Of course there is a civil right to travel. Immigration laws are not about protecting private property and "public spaces" are not private property.

I agree and thought you meant as much.

First off, I should have qualified my arguments. The first point was meant to be in general. What I meant was more people more economic activity means everybody benefits. Obviously, The welfare state muddies the water on that point.

For the second point, I was merely stating a principle from which government policy should follow from. Obviously, people who immigrate to the United States need to be vented and it would hurt to roll back the warfare state at the same time...

Agreed. Some on the forum however suggest otherwise.

Sorry for the late entry into this, but I have not come across in any of Rand's writings (that I've read) where she or Objectivism calls for open borders and no restrictions on immigration. Just like you may not want thresspassers on your property, the society may choose not to have thresspassers on its land.

Lol. Point. =D

Of course. They are the ones who see him as an avenue of power.

No conspiracy theory. Roosevelt was aware of Japan's plan to attack Hawaii in January of '41. Plus, Japan was in dire need of raw materials most of which were obtained from the USA. Roosevelt cut off their supply, thus putting pressure on their current regime, making it unable to produce. The only thing he was unaware of was the date of the attack. Also I can list all his anti-Semitic actions which led to the deaths of hundreds, perhaps thousands of Jews.

I didn't really get the feel that they were advocating to bring people for the sake of warm bodies, however. Madison made it pretty clear that they wanted able bodies.

I agree with you on the application of immigration law and processing and how one set of rules will apply. What I found is interesting is that we already have the immigration laws on the books which require legal immigrants to integrate into society. The problem is that those laws have to be enforced, and the current administration is loathe to do that. You point that out well in your last paragraph.

I agree, but there are some Objectivists who claim open borders are a right despite the obvious right out of Atlas Shrugged.

"One could argue that simply having more people will make us richer and stronger regardless of who let into the country."

And such an argument can easily be debunked simply by looking at the costs of illegal immigration today. Welfare, education, and the medical system all suffer disproportionately.

"The principle being any human has the right to live and work wherever they want..."

No, they don't actually. They have the right to pursue life, liberty, and happiness, but there are no guarantees - implied or otherwise. People have the right to control and apply themselves, but how they apply themselves is a subjective decision.

"...as long they respect other people rights."

And that is the key. We must all respect the rights of others if we expect ours to be held sacrosanct. That includes the right to property - beginning with ourselves.

But you have no right to be on property you do not own. It is as simple as that. All the rights we have of action originate from one simple axiom: self-ownership. It starts there. If you do not own it, you do not have right of control. That includes travel over land you do not own: it's called trespassing for a reason. There is no civil right to travel and no civil right to occupy space on land you have no ownership claim to. To claim otherwise is to assert ownership over someone else's property - to assert theft. There is no civil right to "be in a country". There is simply the right of ownership: joint or individual. Citizens have a right to use common spaces because they are part-owners. Non-citizens have no such privilege and must rely on the grace of citizens/owners for use of public spaces just as if it were private land.

Thanks for your reply and explanations!

fostering the Pearl harbor attack- well, all this time I have been under the impression the attack was by Imperial Japan ..
I expect promulgators of this conspiracy theory to now produce evidence of the Japanese military leadership saying 'I was under orders, US President Roosevelt fostered me to do it'.

No, that is not the Objectivist position. The question is not answered by either what a business would do or what "travelers" want. A country and the defense of individual rights by government are not a business, which is within a country and subject to its proper laws.

Ayn Rand defended the right to immigrate, as a basic human right, in the context of normal life and normal economic affairs in a free country, and that is all she said about it. Specifically she properly opposed blocking people from coming to the country out of protectionist fear that they would compete.

There is much more to the broader question of immigration as a legal principle, especially with today's problems, which were not an issue in 1973 and which Ayn Rand was not asked about when she spoke about it in a brief response to a question about protectionism for economic interests. She was not discussing hoards of religious primitives coming to this country for welfare and/or the spread of sharia law. She simply rejected using force to prevent another human individual from peacefully pursing his own economic interests by moving from one country to another.

She defended the right to immigrate based on the rights of the individual, which apply to every human being peacefully pursuing his own interests. She did not base it on a "right to travel", which is a derivative principle. "Travel" is only one aspect of freedom of physical action and movement, which is a consequence of the right to live here in a material reality, and does not require much discussion. She did not publicly discuss a philosophy of a "right to travel" at all, let alone as a basis of immigration. (She did once disparage the leftist hippie mentality for objecting to the legal necessity of passports.)

1. Her sole public statement on immigration was in a spontaneous answer to the question on protectionism at her 1973 Ford Hall lecture on censorship. I don't know if the question period is included in the recording, but you can listen to the recording at https://estore.aynrand.org/p/16/censo....

The edited transcript is in Ayn Rand Answers: The Best of her Q&A, edited by Robert Mayhew, 2005, p. 25. The question addressed there is: "What is your attitude towards immigration? Doesn't open immigration have a negative effect on a country's standard of living?"

The topic is expanded on by Leonard Peikoff in two of his podcasts:

2. "What is the proper government attitude toward immigration?" 7/5/10, 10 min http://www.peikoff.com/2010/07/05/wha...

3. "You said that if a country had laissez-faire it should not control immigration. What if New Zealand, with a population of 4.5 million people, had laissez-faire? Would it be obligated to accept all immigrants, even if that resulted in its becoming Muslim and having Sharia imposed?" 9/13/10, 4 3/4 min.

Perhaps this will put to rest the false alternatives that either the country should restrict immigration on the conservatives' collectivist grounds of what is best for the "economy" versus the misrepresentations that "Objectivism" promotes "open immigration" no matter what -- including terrorists, welfare statists, and supporters of sharia law -- based on a "right to travel" in border anarchy or anything else.

Citizenship is not "ownership" and the right to use public thoroughfares is not (properly) up to the whims of government officials. "Travel", in this context, is simply a means to get from one place to another where you have a right to be. A civil right to be in a country is not based on a "right to travel".

Let me state Madison point in my own and then I will offer my own point. Madison is saying that the US should only allow immigrants into the country that makes us richer and stronger.

One could argue that simply having more people will make us richer and stronger regardless of who let into the country. Granted we would let in some trouble makers but overall most people are good and will serve their community well.

I think a better principle in recognizing the basic human right on mobility. The principle being any human has the right to live and work wherever they want as long they respect other people rights. Our immigration policy should reflect that principle.

This is what progressives and cry baby liberals do not get or does it scare the pants off of em.
It is NOT a natural right for anyone to become an American...we are a far cry from that now but not to late to change.

To understand Obama, one simply applies the lesson your Mama used - "show me your friends and I`ll show you your future" , just swap "your future" for "our future". Basic research shows, very clearly, his objective, that same research shows he learned the methods to obtain it.

There's no need to delude the already delusional. Many of them like the idea of a black President so much that they are willing to blank out every horror perpetrated by BHO upon the USA.

I don't see a conflict or a "Madison v. Objectivism" issue. The physical Gulch had "border control" and appears to have invited producers and screened out the looters and moochers.

Obama is revered by the Democrats I've talked to. They'll simply handwave (ignore) anything said about his failures. I can't understand why anyone would see things that way. Economic reality just doesn't exist to these people.

Exactly. A bit of common sense. I dont want a flood of low lifes with little education and drive to succeed to come to the US and get welfare. I want to welcome smart, educated, entreprenurial, rich, or otherwise a benefit to our society. This does NOT include refugee muslim Syrians for sure.