Is the GOP still a party of two souls?
(No Reagan bashing here. But this does serve in explaining why the illegal immigration has proliferated to the state of it now being an invasion.)
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Ronald Reagan called himself a conservative, but on immigration, he was not, and neither were thousands of Republican operatives he installed in places where they could implement his revolution.The Republican Party had two souls, one devoted to law and order and respect for the institutions of family, church, and nation; the other and more animated one steering not by those cautious and preservative instincts but by a libertarian, free-market, government-hating ideology.
The latter quickly understood that immigration reform meant strong government somewhere, so with religious conviction they moved quickly from a total lack of interest in the subject to vigorous opposition. This struggle for the soul of the Republican Party did not last long because Ronald Reagan's heart was not with the conservatives, but with the rightist ideologues.
However, the objective today is not to keep hammering Reagan for signing the IRCA of 1986 into law, its to make sure that the current president doesn't make the same foolish mistake all over again.
Reagan wanted tough enforcement of IRCA laws that held employers responsible for hiring illegals in the first place. To date its not happened. If all the immigration laws on the books were enforced, we could make significant headway in solving the problem with illegals crossing into the US. The current crop of politicos seem more concerned with liberalizing US immigration policy then solving the problems associated with illegal immigration.