Whenever there is a government program or system that is producing deaths of innocent people as well as tyranny, that is a persuasive sign that that is a bad government program, one that needs to be eliminated. Yet, that is precisely what we have with America’s decades-long system of immigration controls — death and tyranny.

For years, people have been dying, trying to get into the United States to better their lives through labor. Just recently, the mainstream press displayed a photograph of the bodies of a man and his two-year-old daughter on the shore of the Rio Grande in Texas. Father and daughter drowned trying to get into the United States. How can anyone who sees that photograph not be moved by it?

They aren’t the only ones. For years, people have died of thirst and dehydration crossing the desert in the American Southwest in an attempt to enter the United States. They have also died of dehydration and difficulty breathing in the backs of 18-wheelers smuggling them into the United States. Some of them have even been shot dead by Border Patrol agents.

It is worth noting that in a libertarian society based on open borders, the deaths of such innocent people disappear. Now people are free to cross borders like human beings, with dignity. Under a system of open borders, that father and his two-year-old daughter would still be alive. So would all the people who have died on the desert, in the backs of 18-wheelers, or at the hands of the Border Patrol.

There is also the immigration police state that accompanies a system of immigration controls. A police state is the very essence of tyranny. A police state is what we find in totalitarian regimes, not free societies.

Highway checkpoints that subject people to full searches even though they have never left the United States. Warrantless searches of ranches and farms near the border. Roving Border Patrol checkpoints that arbitrarily stop whatever vehicles they want and search them. Criminal prosecutions for anyone who dares to help, hire, or transport illegal immigrants. Immigration officials boarding Greyhound buses and demanding to see people’s papers. Searches of cellphones of Americans returning from vacations or business trips in foreign countries. Violent raids on privately owned businesses. Forced deportations of people. Separation of children from parents. Berlin Fences and Berlin Walls. Eminent domain stealing of people’s lands.

Those are the types of things that are found in brutal totalitarian regimes. They are the very face of tyranny.

It is worth noting that in a libertarian system based on open borders, the immigration police state disappears. Tyranny is replaced with liberty.

Which will it be for America: Death and tyranny? Or life, liberty, peace, prosperity, and harmony?