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[JAlpert]

Daniel, it seems like we can all agree that immigration laws need to change. I also believe we agree that illegal immigration is also not inherently bad (as I mentioned earlier, people like Amadou may actually contribute positively to the country).

We disagree that Amadou should be punished because he broke the law.

There are four reasons why the government punishes people ("the purposes of punishment"): deterrence, retribution, incapacitation, and rehabilitation. Many laws contain portions of each of these purposes. But some laws are made purely for deterrence - like laws against carrying loaded guns. Carrying a loaded gun doesn't necessarily hurt anyone, but it probably has a high correlation with bad outcomes. A subset of deterrence laws are regulatory laws. These are laws where the action isn't inherently evil, like speeding or jaywalking. Speeding or jaywalking may be correlated loosely with bad outcomes, but obviously carrying around a loaded gun is much worse than doing 5 over or crossing the street while there is no traffic.

In my opinion, because we both seem to believe that illegal immigration isn't inherently evil, we would both interpret the law to be regulatory in nature. That means illegal immigration is really no worse than speeding. To an illegal immigrant, they're doing 5 over. Any possible harm to anyone else is so remote that it probably doesn't matter.

This brings me to my point. By your logic, we should bring the maximum weight of the law on everyone who goes over the speed limit ("Without consequence there is no rule"). Would that be OK? You can't just say that everyone who speeds deserves to be punished. That would mean pulling over half the cars on the highway. When nearly everybody breaks a regulatory law at one time or another, and the chances of harm are so remote, it's probably OK to do so. The point of the law is deterrence, not incapacitation or rehabilitation, and is interpreted as such.

In Amadou's case, the argument is even more powerful. This is a case of necessity. Not only is he not hurting anybody by being here, he needs to be here because he had no choice (and furthermore, he's probably actually helping the country by being here). It's like going 5 over because you've got someone in the back of your car who needs to get to the hospital. It's clearly OK to cross the street even though the sign says 'don't walk' if your grandmother is having a heart attack and you've got to get her medical attention. Yet by your logic, the law should come down hard on any and all jaywalkers.

Jeff

PS: I should have been more clear about the "overweight robot" rule in my last post. The reason it doesn't apply is because the rule is not just regulatory. The bad outcome in this case is gaining an unfair advantage, which happens as soon as the rule is broken. It's not at all like immigration in that respect. Some demand probably exists to break it, by people who wish to cheat. That's different than economic demand, though. Nobody fills a void the competition needed to be filled by playing an overweight robot. It actually harms other teams when you break the rule, and is inherently evil to do so.