The Americano dream on the border between Mexico and Arizona

The Americano dream

Jul 14th 2005 
From The Economist print edition

AMERICA is going through one of its periodic bursts of high immigration. According to the Census Bureau, the country is home to about 34m people born abroad, half as many again as ten years ago. It is also going through one of its periodic panics about the subject.

Self-styled "minutemen" search for illegal immigrants on the border between Mexico and Arizona. Hospitals say they are being bankrupted by the cost of treating illegal aliens. The Republican Party is riven between those who want to crack down on illegal immigration and those who want to regularise it. …