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The border mentality

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News - Immigration

ONE TIME, a US Customs official sent a chill through me, and I feel it still. We were returning from a ski trip to Canada. At the border, the official was brusque as he interrogated me. To my horror, I realized that I had neglected to declare a purchase made at the ski resort, and he seemed to sense it. He began a rough search of our car. His rudeness prompted me to say at one point: ''You can't treat me like this. I have rights. I am an American." ONE TIME, a US Customs official sent a chill through me, and I feel it still. We were returning from a ski trip to Canada. At the border, the official was brusque as he interrogated me. To my horror, I realized that I had neglected to declare a purchase made at the ski resort, and he seemed to sense it. He began a rough search of our car. His rudeness prompted me to say at one point: ''You can't treat me like this. I have rights. I am an American."

He looked at me coldly. ''You're not in America yet, Bub. You don't have rights until I say you do." I felt humiliated, but instructed. A border by definition is the territory of absolute power, and such power by definition demeans.

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