about Cuban or other Caribbean immigrants? Entertainers have come from those countries. They are accepted if they entertain us. What about factory or agricultural workers?

Our first problem is correcting the president’s directive to separate children from parents. Children don’t quickly recover from these separations; this is a trauma they don’t deserve. Maybe the president should pick on someone his own size!